what type of day am I going to have?

a decision, a reframe, a loving limitation

Photo by Kyle Arcilla on Unsplash

I’m hopping into your inbox a day late this week, friends. It do be like that sometimes, and the below reflection, which has been sitting in my drafts for months, is something I could do well to remember myself these days! We’ll be out of the stressed season soon, but this week, you’re getting another coping essay. Buckle up!

One of the first things I talked about when I started going to therapy this time around was burnout. I could give you a litany of reasons why James and I were both burned out, but honestly? I’m sick of complaining. Suffice it to say that we were both feeling burned out and were each wanting—expecting, even—the other to pick up the slack we were leaving in our wake.

This expectation works as a short-term solution when one member of a family is feeling overwhelmed, but as a long-term plan when both spouses are feeling absolutely depleted? It’s a recipe for a constant struggle.

I was tremendously grateful for the reminder that James, like me, is allowed to feel burned out. It was sometimes frustrating to have to let things drop because neither of us was able to keep juggling them, but it was better than each of us getting angry at the other for not doing the thing, and eventually that challenging season did get easier.

But I still think a lot about one of the coping strategies I learned, when it comes to functioning with burnout-without-an-end-in-sight (or, with an end that seems way too far away). I can’t even remember now exactly how it came up, but my therapist recommended I try picking one “thing” each day. One frame of reference. One mindset or guiding principle around which I would organize my day.

Presence. Productivity. Rest.

Those were my options, and I could only choose one for the whole day.¹ My immediate response was to try and justify choosing two—one for the morning and one for the afternoon—but I was held to a strict limit of one (1) principle.

• Presence: This includes focusing on relationships, on the people I encounter that day. As a full-time homemaker, this primarily means my children, but would also extend to James, to friends or extended family we spend time with, and (when called for) to the other individuals we encounter as we go about our day.

• Productivity: This includes getting work done around the house, catching up on emails, scheduling or planning for upcoming events, and any other “work” that is necessary to keep the household running. These tasks don’t have to be unpleasant in order to qualify, and you’re likely to feel a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day because you can point to concrete tasks you’ve completed.

• Rest: This includes any activity that refreshes and rejuvenates the soul. For me, that might include taking a nap, watching a show, or going for a leisurely walk. Depending on the type of rest needed, I might prioritize staying home over going out, or I might prioritize finding social circumstances that allow the girls a relative degree of independence and allow me some adult conversation and a break from constant vigilance.

You’ll notice, as I did, that our natural state is to dip in and out of these three categories throughout the course of the day. Sometimes, this isn’t a problem. If you can get in the habit of cleaning for, say, half an hour every evening or for ten minutes after each meal, then you can reduce your need for a whole day focused on productivity. If you have children of napping age, or if you implement some sort of quiet time (for your kids and yourself) as your mental break, then you may already be getting a good chunk of rest time each day. These habits may free you up to be fully present with your family during the other times of the day.

But in a season of burnout or busy-ness or high stress, even with the best of intentions, we don’t usually engage fully in each area every day. We flit between them like a housefly, barely standing still long enough to appreciate what needs to be done before overwhelm sets in and we dart to the next thing, hoping for relief. And in the end, we opt to disengage: to mindlessly scroll, to binge old sitcom episodes, to fill our bodies with junk food, to let the chores pile up until we’re so behind that even starting feels like a monumental task.²

I have found a promising antidote to this listlessness in choosing only one thing to focus on per day, and in refusing to take shortcuts. While folding the laundry and watching a show could technically go either way (rest or productivity), you probably know in your heart of hearts that you’re trying to double dip. (This is where it can be helpful to have an accountability buddy to check in with at the end of the day.)

It’s important to note here that choosing to focus on one thing means the other two will go relatively untended, and that’s okay. Your emails will still be there tomorrow. Your children will not be permanently scarred if you let them entertain themselves for an afternoon. You’ll have a chance to take a long hot bath another evening.

It felt counterintuitive, at first, to intentionally do much less in a season when there was much more to do. I ran through the list (presence, productivity, rest) over and over again in my head, trying to find a weak spot in this plan: where is it off-balance? what’s missing? what’s overemphasized? if presence and rest are both unproductive days… but no, being really present with my family is work… well, it’s selfish to take a whole day of rest… but no, that’s straight from the scriptures.

But this approach helped me realize that it wasn’t just the task list that was the problem: it was my feeling unable to prioritize, unable to start, unable to finish any given task. By removing the pressure to do everything at once, and by dividing my load (both mentally and time-wise), I actually felt freer to live out my vocation well.

I’ll have more to say about mindset and mood-setting in a few weeks—these topics are percolating in my mind and my prayer right now—so for today, I’ll leave you with this question:

Where are some areas where committing to less can help you become more free to live your life from a place of peace and virtue?

Moved by this piece, wanting to help me support my family, or just interested in enabling my coffee habit? You can make a one-time donation at my “tip jar” here.

1. I appreciated this approach so much that I built it into the daily planner page I designed for this year.

2. See also: Mt. Clean Laundry