Too Much

As I've stated many times, I'm a sucker for extremes.

This year has actually been a surprisingly moderate one for me. The dozens (yes, literally) of daily metrics that I take on my life have kept me on a careful watch for excess. With a few slips here and there, for the most part, I've been keeping an even keel, and getting done the things I need to.

Of course, this knowledge only points out my latest excess - extreme monitoring. I can't just tell myself, hey, self, chill out a little. No, I've got to have spreadsheets upon spreadsheets to hold myself accountable. I have to track progress toward year-long goals with the fervor and attention of a last-second countdown. Even in my attempts to moderate my life, I put myself into a state of constant contention.

And what's more, my attempt to moderate things has (in my brain) meant that I can bring in more things to moderate. There are at least a dozen aspects of my life that demand regular attention right now, in addition to having a family and a job. I join committees in networking groups, I participate in strategic planning groups, and I'm in active preparation for theatre work with four different companies (some with multiple shows). And if schedules didn't change and the work were consistent, maybe (and only maybe) I'd be totally keeping up.

But they don't, and it's not, so I'm not. Things change, it's a part of life. I need to be able to roll with it, but there is nothing that will throw me off my balance like a plan thwarted.

It happened on Sunday, of my own accord. I've been running a whole lot recently, and I just ran my right foot into the ground a bit. I woke up with a pretty sharp pain in the top of the foot, and decided that it probably wasn't a great plan to test it with a 17 mile run. Of course, there was also the fact that I did get to bed until after midnight the night before (and the night before that) which helped keep me in the house that morning. The next morning was the same story, and the morning after that. My foot hurt, and my body wasn't cooperating.

Not enough sleep, and too much everything else.

So Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, I set my alarm for the correct time. I had a rehearsal, but not too much else that evening, and I even took a little time to relax before. When the alarm went off, I knew I wasn't rested yet. I needed one more day to recover, so I took it. And this morning, right at the buzzer, I headed out on the roads following a four-day break, the longest of the year so far.

See, what I recognized through my hazy eyes Wednesday morning was that getting back to the grind wasn't going to suddenly make the grind work. I needed to feel good, not good enough, and I could only do that by giving myself permission to step back.

I've begun the gradual process of relieving myself of some of the responsibilities I've garnered. I like to be the person everyone relies on, but stepping up too often will only make me unreliable. I need to take my rest when it's offered.

But not too much.