Remembering what you suck at could save your life

or, at least, your energy

      

Business bitch image via @crownaffair IG for their hairspray campaign. OBVIOUSLY, it sold me.

For as long as I can remember, my favorite content to consume has been the type that touches on other people’s routines. How I Get it Done from The Cut; Into the Gloss’ Top Shelf; a feature on Pandora Sykes from a random website that is now only available on the Wayback Machine, which I still fire up occasionally so I can access it.

I don’t think I’m alone in loving these features; they’ve spawned and furthered entire careers (the influencer who posts a “Get Ready With Me,” the Founder who does “Day in the Life” vlogs). For a long time, I also convinced myself I was using them solely for inspiration and motivation. But this weekend, my first one at home after a long, chaotic summer, after a forced bout of stillness (more on that later), I realized I had allowed myself to get so entangled in these edited, polished, public-facing conceptions of other people’s lives that I hadn’t been living mine. 

I’ve long bristled at the phrase “burnout.” This summer, when I saw that a renowned travel influencer had complained about getting sick and burnt out from going on too many trips, I hastily sent a screenshot to some friends. “She’s burned out from having to go to Greece on fully sponsored vacations too many times? LOL” I captioned the text, knowing that I was just jealous she was able to admit that even good times can be draining.  

“Needing rest” is not a concept I grew up with. I’m the daughter of two extroverted, highly active parents. Their idea of a relaxing day starts with a 40-mile bike ride and ends with a raucous party. They never pushed that concept on me (in no way is this a knock on them, they’re great), but at some point, long ago, I internalized the idea that you only earned rest if you were sick, and you were only sick if you had a fever above 101. Weekends, no matter how tired you were, were for squeezing the life out of.  

And this summer, I took that idea to an extreme. I flew across the country three times (once for thirty-six hours), across the Atlantic to Europe another time, took a four-hour train to DC a few weeks back, and spent about six hours in the car every weekend I wasn’t in a plane or a train, heading to visit family or friends. Everything I traveled for was incredible. Which was why I didn’t believe any exhaustion I felt as a result was warranted. 

Instead of allowing myself rest, I convinced myself I just needed to do more in order to feel better. I was simply ungrounded, and that was solely I was traveling so much. I’d to take advice from all of the greats I’d read about in my various instructive columns, adopt their their routines. Once I bought the things they had and did the things they did, I would feel whole and energized again. 

So, instead of stepping back from the overwhelming fragments of other people’s lives I’d ingested over the years, I tried to take on as many of them as possible. I heard a podcast called “How Protein Changed My Life,” so I started tracking my intake. After watching Scoop, and listening to an interview with Emily Maitlis, where I found out she went running every morning to clear her head, I started running again. Another person I respected talked about the changes in their mental health when they started strength training. Surely I was a failure if I didn’t do it twice a week. When a Fashion Editor I admired walked through her “outfit formula,” I panicked at the fact that I didn’t have my own. I needed to not only develop one, but also buy more clothing to ensure that I had enough for a capsule wardrobe. And if I was going to be shopping more, I needed to take on freelance work outside of my full-time job, because I should probably only use “fun” money to shop. And if I was going to freelance, I had to get up before work to do it, because I had to strength train after work. And, obviously, I needed to start meal-prepping and time-blocking my entire week, because how else would I fit the rest in if I didn’t? When I lacked creative inspiration, my solution wasn’t to sit back in silence and wait for it to come, but to start The Artist’s Way. I never made room for insight; I just attempted to fill every empty space in my life, conflating stuffing it with activities to being fulfilled. In reality, I was too full.  

When I started getting really exhausted; irritable (a random Slack or text could send me over the edge for no reason), nauseous, and so debilitated from routine experiences like period cramps that I was vomiting, I might’ve taken a step back to rest if I’d had more perspective. Instead, I bought a magnesium supplement that an influencer I like recommended and went on with my day. To further combat the exhaustion, I started drinking a second matcha (despite being caffeine sensitive and always feeling like shit after the fact). When I started developing rosacea for the first time in my life, I got a facial and bought $485 worth of new skincare products instead of trying to figure out why it had happened in the first place. 

I was able to keep ignoring it all until last week, when I was in Wyoming for a (wonderful) wedding, and I put on some moisturizer that I’ve put on before with no issue. This time, my entire body erupted in stinging patches of eczema within minutes. I ignored it and went to bed, before waking up four hours later with my legs burning so hot that I couldn’t touch them with my hands because it hurt too badly. My panicked midnight Reddit search did not yield very promising results.

I hit my hand on a wooden door the next day and got two splinters. Not a big deal, but I didn’t want to have to remove it or get it removed (no time). So I texted my dad, not because I trusted his medical advice (no offense, Dad), but because I wanted someone else to assure me that I could ignore it, despite the infection risks, and I knew he’d say it was fine. He said it was fine. The splinters are still in my pinky as I type. (I will take advice on this from any real doctors that are reading, btw…)

Then, last Sunday, there was a harrowing moment where I was sitting on the couch (again, in Wyoming), fully conscious and awake, reading my book, when my mind went completely blank. I completely forgot where I was and what day/month/year it was. This must’ve only been five or ten seconds, but it felt a hell of a lot longer, and somewhat concerning in the context of everything else that had gone on in the nights prior.

The next day, still exhausted, I put diesel in our rental car, a mistake so dumb that there’s scant information about whether insurance even covers it on the internet. I could say “in my defense, the nozzle fit,” but there is no real defense. Putting diesel in a gas car is not something that happens to someone that is focused and feeling good.

In a way, it was an expensive (although, pray for coverage) metaphor for what I’d been doing all summer. I’d been attempting to re-fuel myself with the wrong fuel. Fuel that, actually, threatened to break me down much further, and cost me a lot in the process. 

Unfortunately, this incident didn’t quite get me where I needed to be in terms of recognizing my need to relax. It was yesterday, when I became too physically repulsive to go outside. I’m actually not being dramatic (I’m being kind of dramatic). I got a sunburn on my lip during a hike last Saturday, which then turned into a lip pimple. By Thursday, it was a small cold sore. By Friday, it was giant and oozing (sorry), and by Saturday, it was a cluster of brown, scabbing fever blisters splitting my bottom lip in half in a way that was impossible to ignore and (sorry for not de-stigmatizing it) gross. I haven’t had a cold sore since I was little, if ever (I have no specific memory of having one, but I must’ve at some point), but I’ve definitely never had one this bad. But, as they say, the body whispers until it screams. And mine had sent me to so many other, subtler signals that I’d ignored, that it had to bring in the big guns, with a physical manifestation so obvious, I felt I had no choice but to hide from the world (obviously I didn’t NEED to hide - I’ve never once been disgusted by someone else’s cold sore, that I can recall–but I guess threatening my vanity was what it took).  

So, I spent yesterday inside. I wouldn’t say I did nothing (what does that even mean?) But I did exclusively prioritize things I enjoyed. I read an entire book (a cheesy one). I took two baths with expensive bath oil. I drank a matcha (one!) I laid down for an hour. I didn’t hang out with anyone. I made oatmeal (a beloved food I’d previously abandoned because some doctor I liked said it messed with your blood sugar). I watched A Very Royal Scandal and decided to give up on Slow Horses. I ignored my phone for hours at a time. I purposefully didn’t write–for my newsletter or for freelance–even though I had ample time to do so. I didn’t do a single thing because I felt like I “had” to or because a magazine had told me to or because it would advance my career, my status, my life. And it was then that I started to feel a sense of confidence I didn’t even know I’d lost creeping back. 

I’d had an inkling that a loss of confidence was an issue here back in August, when I started to wake up at the top of each week with a sense of dread. It wasn’t dread because I wasn’t looking forward to all of the trips I got to take (I was). It was dread about the impending overwhelm that would come with doing those things and dealing with life at the same time.

A few weeks back, during a bout of stress brought on by trying to answer some work emails before a 7:00 a.m. flight, I typed “What’s the antonym of dread?” into Google (incognito mode, I have SOME pride).   

The answer: confidence. 

My favorite definition of confidence is “the feeling of self-assurance arising from the appreciation of one’s abilities or qualities.” It reminded me of a piece I’d recently read by

Haley Nahman

, about envy. She wrote:

“a lot of celebrated qualities are incompatible with each other. Ambition often comes with discontent; focus with rigidity; contentment with complacency…it’s worth remembering that we all have to assess our strengths, try to build lives around those, and accept the consequences of those choices.”

She also wrote about social media being two-dimensional, not allowing for nuance. I felt ashamed when I read it and thought about making fun of that influencer. I thought about how I had just posted my own carousel of fabulous summer photos, with the intention that a casual viewer would encounter and see what a great summer I’d had.

The reality is: life still happens when you’re having fun. And sometimes, you may feel even more guilty or stressed for having fun while life is happening. There’s been a constant hum (and occasional roar) of stressors shading the background of my summer. The influencer whose post I sent to friends with an eye roll could be experiencing the same things I am. Neither of us need to share what they are. But we do need to remember, when we observe other people’s lives online, or attempt to take their advice, that everyone’s life is their own puzzle. When we take one piece of advice dispensed by someone we admire, we’re attempting to fit their piece into the puzzle of our own lives, without accounting for how the rest fits–and then acting confused when our lives don’t fall into perfect place as a result. 

If you spend your life trying to solve your problems by taking advice from people whose lives you don’t have the full picture of (reminder: the only person whose life you have the full picture of is your own), you may be putting diesel in a gas car. So don’t be confused when it doesn’t run smoothly.  

When I realized the cause of my burnout was simply a failure to assess my own strengths and a willful ignorance of my weakness, I felt like Archimedes in the bathtub (compounded by the fact that I literally was in the bath when I read a sentence in my book about “accepting your limitations,” though I doubt Archimedes used Susanne Kaufmann bath oils). 

I developed plan to cure the burnout. To leverage my strengths, understand my weaknesses, and assess how everything I’d been spending my time on has either been helping or harming me. I split my life into five categories.

Strengths

(if you can’t come up with your own, you can take this quiz: VIA character strengths)

• Creative

• Curious 

• Authentic

• Funny 

• Engaging* 

• Appreciative of art and beauty (that’s me trying to call myself tasteful without bragging, but I think it comes off even snobbier…sorry dolls) 

(Just a few of) my weaknesses

• Impulsive

• Impatient 

• Easily bored/smothered

• Occasionally forgetful 

• *On the flip side of engaging: short and snappy when depleted 

Things I enjoy and how they leverage my strengths/address my weaknesses

• Hot yoga (helps with anxiety; every class is different so I don’t get bored)

• Reading (sates my curiosity), especially contemporary fiction (regardless of prestige)

• Baths (soothes anxiety)

• Cooking new recipes (satisfies my creativity, directs my focus)

• Long walks (particularly in Central Park after work; helps with anxiety)

• Dinners with friends (humor; if you’ve ever been to a dinner with my friends, you’ll know)

• Watching something with my husband or a friend (engaging; ignites creativity, can be humorous or further trigger curiosity)

• Writing my newsletter about whatever I feel like (am curious/creative about at that time)

• Buying a ton of clothes and returning whatever isn’t absolutely perfect (jury is out on how healthy this one is as it might be indulging my impulsivity…but it satisfies curiosity)

• Buying books like wine (i.e. even if you already have a million, and even if you won’t read it soon, purchasing one when you want in order to build up a collection)

• Exclusively drinking natural orange wine when it comes to alcohol (drag me…this one doesn’t really leverage my strengths…but I wanted you guys to know…)

Things I don’t enjoy, but are good ways to address my weaknesses or leverage my strengths

• Creating a monthly calendar with all of my plans on it (makes it clear if I’m overcommitted, which would lead to me feeling smothered)

• Meditating in silence twice a day (helps with impulsivity and anxiety)

• Automating my savings (stave off impulse buys)

• Writing down ALL of my tasks in my planner each morning (directs focus)

• Checking the weather (lol, reduces impulsivity)

• Pilates (anxiety; impatience)

• Not having Instagram on my phone (reduces anxiety)

• Reducing my screen time by leaving my phone locked away for the majority of the day (ditto the above)

• Strength training when I want to (keeps me healthy without me feeling bored by a forced schedule)

Things I don’t enjoy and don’t need to

• General rigidity and committing to the same schedule week-after-week (this works SO well for most people that I’ve long believed I’m “wrong” for not liking it, but I’m finally owning it)

• Planning my content months in advance (pour one out for all of the times I’ve attempted to use Notion to plan this newsletter and then completely ignored it)

• Meal prepping (depresses me, though I know it’s a game-changer for others. If I have leftovers from a fun recipe I’ll bring them to work but I don’t care about spending money on lunch out once a week

• Evening workouts. I am tired after work and want to come home

• Most buzzy TV shows (I googled the ending of The Perfect Couple because every second I saw of it felt like a waste of my time but literally EVERYONE else I know loved it. Freeing to be the sole hater!)

• Shared calendars (smothering)

• Comparison shopping for utilitarian items (tote bag, suitcase, etc. I really don’t care about getting an average one, as long as it doesn’t break. I would rather overspend on pretty things and under-index here. That’s just me!)

• Read a dense boring-ass book because people I respect like it. (If I decide on my own that I want to read it, then I will. But I’m not gonna die reading books I don’t care about just to tell people I did)

• Running (walking is currently working better for me)

For now, I’m cutting out everything on the fifth list. I encourage you to make your own, and share it. The more you share your strengths and weaknesses openly with others — instead of trying to hide them, because we all have them (yes, literally all of us) — the more readily you’ll find those willing to fill your gaps and help your life run more smoothly.

Ideally, your list will look COMPLETELY different from mine. Hopefully, some of the things on my love list are on your hate list. Because that’s the point. We all need to focus on our own puzzles. I promise you, we’ll solve them much faster.