I love travel because it drags me out of my normal schedule and patterns, tossing me into unknown situations and ways of thinking. Even something as simple and mundane sounding as meeting someone at a coffeeshop can be enough to shake up my normal routine. I guess one of the benefits of working from home with a commute measured in feet rather than miles is that the bar for excitement can be low enough that a quick hop will get you over.
However, breaking routine isn’t always a great thing because some routines are important – even vital – to keeping my life moving in a positive and productive direction.
Last week, the family and I went to Boston for a few days during school vacation because we wanted to go south and that was about as far as we could afford at the moment. While Beantown wasn’t exactly tropical, it was fun to get out of our normal surroundings for a bit. Trouble is, it also helped further derail the routines I’ve been trying to establish in my life with self care and creativity.
So yeah… if you were dying for a new blog post from me last week, that’s the reason why you were left wanting.
Monday became the Day To Get Things Done Before Leaving and then Friday turned into Holy Crap I Have So Much To Catch Up On Before The Weekend. Not exactly my favorite ways to spend hours, but so be it. As a result, I dove into work each day without writing or doing much of anything besides getting some coffee down the hatch and prying my eyes open.
Which is all a great excuse, but looking back at my post history, I was missing days before that too. Self care is hard because it requires discipline – both to do it and also to not do it too much where it becomes indulgence and complacency. Fortunately, I can trend in either direction there, so it always gives me something to do.
So here I am today, beginning again for the umpteenth time. Good thing we all have experience with that each day when we wake up, right?