It feels like it has been a week. It is wet, the leaves are falling, the evenings are dark, we’re clearly not through Covid and MPs are being stabbed in the street.
I feel like Chicken Licken, the sky is falling.
It might be that I’m crawling on my knees to half term. It might be an autumn slump. It might be that as an adult, I again actually feel scared about what is happening in our country.
I’m an obsessive planner. It feels like we’re managing the story not the situation. This scares me.
Driving past petrol stations with no fuel scares me.
Reading the current covid numbers and talk of waning vaccines scares me.
I hope it is an autumn slump and a week of slow mornings, movies, and cuddles with my kids will turn this on its head. I’m honestly tired of making lemonade.
But, I know I need to make a change, to shake it off. I need a quick reset. Not something that requires effort. Not something that takes a day, needs childcare, or any extra cash.
This is my press pause plan – a day of easy choices to soothe the tired mind.
- Buy a decent ready meal for dinner – something that takes half an hour in the oven, no prep, no fuss, no washing up.
- Walk at lunch time – rain or shine, a break from my desk and some air for my lungs
- Read – fully lose myself in the new Sally Rooney, Beautiful World, Where Are You. Even just for ten minutes.
- Drink tea – loads of it, might treat myself to Yorkshire, on repeat, in my favourite cup
- Eat Dim Sum for lunch – I don’t live in a dim sum kind of place, but the Itsu frozen Gyoza are definitely good enough for this emergency reset
- Phone a friend – it’s easy to feel irrational, to swirl, even just ten minutes to hear a voice, a sanity check
- Wear fluffy socks – so obvious really
- Make a hot water bottle, in the day – it’s hard not to feel a bit better when you’re cosy
- Tidy my bedside table – a small step to feel some control and reduce the busy mind
- Be kind, to myself – even just a little bit. It is okay to acknowledge that this has been a hard year. It is okay not to be okay.
