We all have our own rhythms in our lives. Cue Thoreau and his different drummer, which is lovely, but not what I mean. What I mean is this: we need to find the times when we work best and we need to avoid over-criticizing ourselves when we try to do stuff in the times when work is naturally more difficult for us.
On a daily basis, this means that we all have a preferred time of day for working out. I am happy to work out in the morning, but if my only choice is an evening workout, I am—how to put this—grumpy.
That daily rhythm is fairly easy to perceive, but there are larger ones, too. I know better than to start anything on a Thursday. In fact, I have gone as far as calling Thursday the Official Day of Getting Nothing Done. If I don’t do anything, cool; I expected that. If I somehow manage to accomplish things anyway, I get to feel like I’m extra-special.
Which brings me to August. August is the Thursday of months. It is the low point of my personal energy and enthusiasm. Now, when it’s a whole month that is problematic, flat out quitting is really not the best choice. Enter the extremely low standard. Maybe it’s a walk around the block most days. Or five minutes of yoga. Or one day of spin each week (obviously not on Thursday!). What we want is to create a feeling of success amidst the general suck-i-tude (no, that is not really a word, but I’m sure it makes sense).
In all of it, evenings, Thursdays, and Augusts, we need to be kind to ourselves and remember that we are valuable even when we don’t do all the things.
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