We live in a society where we often feel pressured to do more and more. Asked to accomplish 11 hours of work in only 8 hours. Agonizing how we might somehow fit in an hour’s drive to check in on an elderly relative while worrying we won’t be back in time to pick up our kids from school. Getting home exhausted after an hour-long traffic-snarled commute that was supposed to be 20 minutes – only to arrive to a dirty apartment we don’t have the energy to clean.
We often hear catchphrases like “You’ve got this girl!” While sounding superficially supportive, there’s a bit of a dismissive quality to such comments. They assume the listener has the resources, energy, finances, and skillsets to accomplish their goals – when in fact they may not.
And from popular self-help sources, one would think all might be solved with a cup of chamomile tea and a bubble bath. But experts point out: it’s not so easy. We have finite time and energy – and without the time needed for rest and recovery, we can burn out.
That seems to be one message author Amelia Nagoski seems to refer to in her book Burnout: the Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle. She points out that the oft-referred to call for “self-care” is much like asking the struggling to ‘try harder’ when they are already maxed out. They may end up with self-reproach rather than self-care, as they are re-directed from the original sources of their burnout to chastising themselves for their lack of self-management. Their attempts to fit in a bubblebath may seem like just one more chore added to an already overloaded day. She points out that rather than off-loading the onus of care to already overburdened individuals, we need to do more as a society to build in protective policies, such as better worker protections.
And it seems we live increasingly hectic times. James Gleick, the author of “Faster,” notes that we live in an ever-accelerating society that promotes feeling rushed and harried – and that under the constant pressure to be productive, we can find ourselves neglecting basic needs such as family time. Oliver Burkeman, author the book “Four Thousand Weeks,” puts this in even starker terms. He posits that if one realized that on average one only had about 4000 weeks on this planet (the equivalent of about 76 years), one might look at ‘productivity’ in a different light. Would we be happy with the use of our time?
Greg McKeown, the author of “Essentialism” doesn’t seem to think so. He argues that the antidote to ever increasing demands on our time is simply to cut things out. Get clear about one’s priorities and block the timewasters – whether those are people or low-priority activities.
Of course, identifying exactly what we want to prioritize and sifting out the timewasters also takes time? But it seems more meaningful than a bubble-bath – and perhaps points to a truer path to self-care.