Like many Tasmanians, I have been lucky enough to be almost entirely insulated from the major consequences of the COVID 19 pandemic to this point. At a personal level, 2020 has actually been an extremely good year for me in a number of ways. Which made it a surprising realisation that in spite of this, I felt I might have hit a bit of a rut a few months back. I was still healthy and enjoying life, but something wasn’t quite right. Over a period of several months I was consistently feeling less energy and less productivity than normal (this is starting to sound like the script for a food supplement ad so I better get to the point pretty quick). I grappled with the question of whether this was a real problem. I doubted there was any clinical issue, but I did eventually consider going to see a doctor if I couldn’t get on top of things. But for the most part I still felt happy and healthy, so I just stayed mindful of my own wellbeing and waited to see what would happen next. It had been a busy year, so one theory I had was that I had just let myself get a bit rundown, but no amount of extra rest or reducing my own expectations of myself seemed to have much impact. I also couldn’t connect this to any external factors. I was lucky through this time to have the support of some wonderful friends and family who provided any number of highlights and probably unknowingly ameliorated the impact of this period (seriously you guys are the rockstars of my world).
Eventually (thankfully, just in time for the Ross Marathon) I did come out the other side and something that became very clear to me was that the real catalyst in shaking off this listlessness was the active decision that it was time to change. No amount of rest or encouragement from others would have done this without a shift in mindset. Once I accepted I was actually both physically and psychologically healthy, I decided there was no point in continuing to go easy on myself and it was time to demand more. It wasn’t an overnight change and not without the occasional backwards step, but gradually I pushed myself back into more disciplined routines, until I felt I had rediscovered some of my former energy levels. I share this story for two reasons. I hate to sound anything like Jordan Peterson (not that this is an original idea of his anyway- I’m yet to hear anything original from him actually), but it was important that I realised things weren’t going to automatically get better if I all I did was wait for change to happen. But just as importantly, it was valuable to recognise that even the best support network is rarely enough on its own. I couldn’t have had better friends and family around me this year and they have brought me a lot of happiness, but they still could not pull me out of the rut until I was ready to do the hard work myself. As someone who seeks to help others where I can, this was a really timely reminder not to place too much onus on myself for the wellbeing of those around me. In future I need to recognise and accept more readily that sometimes I can make a difference and sometimes I can’t. That is less a sobering thought than a liberating one. I won’t stop trying to reach out to those around me, but if and when I don’t have a noticeable impact, I won’t worry as much about what I could have done differently.
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