Posted by The summer break is a time to slow down. This year, in particular, I wanted to use the time to slow down my overall pace. I guess I was hoping it would spread throughout the remainder of the year. However, summer slowdown mindset also means breaking with habits, not getting things done, and not focusing. And that can be really difficult too.
No more routine
I can probably lose count of how many times I have spoken about habits or routines. For me, they suit me. As with everything, with the right balance. Before the summer break, I had re-established a few habits – more regular morning pages, morning yoga coming back, keeping up with my gratitudes and I even restarted reading before bed. All those habits I want to foster. I also had a set schedule for different types of work, had my life organised around kids’ activities, and overall felt like my portfolio life was finally more looking like a handful of glowing circles and less like a mush of cloudy things.
And then came the summer. And my desire to cut with the schedule, to let things flow, to slow down, to have fewer plans and more spontaneous moments. That was the end of anything looking like a routine.
A flow of others
The summer is often filled with others. Filled with my children, as we hang out more, and they expect me to be there more. Filled with their friends and playdates. Filled with our friends and our so-called playdates. Filled with a sense of “why not?”, of saying yes to things, of always thinking nowhere is too far to drive to, and everything can be done. Filled with family and taking care of home and all the things that had been waiting all year long.
In all honesty, filled with just about anything but time to myself. As I recognise this pattern after the first few weeks, I try to course correct. But can you?
Aren’t holidays supposed to be for being with others?
By the time I got to London, halfway in, I was ready to embrace sitting in a café with myself. Or just hang out at the library. Perhaps I was guessing, that this one week in the middle of the summer would be the only one when I could really control my own time. Without being flooded and, if I’m honest, without flooding myself too.
A Long Wish List
For a couple of years, we did a summer holiday wish list. It worked well to ensure we stayed focused and prioritised what each of us wished we would do. More intentional. It was fun to do as a family, and, to be fair, it was more fun in the first year. Potentially, the novelty factor helped. But it was also a lot of wishing amidst already too many activities and camps. For this year, my focus for the summer slowdown mindset was really on removing any sort of pressure and any sort of over-scheduling. To learn about being present together, not to rush, and to have fewer commitments.
That meant that this year, we had no wish list or even a to-do list (even if sometimes I wish I had). I wanted us to stay gentle and really break the concept of time. One day, we were home in Alentejo as the scorching heat did not invite us to go outside, so we hung out doing little massages to each other. At some point, Little Girl C says:
Don’t we have to go somewhere?
I gladly replied:
We have nowhere we have to go, we can do whatever we feel like!
She was pleased and relaxed, and we just stayed there for another hour, enjoying the AC. That was our wish.
Lack of Focus
With flow and spontaneity comes a more blurry path. Or shall I say bluntly – lack of focus? As I disentangled myself from some responsibilities and also some commitment to growing my business, I also found myself losing focus. It got me thinking about a yoga I used to practice a few years back. At some point, you would stare at your finger in front of your face and then shift your gaze from focusing on the finger to focusing on the distant pattern of things in front of you. The pace would increase rapidly as a way to exercise your ocular muscle, or so they said.
Some productivity studies also sometimes refer to the importance of looking beyond your screen, ideally into the horizon (bad luck if you have a wall behind your screen…) to allow your eyes to relax and be able to see near and far.
I guess that is what I was trying to do this summer. Without a wish list in sight and a fiction romance in my hand, I allowed my mind to wander and move away from here and now.
It’s hard, don’t get me wrong. Sometimes I felt like I needed a notepad to write down all the random things I remembered or wanted to remember when I was “back”. But it was a much-needed intensive course for the summer.
Lack of focus for a while is actually a clear path to re-find your focus. (or so I hope)
Accepting and Being
Part of my own challenge for the summer was to embrace my environment and accept where I am more. The constant feeling of falling behind, being late, needing to do more, needing to do less, having to have more habits, having to break some habits permeates my daily life but turns out particularly strong at the end of the school year and then again at year end. This summer, I wanted to break the cycle, accepting from the beginning that I was just not going to do a number of things for 2 months.
To accept it and to be content.
I also sought to surround myself with people who don’t try to change me and that usually are actually quite supportive of me. Not because I needed some patting in the back, but because I needed some re-energising for the months to come.
When in uncharted territory, it is hard to know if you are in the right or wrong direction. So I spent this summer pausing and accepting that I am in A direction.