No bad days
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Normally when I think about my day, I tend to have the mindset that either it was a good one or a bad one. I’m sure I’m not the only person who thinks it can be that black and white.
Recently I had a really bad day.
I let the pressure of life get on top of me. I was trying to balance writing blog posts, creating ideas for social media content, starting up a business and studying to be a personal trainer all on top of having a full-time job. As well as all of that, trying to get 8 hours of sleep a day and 3 gym sessions in a week including trying to complete a running challenge. Not to mention feeding myself regularly, doing any kind of household chores, spending valuable time with my boyfriend and trying to fit in some time for myself in and around all of the above.
Even typing all of that out feels exhausting.
On that day what would have seemed like the tiniest thing to anyone else, set me off. Trying to juggle and balance everything didn’t feel possible anymore. I felt like the world came crashing down as I ended up a very angry and emotional mess struggling to express how I was feeling deep down inside.
Anyone who knows me well will know that this is a state I often get into when I allow pressure (usually that I’m only putting on myself) to get to me, especially if I don’t reach out for support. I then spiral into negative thought patterns, I find it difficult to think clearly and wrongly take it out on those closest to me.
All of what I’ve just described there is what can otherwise be known as burnout.
I’m a perfectionist with incredibly high expectations of myself. I’m constantly striving for things in my life to be a certain way to a standard that I’m happy with because I won’t settle for less. Whilst I believe that’s a blessing and it’s certainly got me to where I am today, it’s also a curse. I will get to points where I neglect my own needs because I’m trying to prove to myself and others that I can do it all and that I’m fine.
The few days before this burnout I had completely fallen out of my routine. I’d messed up my sleeping patterns by taking naps after coming home from work. I’d not been eating properly and increased my workload with the mindset that if I get ahead now I’ll have less work to do later. I was prioritising this instead of taking time to relax and recharge my batteries.
On that particular day, it seemed like I was having the worst day in the world and that I’d taken a million steps back from all the progress I’d made in finding more balance in my life. But, in hindsight with a clearer head, it wasn’t that bad of a day because what I got from this was an opportunity to reach out to my support system, help others understand my trigger points and learn for myself how I could potentially avoid this happening again to such a great extent.
It’s easy to fixate on whether a day is a good or bad one and treat it as though it was a success or a failure. It’s not that simple. What’s important to remember is that some days are just better than others and you wouldn’t appreciate those days half as much if there were no bad days.