At first I thought he was suffering from some sort of post dysfunctional job PTSD, but here we are at the beginning of week three, and my newly-retired husband still takes a nap nearly every single day since stepping away from his 9 to 5. Who knew that not working could be so exhausting?!
My husband worked nights, 3rd shift…meaning he started work at 10:00 p.m…for nearly 20 years. He was tired all of the time. And that felt normal. Justified. Mostly because on weekends he flipped back to a regular schedule, napping on Sundays before returning to work Sunday night. He was always sleep deprived. Of course he was tired.
But retirement exhaustion? How could a person be tired when they didn’t go to work. When they didn’t have responsibilities. When they spent their days golfing, working out at the gym, hiking, fishing, and happy hour-ing with friends.
It’s taken me two weeks of him being retired to remember that feeling tired isn’t odd. It’s part of being human. There are many reasons we can feel tired. And it’s important to listen to our bodies and to give ourselves all of the rest that we need.
What is it about our culture that condones naps only for babies? And children. Or the sick? Rest isn’t O.K. for the rest of us. It’s considered a weakness. Or a luxury. Other places in the world see it differently. Some countries close down for two hours for lunches and siestas.
Here productivity is highly valued by companies, because the more productive an employee is, the more money the company makes. The company, not the productive individual. A highly-productive employee makes the same as a less productive employee.
I used to think that my drive to be productive and have to be doing something constantly came from growing up on a farm, but it recently occurred to me that the summer after I turned 11 my parents started this thing where they decided we would only eat two meals a day. To save time. Time on the prep work and time actually sitting down to eat. We didn’t live on a farm at the time. We lived on ½ an acre with a large old house, a huge garden and the red Kirby building that housed my step-dad’s VW repair shop.
I had always done dishes, cleaned and worked in my step-dad’s shop, mostly cleaning Snap-On tools, but this summer we got paid $.25 per hour to pull weeds. Specific weeds like Creeping Charlie. I remember calculating I could make $2.00 per day if I put my mind to it. I don’t know exactly how much I worked that summer, but I know that I bought two things: 1. my first watch, a $15.00 Timex, at Harnetiaux Farm and Home. And 2. I had to replace a window in my bedroom. It cost $100.
Twenty years ago I worked for a company where we tracked time in 5-minute increments, ostensibly to bill hours to our clients, but also to measure productivity. We were all urged to improve our percentage of billable hours. Naive, I didn’t realize that at 96%, there wasn’t much I could do to improve my percentage. The company was thrilled with my performance. Why wouldn’t they be? They billed me out at 5 times my hourly rate. The more I worked the more I made, the more they made. They set me up to work from home. Why wouldn’t they?
I’m one of those people who can remember minute details for most of my life, but I can’t remember much of the three years I worked that job. I was exhausted all of the time.
So I stayed up late to watch TV shows that I don’t think I should be watching. That’s not right. It’s not that I didn’t think I should be watching the shows. It’s that I thought I should be doing other things. Like folding that laundry. Or the dishes. Or cleaning the sink. You know, being productive. Because sitting around watching TV was lazy.
Sidebar: Compare women’s hobbies to men’s hobbies. Men throw balls at pins. Hitting balls with sticks. They run. They watch sports. We bake. Cook. Sew. Do crafts. And we have the nerve to call ourselves lazy.
I realize now that staying up late was the only time I had time for myself. Where I could watch whatever I wanted to watch without being judged. Without judging myself. I replaced the shame and guilt with Ben and Jerry’s while I relaxed and recovered from all of the productivity of the day.
But deep down I didn’t think I deserved to sit still and do nothing.
I used to think it was the people around me who were judging me, who were the problem. They’re not. It’s all me. I’m only bothered if there’s a little part of me that agrees with them. Otherwise, why would I care?
I wonder if now there’s a part of me that’s judging us now. I’ve always said that I hate when people waste my time. Am I wasting my own time? Is Cory wasting time? What does that even mean?
We are so programmed to think that we have limited time. With a timeline from a financial planner and an “end of plan date,” it’s easy to see why we might feel a sense of urgency these days. How we could feel driven. To get it all done while we have time. While we have energy. While we have health. What about FOMO?
I’m learning that being productive is overrated. Being busy. Let’s hear it for sitting still and doing nothing. And letting go of what I make it mean and what anyone else might think or say.
Let’s hear it for balance. For soaking up life. Enjoying the moment. It’s kind of like traveling. There’s having a list of places you want to see and things you want to do, but there’s nothing like taking a smoko. Whether it’s sitting in a cafe or a park. Time for Reflection. Time for Gratitude. Time for Rest.
Taylor Nardone says, “Your success will come from your rest.”
I’ve said that I want to be more myself. I want more ease. This week more ease means reminding myself, “I have plenty of time.” And asking myself, “If it were easy, what would it look like?” I also need to rethink what I think a weekend means to me now.
How does the saying go? A rich person isn’t defined as one who can buy the book, rather the one who has the time to read the book. Time is wealth. And I’m a very wealthy woman.
Do you need more of this kind of wealth in your life? What can you do to create it? What can you let go?
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