Friday, March 14, 2014

Is it Just Me or Do You Need Routines More as You Get Older?

TGIT - Thank God It's Thursday. I don't go into the office on Friday, so my TGI is with a T rather than a F. This Friday I woke up pretty early, brushed my teeth, made some hot water and got dressed like any other day. Why? Only one year ago I would have been up and gone from the house. Off to see friends, work out, run errands or any other number of things. When did I suddenly get a work day routine?

I understand that most people like routines and I have an extreme example sleeping next to me each night. Mike loves to get up each morning and follow the same routine. So much so, that if I get up early and disrupt any part of it he turns churlish very quickly. I have always mocked his lack of flexibility. Ha! I would think as he snapped at me for being in the bathroom when he wants to brush his teeth, I am so far superior in my flexibility skills! But actually I may just a routine late bloomer.

Yesterday I slept late. I woke up and had to cut the "routine" short. Quick shower, throw on clothes, grab food and drink, dash out door. All day at work I felt muddled, cranky and quite frankly, churlish. Is this because I didn't have my normal morning routine?!?

I am not the runner that must run, I am not the traveler that must have an exact schedule, I am not the person that gets churlish in the morning. What exactly does the onset of the "grumpy old man" syndrome look like? The more I think about it I may have just discovered the early symptoms of the disease!! I remember interrupting adult routines from my teen years to my twenties. They never seemed to appreciate it. My reaction was, "I will not be grumpy like that old person!" Amazing what truths arrive as you age. I didn't feel like myself all day yesterday. So why wouldn't I feel grumpy about not feeling normal?

What will this realization bring to my life? Can I reverse the signs of being a routine person? I've always lived by a creed of going with the flow, but what happens when my new "routine" interrupts the flow? Even further down the rabbit hole, did I have a routine of not following a routine all along? Morning musings are over and I'm off to swim and hopefully stave off being a routined person as long as I can.

Monday, February 24, 2014

What is Back on Track?

This morning I wasn't feeling that well, so I stayed home, slept in and thought about how out of whack I've been of late. I haven't been taking very good care of very much... very consistently lately. Not feeling well, not eating well, not training like I'm used to.  My life scale has not been balanced of late. (And speaking of my scale, I'm not impressed with what it had to say to me this morning!) I do excellent at working out and eating right and work takes a hit, or I'm doing well with work but my personal relationships begin to decline. This morning I began the day thinking, "I need to get back on track." I'm going to take better care of myself, get back to training, eating right, really concentrate on progressing at the office again and do a better job at calling friends and family. I can do it!!

I picked up a bit around the house and started planning for the long list of items from my self-pep talk earlier. It sounded overwhelming and not feeling well already it sent me directly to the sofa to sink into the oblivion of the Real Housewives of where-ever. After a few shows I knew I needed to get up and get ready to go into the office. I had a conference call that I didn't want to miss and I didn't want to get any further behind, but I thought some meditation might put me in the right mind-frame to survive the day. Hey, even if I'm sucking at life at least I can be cheery about it right? Thirty minutes later I sat not thinking about how I was going to go conquer the world, but instead contemplating whether my feelings of being behind are because I'm on a different track than I thought I was. Maybe I'm not really "off track" maybe instead I veered onto a different course and I was so busy looking at the directions for my last course of action that I didn't even notice that my route has changed.  

So am I back on track? I'm certainly not, but maybe I'm not quite as lost as I thought.