Evie Out, Me, Me In

Yesterday I decided to let go of trying to maximize this week, or Summer in general. For two days I’d been in a medium to full-blown logistics spin over how to “recover” from scheduling changes that had Ax with more free time than we’d planned this week.

I had many many options to fill the days and yet none were coming together and, in actually consulting my actual teen, none were particularly more desirable to him than hanging out doing all the many things he likes to do on his own. He is so not me.

Evie, my evil inner critic, loves Summer. She wants to schedule, schedule, schedule, more, more, more. For me, Summer brings a plethora of Evie-fueled opportunities for compare despair — and also fear, not-good-enough-itis, longing for more, better, different.

So this week’s change of plans gave me an unwanted gift — the opportunity to examine my values, for myself and my child, and to see whether how we actually spend our time is aligned with those values. To check in with Me, Me and see whether I’m willing to allow myself to be okay regardless of the externals.

We had a plan, a great plan, a fun and edifying plan. And then it got canceled, not by us. And I wobbled, but I’m happy to report I did not fall down in my commitment to putting feeling good first.

We pivoted. Well, my kid pivoted and seemed instantly content with extra free time. I “pivoted” more like a great ocean liner makes a turn in choppy water, slowly, laboriously. It took a couple of days before I was ready to relax and enjoy but relax I did. And it felt great. I’m gonna keep going.