i woke up this morning with the same kind of overwhelm that has come to plague my mondays, except exponentially heavier. this overwhelm is a symptom of my workaholic nature – the fact that i actually took a real weekend off (rain and a global pandemic will do that to you) meant that i feel like i’ve been utterly useless for 48 whole hours.

online, i see people in my network motivating to produce online concerts, exhibitions, meditation sessions, and screenings. it’s been at once incredibly inspiring but has also induced guilt on my end – guilt that i call myself a community organizer but in the past few days have spent more time pruning my new house plants and repairing my vacuum cleaner than i have thinking about how to contribute to the many things my village needs right now. during these times, i try to remind myself that tending to oneself is not a cousin of laziness. that maybe i would’ve been able to pivot more quickly had i not spent the past few years burning myself out. and even if i hadn’t, that it’s still okay to have a late start, or take time to process before acting, or to even take the bench now and then.

i continue to feel hypersensitive to the various ways that people are reacting to this outbreak. i shrivel when i ask how a friend is doing and they respond with projections on death tolls. there is so much anxiety that comes with having an open spigot of information paired with a recognition that the best way to respond is not to take to the streets, but to stay in – not to band together but to practice social distancing – not to resist an enemy but to honor forces of nature beyond us.

today i’m learning that it’s not my burden to smooth out every crease in an unfolding universe.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *