Happy Fall Ya’ll… Summer Edition
These last several weeks have been a lot of moving and shaking in the world of work. I have been on and off too many planes to count and working with some of the most phenomenal clients around. I have been doing everything from keynotes to breakout session to leading full multi-day training classes. Things were going so great, and I also had a few vacations worked in to spend a little down-time doing some R&R (which usually for me means planning for a ton of activities on vacation too). I had just finished a great week of work and headed to the Dominican Republic for a seven-day vacation. What I didn't know was how much R&R was really in store for me because for the first time in forever *cue the iconic song from “Frozen”… I fell down.
Like literally, physically fell down…hard. Walking in from my swim-up pool on our little cute swim-up suite to the bathroom I made two very big mistakes.
One - I did not dry off.
Two - I did not put anything on my feet before walking in soaking wet from the pool in a hurry.
So, I found myself slipping not once, but three times hitting the same knee on that amazingly beautiful, super hard tile floor. Well in short, I spent the final three days of vacation both in a Dominican emergency room and then in bed with ice on my knee - and with a lot of down time. The funny thing is, I needed it.
I, like a lot of people, don’t know when or how to sit still. Even when I am “relaxing”, it tends to be in motion. I love to be in motion and sitting still for me is hard. Yet life has a way of getting you to do what you need to do, even when you don’t want to. Those last few days of vacation just invited me to really rest, sleep in, skip the excursions, enjoy the room service and alone time with my husband. It gave me some calm and realization that a few days of rest can go a long way to sparking creativity and long-term visioning. It allowed me to enjoy the little things like conversation, laughs and all these amazing shows I never have the time to watch. (If you need a list, let me know! I have watched everything on every network these last few days.). I also had to get comfortable with having to wait to know what is going on with my knee (finally seeing the orthopedic doctor today) and not having a plan for what the next few weeks will look like —which is hugely uncomfortable for me. It is also growth and maybe what I needed in this season to be ready for the next season.
So as I sit here… like literally sit here…lol… day ten since my fall, I am grateful for this unexpected downtime I have had and really thinking of how to make this a part of my self-care routine going forward. Take the time to plan a day or two to do nothing at all, and see how it works for you!
