mismatched

For some time now, I’ve been having a hard time maintaining a balance between my professional and personal life. Before January, I hadn’t felt this way, and it seems that there’s no reason for me to feel this way now either, since there hasn’t been an increase in my workload—neither in terms of volume nor complexity.

Realizing that even though the circumstances haven’t changed, something inside me has, made me want to figure this out.

I realized that perhaps something contributing to this had a lot to do with how I organize the time when I’m not working. Whether it’s the time I have before starting work, on the weeks I’m on the afternoon shift, or the time I have left until I go to bed and after leaving work, on the weeks I’m on the morning shift.

Was there something I had changed since December that was making me feel out of place, unbalanced, or out of sync?

Last year, starting in mid-August, I made a conscious decision to spend less time watching TV. This really helped me focus more on the present. It might seem counterintuitive, but the fact is that not being so glued to the news gave me the chance to notice more of the things that don’t appear on TV. And this doesn’t mean I’ve just focused more on myself. That’s not where the benefits lie. We have to view life as “a whole.” We need to know that we are part of a reality, but that this reality, while it may affect us, cannot change the way we feel inside.

Being attentive to what’s happening around us doesn’t mean getting lost in the rest of it. These days, with news of conflicts and attacks and updates every hour, it leaves anyone feeling a bit adrift in this deep sea that the world has become.

Words seem to be worth less and less, and what has been agreed upon, or what will be discussed, may not even be worth reflecting on. Words and phrases shouted into the wind, which breed more mistrust in others and less hope for a more predictable future, still seem far away.

In order to find a little inner peace, it seems I’ll have to limit my access to—and the amount of time I spend—keeping up with (or is it just getting misinformed about?) what’s going on in this crazy world.

How was your weekend?

I hope you enjoyed the days, if you weren’t working. Tomorrow a new week will begin. And I hope I can get back on track with a path that’s more favorable to me, and pull myself out of this almost automated mode, unrooted from constant external constraints.

Cheers🍀

^{Image by Jason Goh from Pixabay Original text written by @xrayman in Portuguese and translated with DeepL.com (free version)}