For When You Just Can’t Get It Together
A couple weeks ago, I sat around a lunch table at a conference talking to new friends. In between bites of sandwiches and sips of coffee I lamented, “I feel like in every part of my life–parenting, work, health, faith–I’m running the hurdles. And I know eventually I’ll get to the finish line. But I am tripping over every single hurdle in the process.”
I try to carve out time to work on an essay. Then one of my kids gets sick and has to stay home from school, so I have to pivot.
I try to wake up before the kids so I can have a few minutes of quiet time. But the dog keeps barking at 2am, so by 6am I succumb to the snooze button.
I try to make myself a healthy lunch, but I’m too tired to cook, the kids didn’t eat their chicken nuggets, and I end up scarfing down their leftovers and topping it off with a piece of Halloween candy. (Snickers has protein, right?)
I have all the best intentions. I even have organized to-do lists and a color-coordinated Google calendar. But I just cannot seem to get my life together right now.
Anyone else feel like that?
When my head hits the pillow, I often think about all that didn’t go according to plan–the coffee date I had to reschedule, the boxes that didn’t get checked, the fact that we ordered takeout for dinner, again. My meal plan I so dutifully filled out on Sunday night said we should have eaten all those vegetables I bought when my cooking motivation peaked while in the produce aisle. Hopefully the lettuce won’t wilt by tomorrow.
I look back on the day, and I can see that I parented, worked, fed people, and more or less tried to do what my life required. But I didn’t do it as perfectly, gracefully, flawlessly, promptly, or (insert your own adverb here) as I envisioned.
“But if your best day becomes the measurement for all other days, you’ve already lost.”
In her latest book, The Plan, Kendra Adachi writes, “It’s normal to want to have a good day. Maybe even the best day. But if your best day becomes the measurement for all other days, you’ve already lost. Not only that, but ‘the best day’ probably equates to ‘successfully executed plans,’ and I’m not sure that’s the rubric we want…We have diminished living to getting things done.”
We expect to run the hurdles, perfectly, every day, gliding over each obstacle and interruption as if it wasn’t even there. Anything less than that deserves our self-criticism.
This is an exhausting way to live.
After I shared at that conference lunch table how I couldn’t get my act together in this season and was tripping over every proverbial hurdle, one friend looked me right in the eyes and said, “Yeah, but you’re getting back up every time.”
Maybe that’s the rubric we need to start using. Instead of calculating the success of each day based on how well it adheres to our plans and expectations, maybe we consider how we kept going when life got hard or how we pivoted when plans changed. Maybe we congratulate ourselves for slowing down because we’re tired or we’re hurting. Maybe we count it a victory when we wave someone over to carry us to the finish line, because we certainly aren’t making it there on our own.
Friend, I don’t know if you feel like you’re conquering the world right now or if you feel like you’ve fallen flat on your face while everyone watches. But I don’t think every day has to be our “best” day. Those days are great, and we get to celebrate them when they come. But if today isn't your best day, that doesn’t mean you’re failing.
It means you’re living.
This post was originally shared in the Coffee + Crumbs newsletter.
