Ever have a run of days that just wear you out? That’s how the past week has been. Shoot, sometimes I feel like it’s been the entire past 6 months. Between maintaining a constant level of vigilance at in the office and the hospital to protect myself and my family from COVID to managing my own thoughts about social justice issues to trying to stay engaged in the political conversation in an election year (but not so much that I’m consumed by it), it’s been an effort to stay balanced. But working through the past few days have taught me that it can be easier than I think to get myself on solid ground again…
I had a full day of surgery scheduled at the end of last week. The cases were mostly straightforward, but when you add up the time for the surgeries, the times between cases to get the room reset, and starting around 7 am in the city, it was scheduled to be quite a long day. I found myself wanting to gripe and complain, wondering why I wasn’t able to limit the number of cases that were scheduled for me on a particular day and feeling frustrated that most of these cases were coming to me before I’d had an opportunity to review them and decide if they were appropriate. I began hearing thoughts in my head that sounded faintly familiar but weren’t what I wanted to think. Thoughts like, “This sucks. This isn’t how things should be done. I shouldn’t have to do things this way. If I had control over my own schedule, I’d organize this differently. This is the problem with working for a company.” It took me a minute, but I realized that these were just recycled thoughts from my training years, thoughts I started learning from other med students and residents twenty years ago. Those thoughts were spoken by others, and I learned to think that way about my workdays, that I was under the control of the system and things would be better if I had more autonomy, that I was just a cog in the wheel and who and how I was didn’t matter.
Today I’m in a different situation as an attending physician, but there are situations where working within our healthcare company that I am tempted to fall back into this style of thinking. But I don’t have to, because they’re just the thoughts I’m choosing to think. If I’d know this in training, life (and I!) would have been much more pleasant! When I take control of my thoughts instead of letting the old ones play automatically, I get to choose ones that work for me instead of against me. For example, I chose to think, “I am helping a lot of women today. This is going to be a great day! These cases are going to fly by and besides, these really are straightforward surgeries. I have an excellent assistant and we are going to get in here and get this handled. I’ve got this.” Interestingly, with the exception of an unexpected surprise during my last case, that’s exactly how the day went. The best part was that I didn’t spend the time between each case torturing myself by wishing away the “horrible” day I was having – because I wasn’t having a horrible day at all. I had a great day because I was able to allow it to be that way in my mind. When have you made your own day awful because of how you set your mind against it from the outset?
You can make your own potholes in your mind that trip you up…
My husband decided to take a mini-retreat to celebrate his 20th spiritual birthday this past weekend. And while that was definitely an event worth commemorating, it left me at home with the kids alone with short notice, after I’d already worked the past weekend at the hospital. I had decided in my mind that this weekend would be a break for me, but now I was on the hook for handling the kids. This one I caught upfront before it got too far out of hand. When I started counting up all the meals I’d have to manage and how I thought we’d be enjoying our grown-up TV time together after the kids went to bed and I’d be alone all weekend and I’d have to manage the kid’s messes which irritates the mess out of me, I pulled up short. I didn’t have to go down that rabbit hole. If he was taking a retreat, then I had the option to make it a weekend of drudgery that wore me out by the end, or I could stay with the plan of having a restful weekend. How was I going to do this at home with four kids? By deciding what I would and would not think. I spend so many weeks at work wishing I could be home with them, so now I have a weekend where I can, so I’m going to make the most of it. I also told them Friday night how I expected the weekend to go, and they’re old enough now to understand and manage themselves accordingly (not perfectly, but they try). I relaxed my stance on TV, but I made them finish cleaning up before we sat down to watch anything. I absolved myself from making lunches and told them they were on their own (and even the 7-year-old can make an almond butter sandwich without me). I decided to order out for dinner instead of cooking, so I could read and take a nap Saturday afternoon. When they didn’t do what I asked, I remembered that was on them and instead of yelling I sat down and read a book until they did what I asked. They lost TV or fun time, not me (mostly). We watched a little Moana together, and I enjoyed the peace of the evenings with my book. I love my evenings with my husband, but I’m an introvert so I enjoy the alone time too!
Ok, not totally alone…
Sunday morning was one of those times that I almost let my mind carry me completely away. I asked my oldest daughter to feed the dog breakfast, which usually isn’t her responsibility, but her sister was doing another task. She started complaining about how she doesn’t like the smell of the dog food and put up a battle about getting the job done. I was ticked – I mean really, just feed the dog! She was the kid who begged the most to have the dog in the first place. What really made me angry though was my thinking. I thought she should want to feed the dog, that she shouldn’t complain or resist, that she was disrespectful and rude and disobedient. This thinking made me so angry that I was still mad when we started our virtual church Zoom meeting. And then the sermon was on love. As soon as I started hearing the words of 1 Corinthians 13, I remembered who I was and who I wanted to be. She didn’t have to want to feed the dog, or obey happily, or not complain. None of that is what made me angry with her, and I could choose to love her regardless of how she acted. I can train her to respond better in the future and love her at the same time. No matter what she does, I can act in love and feel love for her because of who I am in God. Her actions aren’t what made me angry – my thoughts about her actions did. And when I knew that I didn’t want to be angry but to love her in my correction, I went to her and apologized for being angry at her. We hugged and she apologized for her complaining. Acting in love is who I want to be, and I just needed a quick reminder to reset my mind.
That’s my baby!
Managing your mind is some of the most powerful work you can do because your thoughts produce the results in your life. You can do this work – capture your thoughts, work through them, and find ways to choose new thoughts and practice them into beliefs. This is work you absolutely can do alone. But, if you need help finding your way, that’s what a coach is for – and I’m here to help if you need me! Let me know in the comments below if you want to do a trial coaching session and we’ll find a time for you. And if you’ve also found some great ways to manage your mind, please share in the comments below!