My Guilty Break
The break I took when I turned 30 reminded me of what it was like to have summers off as a kid. The first month was so exhilarating, I could sleep in, do hobbies, go wherever, whenever I wanted, I was free. The second month, freedom was less exciting and steadily turning into something uglier. I did so much in that first month, trying to make up for the lack of productivity and “earn” my break to appease my guilt, that I was burnt out and in need of real rest. But how could I keep still when I was constantly wrestling with my sense of guilt? Here I am, “taking a break” when other people maybe aren’t afforded this luxury. I need to make the most out of it so that I would have worth while answers when others asked me “How’s your break going? What’d you do this week?”. It was a constant cycle between actually resting and relaxing and the immediate guilt that followed for being able to rest.
There are days that I still struggle with that. I get caught up measuring my day to day and life against what everyone else’s looks like which makes my gut churn with guilt and anxiety. But I have to remind myself that a) I lived that day to day previously and walked away from it for a reason and b) it’s really not that serious. For example, I now spend most of my day with my cat, Theo. While I was spiraling about not adding value to my life and not doing enough, he sat there in the window basking in the sun - guilt free. He’s done this the day he was adopted 12 years ago! And I have never found fault with it. I love him for just being exactly as he is - even though he’s a financial net negative/actually the worst roommate ever and yet - I love him unconditionally. Now, I get that we’re not cats and should not aspire to be but it is a really good lesson in just “being”. Not resting and not doing but just existing. That even when we are standing completely still, we are still enough and we are still worthy of love, from ourselves and others.
That realization actually helped calm me down a lot. I still panic a little when people ask what I’ve been up to but I remind myself that it’s not that serious and that it’s okay if my answer is “I don’t know yet”. It’s not a test, and I can’t fail, and even if I fail to meet their expectation of what I should be doing, that’s not my problem. It’s enough for me to just be.