Sarah J.

A Sojourn with Stress

Mental health conditions are complicated things. They are intensely personal and I’ve found it nearly impossible to discuss with someone from either side of the table without projecting my own opinions or experiences onto the other person, or having them do the same to me – with each having lived different existences, this cannot represent the true experience.

Recently I find myself considering the mental aspects of health as I am in the process of returning to work after five weeks off for stress. It took two weeks of walking to shut my brain down at least some of the time, another two weeks of rest to recover physically enough to consider returning to the factory and a fifth week to be able to constructively consider what going back means and how I can change things to take care of myself while still getting the job done.

I’ve learned some things through the act of taking myself away from the workplace:

I work with some absolutely lovely people who’ve regularly checked in with me in a supportive and unpressurising way
Care from a professional business perspective is rarely personal – at the end of the day, I am responsible for how I feel at work
There is no ‘right’ amount of time for recovery – no matter what my preconceived time is, it takes as long as it takes

I’ve highlighted stress at work previously relating to my workload with my current and previous managers, but it’s nearly impossible to have someone help with prioritising when I have no idea what’s on the list to start with because I’m too busy to sit down and make the list because there’s too much on the list so I’ve no time to sit and generate the list so…you get the picture.

I wanted to be able to return to work, whenever that was, able to have a constructive conversation with my manager about steps we could take so I didn’t feel like this again. In my first week off I spent some time going through my calendar for the previous month listing all the meetings I had and whether my attendance was mandatory, including meeting length and prep time. If I worked only my standard working hours (which I think is the preferred for everyone, especially when you’re not paid overtime!) these meetings and prepping for them took up 54% of my working time. The content of these meetings probably isn’t more than 30% of my job. Doing this exercise I was able to easily see which could be cut, redelegated to someone else, reduced in frequency and have a proposal which reduces my meeting associated time to 32% of my working month.

As well as giving me a framework for discussions, this exercise made me feel justified in feeling as overwhelmed and tired as I have been: this was not a sustainable situation without working several hours of overtime sometimes daily for the rest of my working life if nothing changed, and I’m not willing to do that (judge me as you will for that!). This helped me feel more accepting of being off work: space in my head to take the time I needed without judging myself for doing so and writing myself off as weak or incompetent.

The Seeds of Minimalism

If you prefer to listen than read, push play!

For my husband’s 30th birthday a few years ago I booked us into a small cottage in Jedburgh for a night. It was a small single-storey property with one bedroom, a hallway, living room, kitchen and bathroom. It didn’t even have space for a dining room table for two – just a breakfast bar with stools along one wall of the small kitchen. Going to a property with only the essentials and a few creature comforts, be it a caravan, hotel or holiday home always seems to make life look so much simpler, and while we were there I was wondering why people didn’t live in such a small properties anymore – or even (without any real urge to do so), could we? Houses seem to be getting bigger even as households get smaller but they don’t seem to feel any more spacious.

What had struck me was the absolute lack of clutter. The property was set up for short-term stays; there were no bottles in the bathroom because the owner brought them in when they cleaned it and took them away again. There was no storage space for hobbies, winter coats, formal wear – it had room for the everyday essentials and that was it. Did it make me want to sell my detatched house and move to a one bedroom flat in the country? No. Did I come home wondering how I could get that low-stress holiday feel in my own home? Definitely. Even before knowing what minimalism was, that seed and craving for less clutter in my home was planted and things started to move slowly out the door.

Welcome!

Hi, I’m Sarah. I love writing and exploring outdoors. Join me on my juggling journey as I try to learn balance between work and home, passion and obligations through minimalism, changing habits and positive endeavour.

You can find out more About Me here.

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