I've been trying, lately, to let myself be tired when I'm tired.
Now, that probably seems simple to a lot of you - you lucky folks who get tired and just... accept it.
But me? Apparently when I'm tired, my natural reaction is to do more.
Which... uh... makes no sense.
I'm going to assume it's at least partly down to the tiger vs. not tiger thing I've talked about before. 😅
I.e. my weird little hooman bean brain thinks we're under attack and/or vulnerable in some way when I'm tired, and pushes me to be alert to the dangers/fight the tiger/whatever.
Disclaimer time! - I am in no way any sort of psychological, medical, or scientific professional. I'm a chick with a blog, nothing more.
I have this tendency, when I'm getting stuff done, of being all-or-nothing.
Like, I'm objectively bad at half-a**ing things. 😅
If I'm gonna do something, I will throw myself 6000% into it.
And I've been working hard (ironically) for quite a while to make sure I don't work too hard.
Convincing myself that I don't have to go the extra mile in everything I do, because there isn't enough time or energy to do everything all of the time.
But... I get excited. About what I'm doing.
Which is nice! Obviously. It's great to enjoy what you're doing.
But that makes it so much easier to go overboard because, well, I'm enjoying the thing - you can't be exhausted from doing something you enjoy, right?
Wrong. It's so easy to overdo things.
You might enjoy dancing, but if you do it for an hour straight without even pausing for a drink of water, you are going to feel it, y'know? You're gonna be tired, no matter how much you enjoyed it.
I've been going easier on myself (...I think, anyways, it's hard to tell sometimes.)
I've been more aware of the fact that I am human (or so they tell me,) and that humans are not built for over-extending ourselves.
Especially not humans with long standing health problems, which in my case is mostly migraines - which are exhausting, and Depression/Anxiety - which is exhausting.
Basically, I've had to remind myself that it's OK to be tired, just because I'm tired.
There doesn't need to be a reason that I can point to and be like: This! This is why I'm tired!
Because there really doesn't need to be situations where I 'should' or 'shouldn't' be tired. I'm tired or I'm not, simple as.
Apart from everything else... *gestures towards the world at large*
Life is tiring.
Life since 2016 has been very tiring.
Life since 2020 has been exceptionally tiring.
And that's OK. We really need to realise that living through turbulent periods in history (which I think we can all agree this is,) is pretty damned exhausting!
And I've been trying (trying!) not to fight the tiredness, and to just... let myself be tired.
I seem to tense up a lot when I'm tired, as if it'll help me stay more alert or something? I don't know exactly what my brain thinks it's doing with that, but it does it.
The result tends to be more exhaustion on top of exhaustion.
...Being exhausted is exhausting 😅
Don't get me wrong - there are times when you're tired where pushing through is a good way to wake yourself up and get going, and it's all fine.
But there's times when all it's doing is sapping your limited energy reserves further, and causing the part of your brain that's yelling 'I'm tired!' to take up more and more of your brain power.
And that's... not great.
(When I'm very tired I also turn into a Victorian dictionary and babble a lot. If I ever sound like I'm from the 19th Century, and won't shut up, then I probably wrote that post when I was freaking running on empty!)
And I've gotten myself into numerous cycles where I push through just for the sake of pushing through.
Where I push through when I should rest.
Where I push through purely because I 'should' push through because I 'shouldn't' be tired.
So I'm trying (again and again,) to not do that.
To acknowledge that I'm feeling a little tired and rest, or, at the very least, focus on tasks where I can potter around and take it easy,
Being tired doesn't make you lazy, or worthless, or in some way deficient as a person.
Being tired just means that you're human, and you're tired.
That's all.
Rest well, dearest nerdlets!
Did any of this make the slightest sense?
Talk to me! 😅💬
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I can relate to this. I get angry at myself for being tired, but then I realize I've only been sleeping 3 or 4 hours a night because I'm doing too much stuff. No wonder I'm tired.
ReplyDeleteLol, being human is such an inconvenience, right? ;)
DeleteThis totally makes sense, Cee! And I think somewhat relates to the comment you left on my burn-out post about sometimes not being able to differentiate burn-out from just general tiredness. I hope you get the rest and relaxation you deserve!
ReplyDeleteYeah... I'm not great at the differentiating! Like I said, for some reason when I'm tired, my brain's like, 'woohoo let's do some sh**!' and I'm not always thinking clearly enough to click that that's what I'm doing!
DeleteThanks Em - you too! :)