Boiling water for tea is a good thing, except when it’s too much.
And when it’s too much, it’s not a good thing, because it’s too much.
Let me explain.
- At our office, we don’t use the harsh overhead flourescent lights in the counselling rooms. My thinking is that uncovering and exposing parts of oneself is hard enough without feeling like you are under glaring floodlights. So the overhead lights are off, and there is much more muted and soft lighting from several floor and desk lamps about each of the counselling offices.
- In the cooler months, our offices feel the chill. We have two outside walls, being a corner office, and the heating from the building’s heaters don’t warm it up enough. So we have space heaters in each office and the main area. People are feeling “on edge” often when they come to see us…so trying to warm up the environment and increase the cozy factor is important. (Which all sounds so altruistic…to be frank…it’s hard for me to facilitate good therapy with a client when my teeth are chattering and my fingers are cold, so it works for me, too)
- Melanie, our office manager, likes to work under the fluorescents, so they are on in the main office area where she is. However, she also has a desk lamp on her desk. Our fabulous interior designer, Robyn, reports that research says that a person is 30% more productive with a desk lamp. I’m all over research…thus the lamp. The “30%” has become something of office lore.
- Our administration space is, ahem, very efficient in its use of space (which is another way of saying a terribly cramped). So our “kitchen” is contained in a piece of furniture that was originally built as an armoire. We use the lower drawers for office supplies, and what would normally hold a television now is the “kitchen”–it holds a little fridge, our microwave and kettle.
So…with the lamps on in the counselling room, on Melanie’s desk, the fridge going, and now in fall, the space heaters…when we plug in the kettle...all at once, it goes dark and silent.
The breaker pops because we are drawing too much power on a circuit.
And Melanie makes a dash to the breaker panel to bring the lights back on in the therapy session next door.
By Christmas, Melanie will have retrained us…before we put the kettle on, we unplug the heater and announce to her that we will be decreasing her efficiency (temporarily) by 30%.
The kettle itself is not the problem. The heaters’ seasonal use is not the problem. The lamps aren’t the problem.
The problem is having too many of them drawing power all at once from a system that has finite levels of capability…and exceeding that capability.
Exhaustion has become something of a status symbol in our culture. When people say, “How are you?”, one of the common (and unfortunately, respected) answers is “Really busy” or “Really tired” or “stressed”.
How is it that we, as a culture, esteem those who are maxed out?
Somewhere along the line, people determine their value on their level of productivity…and with our very value on the line, folks exhaust themselves to prove how valuable they are, maybe even indispensable.
When a person’s value is based on their productivity, exhaustion is the logical, even inevitable, outcome.
There is a cost to relationships when either or both partners are exhausted. Some circuit breakers somewhere breaks at some point, because too much is just. too. much.
I had a conversation with a colleague lately who wryly commented that breaking her arm had been the best thing that could have happened to her marriage this summer. She couldn’t golf with her buddies, nobody asked her to sub for the baseball team, she couldn’t take on new projects in the yard, and so on…because of her injury, be necessity, she had to just be.
She was less exhausted because she didn’t/couldn’t have as much on her “to do” list…and with the extra time and the extra “gas in her tank”, she and her husband had a renaissance of sorts in their relationship. They spent time walking in the neighborhood, got hooked on a series on Netflix that they would watch together (and dissect after). They cooked together and ate together more than they had in years.
And she loved it.
Years ago, my insurance agent encouraged me to purchase “catastrophic illness insurance” so that if I contracted any number of serious medical illnesses, I would be immediately entitled to a large cash payment. While it could be used towards unexpected medical expenses, he said that many people had life changing mind-set changes, where they might want to take a trip with their families, or cut back on how hard they were working. He noted that in the face of catastrophic illness, there was often a shift in priorities towards relationships and creating memories…that this insurance could accomodate for by allowing a person to pull back from their financial obligations.
I was horrified, and still am–at this thought.
One of my most heartfelt prayers for my life is that I would not need a “wake up call” like a catastrophic illness to be fully alive to the relationships that are important to me.
The little important things…the little touch of romance with lighting a candle for the meal, cutting a blossom and bringing it inside to put in a vase, rubbing sore feet at the end of the day, or drawing a hot bath for a spouse…these little things are important…but can so easily get lost in the midst of the busy-ness. Those little expressions of kindness and care take time and energy…which often does not exist in our maxed-out culture.
Checking Facebook (and YouTube, and Twitter, and email and a blog and the news highlights and…), taking on another project at work, accepting the promotion, figuring out how to move to a bigger house, enrolling the kids in one more sport, agreeing to one more committee…all of these can put us into situations where we max out the circuit and somethings gotta give.
None of these are bad…in fact, all of them are good…but the stress on the system is HUGE.
For some couples, therapy serves as the one place in the week where they are able to be 100% focused on each other. Where they have a chance to listen deeply, and the only opportunity to feel heard (and valued and appreciated) by their partner. The rest of the week is too much of a scramble…no other time possible to simply sit quietly with each other, and focus on themselves as a couple.
I think sometimes folks put investing in their marriage “on hold” when things get busy, and promise themselves that they will tend to it, when they can, later….if later ever comes. When the circuit is too full, even full of good stuff, the breaker can turn it all off.
It’s heartbreaking to watch a couple come in with their marriage in serious crisis simply because there have been far too many draws of energy.
A marriage cannot survive unlimited additions of tasks, interests, distractions and stressors–even good things…any relationship will collapse under the onslaught of prolonged overscheduling.
The breaker will pop.
How much power are you drawing off? Let me tell you that I have personally witnessed folks who have spent years driving their children around to many lessons and practices, had gruelling work schedules to generate enough income for a certain standard of living. Folks run themselves into the ground, “for the sake of the family”.
Your family wants you even more than they want your raise. Your spouse wants your time and energy and investment more than they want a new car or an expensive vacation. Your children may complain if they can’t get the newest gaming system, but that pain pales in comparison to not having you be an engaged parent playing in the yard or cheering from the bleachers.
If your partner draws you over to read this, take this as a warning shot across the bow.
Have a discussion about how to recalibrate your energies, and decide what to choose to take out of your life before life makes decisions for you. Know that you are loved and you are valued…your family wants you. Know that too much of a good thing is too much…and you could lose the important as you get distracted by the urgent.
So…here’s a little fun assignment. Find a list of values of personal/family priorities like this one and on your own, or as a family, decide what your priorities are. Then evaluate the last several days to determine in which way your energies were aligned with your values, and in which ways your energies were going to values that are not amongst your core values. What changes need to be made so that your energy distribution aligns with your core values?
Unplug from that which doesn’t line up with what is most important to you…so you aren’t in danger of popping the fuse!
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