This post was originally sent through my author newsletter on October 14th, 2022. To subscribe to my newsletter and receive up-to-date news, musings, and more, click HERE.
Last weekend, I flew to Nashville to visit my sister, brother-in-law, and niece. Unusually for me, it was a trip without a specific purpose. What I mean by that is, it wasn't for work. It wasn't a major holiday. I wasn't going to see a show or attend an event. At most, it was a birthday present to myself: a weekend away from home, away from responsibilities. I went to spend time with family. I went to be a little lazy.
I'm not very good at letting myself be lazy.
My niece still naps for a couple hours in the middle of the day. Normally, when my daughter is having "quiet time" (in quotes because she does not nap anymore, and is generally far from quiet...), I find myself scrambling to be productive. I can do an hour of work! I can unload and reload the dishwasher! I can chop vegetables for dinner later! But this past weekend, while my niece was napping...I was lazy. My sister and I watched many, many episodes of "Nailed It: Halloween" on Netflix. We snacked. We lounged.
Not doing anything was really nice. It also made me sleepy. It also made me antsy. (I contain multitudes.)
I'm writing this because, now that I'm back in Brooklyn and back to my busy routine, I can't stop thinking about those relatively lazy days. Those days when I wasn't asking anything of myself other than to be.
I feel so much pressure to go, go, go. There is always work to be done. There are chapters to write and emails to send and appointments to schedule and chores to finish and errands to run and far too often, what I call downtime is actually the precious minutes in between the to-dos. Does the walk to school pickup actually count as a break? Is showering between big work tasks actually as much of a reboot as it sometimes feels? What would happen if I just...sat?
Not sat and folded laundry. Not sat and scrolled Instagram, thinking about book promo. Just...sat.
Could I do that more often? Should I?
Another thing that's been on my mind is that, for the past two weeks, I've kind of fallen off the Instagram wagon. For reference, since about March, I've been trying to post multiple times a week, on a schedule. I've got my book recommendations. My daughter's book recommendations. My book promo posts. Non-bookish content. Thoughtful selfies. Reels. There's a spreadsheet. When I started ramping up my social media efforts this spring, it was about further establishing my brand. (A phrase I cannot read without hearing it in the contact lens commercial guy's voice...) It was also about becoming comfortable trying new things, like sharing videos. It actually wasn't that hard to get into the rhythm of posting more, especially once I had the spreadsheet and could plan ahead. Maybe you noticed my uptick in grid posts and Stories. Or maybe you didn't, because Instagram's algorithm is increasingly hard to crack. ;)
Regardless, I was doing great! Until the past two weeks.
And I've been beating myself up a bit about not following my schedule. About letting things slip. About being...lazy.
I'm going to try to get back to regular postings next week, because I do think it's good for my author life to be relatively active online. But—and this is a big but—I also want to take the time to notice that okay, maybe I burned out a little. Maybe my sudden lack of enthusiasm or motivation meant something. Maybe, just maybe...I needed a break!
(I definitely needed a break.)
Are you good at being lazy? What are your signs that you need to take some steps back? How do you Get Stuff Done without running yourself ragged? These are some things I'm thinking about as we head deeper into fall, and as I hopefully shift from wearing my author hat more than my writer hat to the opposite. Perhaps, in the months ahead, I can find a new kind of balance—one that makes room for a bit of laziness.
~Kathryn
(Below: The "Batman Building" in Nashville.)
What I'm:
Reading: I read the next two books in the Roni Loren romance series I started last week: What If You & Me and For You & No One Else. Super fun, super romantic. My sister also gave me Rivals, the third book in the American Royals series by Katharine McGhee, so that's next in my queue!
Watching: Nothing I haven't mentioned before, but can I say that both "Rings of Power" and "House of the Dragon" are killing it right now?
Eating: I have a hankering to bake something pumpkin-spice-y... if you have a good recipe for pumpkin cake or cupcakes or something similar, please let me know! Especially if there is cream cheese frosting involved.
Loving: The skeleton onesie I bought for Halloween, to match my daughter's spooky princess costume (complete with rib-cage on the bodice). But you're going to have to wait for Halloween to see those pictures, so in the meantime, here is a picture of my daughter's stuffed pup, Pup, on the plane last weekend. She sent him with me in case I missed her and needed a snuggle. :)
