issue #183 - the one on timing

June 04, 2023

The plans I had for October 2021 were the exact opposite of my reality.

We’re Speaking was about to be released, with a major tour planned. We had finished negotiations of our licensing deal. I thought I was going to be able to transition into a more advisory role on the latter to focus on the book launch, and that things would settle down generally.

The reality was two-fold - incredible and exhausting. I look back on the Instagram posts and I’m still overwhelmed and grateful for everyone’s support and reception of the book. What you didn’t see was me spending my time at home in my parent’s hospital or physical rehab room, falling asleep in my kids’ beds when I was home, really long days of integrating two teams and promoting my book, sleeping too little and eating too much pizza.

All to basically sigh in utter relief when most of December and January’s plans evaporated due to the Omicron surge.

I look back on these hopeful expectations and I laugh. That was the moment I learned that the best laid plans are the ones most likely to go haywire, and that there’s never the right time for anything.

The curveballs of the past quarter (various diagnoses and subsequent doctors’ appointments, the rollercoaster that is drug development, building a new home, increased work travel for both my husband and myself) would make a break impossible. I also have a tendency to project-ize the things I’m processing (it’s apparently a common method of processing hard moments and my therapist has called me in on this), and this response adds more to my plate.

It’s taking an upcoming surgery, a lot of awareness, and my incredible teams at work and home to not lean in to all of this. There are a few phrases from my wise friends that have been keeping me grounded right now:

“Breathe here and be here” (Neeti)“I spent my season of leaning into family life to plant the seeds for this work, and I’m ready to shift into this more active working phase.” (Neha)“Recovering from surgery is NOT a break. You need both. Let’s plan it.” (Komal - she has some limited availability for coaching right now, if you’re looking for one!)

The dinner deliveries also helped - thank you, Leah!

My friends know the way to my heart is by food and modeling healthy boundaries for me. I’m equally grateful for both, and I thought I would share some of the tactical tips that have helped me prepare for my own upcoming pause:

  • Limiting my yeses. I set a deadline of June 16th of when I officially go on leave and say no to anything else for the rest of summer (which I pushed to June 20th, but it’s for an excellent reason). If I said yes to an opportunity that came up between now and then, it had to meet certain criteria (a day I’m already out and the following day is at my desk, something I would give and gain value from, a maximum of 3 events that week). I also asked my team to be my filter for events - if it didn’t meet these requirements, it got an automatic decline with my regrets.

  • Plant the seeds. I have a million ideas that come into insane clarity during my morning meditations - books, speeches, documentary, new product development in and outside of life sciences. I log them in my Notes app after said meditations, and brainstorm in this note when I find myself mindlessly scrolling on social media. This is my method of planting the seeds - documenting my ideas, letting myself daydream about them, jotting down the random ideas that I have about them - and that’s it. There will be a time when I’m ready to cultivate the harvest from those seeds, but now is not that time.

  • Delegate, delegate, delegate. To echo my friend Janna, any work that isn’t contributing to my best and highest use has been assigned to a team member (after checking in that they have the capacity to take it on), or eliminated if it was not urgent and important. What helped me identify these items was doing a 2 week detailed calendar audit (I’d retroactively update my iCal to track what I did every hour, from waking until I settled into bed) and I was slightly horrified to see how much time I did spend putzing around on social media or random Google rabbit holes. Highly recommend her Time Alignment Challenge, if you’re feeling overbooked and overwhelmed and don’t know what to do.

Do you have any tips on preparing and embracing any sort of pause (or recovering from a hysterectomy?). I’d love to hear your advice!

My New Go-To Caregiving Resource (sponsored by Together App)

The conversation in this Instagram post’s comments are filled with so much support and wisdom:

And to continue that conversation, I want to recommend a new resource that’s been a lifesaver to our family.

With physicians, therapists, and pharmacies both in Pennsylvania and New York, managing my parents’ healthcare has been a bit of a mess.

Okay. A LOT of a mess, and an insecure one at that.

Enter the Together App, which has streamlined everything - prescriptions, a centralized place for every practitioners’ contact information, notes from every appointment, vitals monitoring, and meditation management.

And those are just the features I’ve begun to use - there are also communication tools among caregivers and personalized recommendations for these complex diagnoses.

The Together App has become the most-used app among our family - and I’m delighted to have this tool to help care for my family as well as I possibly can. If you have elders you’re caring for, download the app immediately (and you can try it for free!)

For feedback or questions, you can reach out to their co-founder Renee Dua ([email protected])

What We Read This Week

  • Stars and Smoke by Marie Lu - recommended this in last week’s newsletter, and I have yet to disagree with any of her superb book recommendations. If Harry Styles got conscripted into a super secret agency for a very specific mission, it would still not be as good as this book. I love the ease and the depth of this book, and I’m very glad I have an extensive Marie Lu backlist to work through while I wait for a sequel.

  • No Cure For Being Human: (And Other Truths I Need To Hear) by Kate Bowler - God I loved this book. It's a little heavy on Christian theology (which, I guess, what did I expect from a professor of divinity?), but in a way that felt authentic and not at all off-putting. It's an excellent meditation on life and what comes next, and on how we spend our limited time here on earth. A choice quote: "We like to imagine that we are starring in an extended morality play where lessons are learned and the hero never dies. But, in fact, we must make do with the fact that there will be weddings and funerals again this year, and everyone will still spend most of their evenings watching Netflix." Another: "Everybody pretends that you only die once. But that’s not true. You can die to a thousand possible futures in the course of a single, stupid life."

Top #5SmartReads Of The Week

The rest of the week’s reads (and conversations!) are below:

May the upcoming season bring a sense of rest and peace for all of us!

xo,HPN

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