Backpacks and Barbells

I’ve been away from a standard working environment for four months.  Sounds like forever, right?  Shoot — I used to think one week away from work felt like a long time. Four months?  Surely, I would’ve changed the world by now. Or at least traveled it. Started a few businesses. Something substantial. Well, folks, I haven’t. And honestly, I’m still months away from being on the other side of this discovery. Am I making a pretty drastic change? Yes — maybe more drastic than most.  But before my last day, I had several people tell me, “Expect it to take way longer than you think — at least six months.” I brushed it off. No. Freaking. Way. First of all, I move fast and basically had it all figured out before I left (HA!). Plus, I couldn’t imagine going without an income for that long. Two months. That’s all it would take. Welp. This process is taking way longer than I expected. And I say “process” like I fully understand it — I don’t.  I have no idea what co...

I’ve done a lot of experimenting with productivity mindsets and tools. Initially, it was all about producing more in less time—because as an executive and mom of three, there never seemed to be enough hours in the day. But what I eventually realized was that I didn’t need tactics to produce more in less time—I was actually craving space for deeper work . I needed to step out of the constant barrage of urgent-but-not-important tasks and focus on the work that truly moved the ball forward. Emails. Teams messages. Back-to-back meetings. Adding the missed comma in a deck for tomorrow’s meeting. By the time lunch rolled around, my brain was fried—leaving no room for the big rocks that actually mattered. And that includes time with my family. I’ve explored all the strategies. There was even a phase where I took cold showers before big meetings to ride the wave of adrenaline for focus and attention. ( Spoiler alert: I like hot showers, and those meetings weren’t that important. ) I’...

Now that my days aren’t consumed by minute-to-minute activity, I’ll have these moments of “A-HA” and realize many of the confines I’ve been operating in for decades are self-constructed. It’s as if I’m living confined in a narrow hallway and when I finally get the courage to turn one of the creeky knobs …not only does the door open, the entire structure that I thought I existed in fades away—poof. freedom to create, build, work in a way that is freeing. A few of the big ones recently: Relearning weekends are just days. My entire concept of balance was based on not working weekends. But Saturday is just a day. Tuesday is just a day. It’s freeing to work when there is energy to work. Rest when I’m tired and not worry if it’s M-F or between the hours of 8-6. Remembering that I don’t have to be sitting at a computer to be making forward progress. For so long, my entire work life lived in this tiny screen. I recently had this moment of “I don’t have to do that.” I can go have coffees...

For those that have followed me for a while, you know I love #data, especially about health, fitness, wellbeing. Over the last several years I’ve tracked my stress score on my Garmin and made note of the external factors happening at the time. I’ve watched that score after making changes to my exercise routines, sleep habits, work schedule, social media usage, etc. In 2024, the highest average stress score was right around the time I was making the decision to leave Credera - those few weeks when I sat on the fence of stay or go. The lowest was after reworking my daily schedule to create more focus time in my day and prioritize 8 hours of sleep. My average score over the last three weeks exceeded anything in 2024 by a long shot. I’ve shared some of this in a previous post, but as I’ve been deciding my path forward, my mind has been so chaotic - the window completely foggy. While there was without a doubt a pull to continue exploring The Athlete Identity Project, I was also simultane...