Most Monday afternoons, I head over to my sister’s place and hang out with my nephew, Little Man Q. Yesterday was an exceptionally beautiful day so I decided I was going to run the few kilometers between my house and theirs. I threw on my running gear, sunscreened my face, grabbed my sunglasses and my spare house key, punched in the alarm code, and headed out the door. Only once the door had shut and locked itself behind me did I realize that the usual bunch of keys I lug around with me (purposely left behind because they are a little too bulky to run with) was hanging out oh so inconveniently on the other side of the door. And then I realized that the fact that there was a key in the lock on the inside of the door meant that I wouldn’t be able to use a key in the lock on the outside of the door. I tried to tell myself- rather unconvincingly- that maybe, just maybe, this was a super special, magical, opens-from-any-side-anytime kind of a door. I placed the key in the lock, held my breath, and tried to turn it. Sure enough, it wouldn't budge. Then I tried to tell myself that maybe it was simply the key. I mean, it had been a little finicky lately. Perhaps I just needed to try another spare key. No matter what kind of a door this was or what kind of super special spare key might open it, I decided to head to my sister’s as originally planned. She was expecting me, after all, and she had the other spare key, plus a phone I could borrow since mine was (also oh so inconveniently) on the other side of the door.
As I jogged to my sister's place (at an increasingly pathetic pace), rather than enjoy the beautiful route alongside farms and wineries and fields in bloom- as I’d originally intended, I spent those 4 kilometres engaging in some pretty unfriendly self-talk.
“This is so typical of you. Only you could do something like this.”
“How could you remember to put the alarm on and not take the keys out of the door?”
“You were rushing again. Why didn’t you just leave earlier?”
And on and on and on it went.
By the time I reached my sister, I was sweaty and flustered and irritable. She lent me her key, her phone, and her bicycle, and on the 15-minute bike ride back home, all the self-criticism originally centred around the incident of the key swelled and festered to include anxiety and judgment about every unfinished task on my May Break To Do list- every email that hadn't been written, every essay that was not yet marked, every burnt-out light bulb in the house that hadn’t yet been changed, my incomplete Canadian tax return, the toppling pile of papers to be filed, the dust bunnies behind the couch, pretty much anything unfinished, forgotten or overdue.
And on and on and on it went.
After trying the second spare key, which obviously didn't work, I called a locksmith and waited for him to kindly come and break into my house. That half hour of waiting allowed me enough time to think of every ounce of energy and time I’d ever wasted on silly, careless, totally avoidable mistakes like this, and every penny I'd wasted on fixing silly mistakes like this, or because I'd been late with a bill or because I'd forgotten to send in a health insurance form or because I hadn't read a sign properly and gotten a parking ticket. By the time the locksmith arrived, my anxiety had reached a level that was almost palpable. While he worked away, I paced and hovered and apologized and even offered up convoluted, alternative ways of getting into the house that involved less violent jiggling and kicking of my front door. Finally, at one point, this calm, kind, sixty-something gentleman stopped, looked at me, smiled, and said, “Rustig, meid. Het komt allemaal goed.” (Pretty much "Chill, girl. It''s all good.")
He was right. I needed to chill out. It was all going to be okay. This was not the end of the world. 100 euros and three hours of my day- it could have been much, much worse.
Still, I had trouble resisting the temptation to delve even deeper into my memory in search of further evidence of my incurable idiocy. On my post-break-in bike ride back to my sister's, I spent those first few minutes sighing, rolling my eyes, and shaking my head as I steeped some more in the afternoon's long and generous dose of self-criticism.
And then finally it hit me: entropy.
Just a few weeks ago, I had been reviewing the topic of energy with one of my classes. While I am no real scientist, what I know is this: when the sun shines down on the leaves of the plants below, not all of that solar energy is used in the photosynthetic process. Some of it gets absorbed by the earth or reflected back into the atmosphere. And when that plant grows big and strong and a rabbit comes along and feasts on its leaves, not every drop of energy produced by that plant gets transferred to Thumper. And when coal or oil is burned to produce energy for us to use in our homes, there is always incomplete combustion, always energy that gets "lost" as heat.
Basically, what I realized is that if plants and animals and the sun in the sky can't fully and completely transfer 100% of their energy productively, what makes me think that I, an unpredictable, sentient and complex being, can do that? It is foolish to expect that every cent of my pay cheque can be accounted for, and that every minute I'm awake can be maximized and used "productively". That is simply not the way it works. The universe is set up in such a way that in every transfer and transformation of energy, a little gets lost. That's just the way it is. I'm going to make these kinds of mistakes, and no matter how hard I try, there are going to be days when I wake up late, or have a bad night sleep, or get the flu, or forget my lunch on the counter. C'est la vie! And all this time, I've been fighting the natural order of the universe by trying to use my resources with 100% productivity, and then getting mad at myself when I can't, reprimanding myself for "wasting" time and energy and money. I realize that my tendencies towards scatter-brained distractibility mean I might need more of a buffer than some of you hyper-focused lot out there, but even the most organized, efficient, frugal individual cannot control the inevitability of money/time/energy-consuming events like flat tires, stolen wallets, food poisoning, and traffic jams. It's just entropy, the inevitable and steady deterioration of a system.
I also realized that in those moments when I become even more obsessed with productivity, usually in response to one of these incidents, because I feel like I have to make up the time and compensate for my foolishness, the anxiety that ensues usually makes me even more scatter-brained and unfocussed, which makes me even less productive. Then add on top of that the energy used in getting mad at myself, and I end up making things worse rather than better. Finally, we could get all philosophical and ask what it even means to be "productive" and why it is so bloody important. Is my day worth less if I don't accomplish some task on my To Do list? Do I have less value if I am not constantly ProtestantWorkEthic-productive?
The lesson learned then is this: entropy is inevitable. What I can control is my attitude and approach to this inevitability. I can transfer positive energy grounded in the wisdom of acceptance, or I can transfer negative energy fueled by piling on the wouldcouldashouldas.
The choice seems stupidly obvious.
As I jogged to my sister's place (at an increasingly pathetic pace), rather than enjoy the beautiful route alongside farms and wineries and fields in bloom- as I’d originally intended, I spent those 4 kilometres engaging in some pretty unfriendly self-talk.
“This is so typical of you. Only you could do something like this.”
“How could you remember to put the alarm on and not take the keys out of the door?”
“You were rushing again. Why didn’t you just leave earlier?”
And on and on and on it went.
By the time I reached my sister, I was sweaty and flustered and irritable. She lent me her key, her phone, and her bicycle, and on the 15-minute bike ride back home, all the self-criticism originally centred around the incident of the key swelled and festered to include anxiety and judgment about every unfinished task on my May Break To Do list- every email that hadn't been written, every essay that was not yet marked, every burnt-out light bulb in the house that hadn’t yet been changed, my incomplete Canadian tax return, the toppling pile of papers to be filed, the dust bunnies behind the couch, pretty much anything unfinished, forgotten or overdue.
And on and on and on it went.
After trying the second spare key, which obviously didn't work, I called a locksmith and waited for him to kindly come and break into my house. That half hour of waiting allowed me enough time to think of every ounce of energy and time I’d ever wasted on silly, careless, totally avoidable mistakes like this, and every penny I'd wasted on fixing silly mistakes like this, or because I'd been late with a bill or because I'd forgotten to send in a health insurance form or because I hadn't read a sign properly and gotten a parking ticket. By the time the locksmith arrived, my anxiety had reached a level that was almost palpable. While he worked away, I paced and hovered and apologized and even offered up convoluted, alternative ways of getting into the house that involved less violent jiggling and kicking of my front door. Finally, at one point, this calm, kind, sixty-something gentleman stopped, looked at me, smiled, and said, “Rustig, meid. Het komt allemaal goed.” (Pretty much "Chill, girl. It''s all good.")
He was right. I needed to chill out. It was all going to be okay. This was not the end of the world. 100 euros and three hours of my day- it could have been much, much worse.
Still, I had trouble resisting the temptation to delve even deeper into my memory in search of further evidence of my incurable idiocy. On my post-break-in bike ride back to my sister's, I spent those first few minutes sighing, rolling my eyes, and shaking my head as I steeped some more in the afternoon's long and generous dose of self-criticism.
And then finally it hit me: entropy.
Just a few weeks ago, I had been reviewing the topic of energy with one of my classes. While I am no real scientist, what I know is this: when the sun shines down on the leaves of the plants below, not all of that solar energy is used in the photosynthetic process. Some of it gets absorbed by the earth or reflected back into the atmosphere. And when that plant grows big and strong and a rabbit comes along and feasts on its leaves, not every drop of energy produced by that plant gets transferred to Thumper. And when coal or oil is burned to produce energy for us to use in our homes, there is always incomplete combustion, always energy that gets "lost" as heat.
Basically, what I realized is that if plants and animals and the sun in the sky can't fully and completely transfer 100% of their energy productively, what makes me think that I, an unpredictable, sentient and complex being, can do that? It is foolish to expect that every cent of my pay cheque can be accounted for, and that every minute I'm awake can be maximized and used "productively". That is simply not the way it works. The universe is set up in such a way that in every transfer and transformation of energy, a little gets lost. That's just the way it is. I'm going to make these kinds of mistakes, and no matter how hard I try, there are going to be days when I wake up late, or have a bad night sleep, or get the flu, or forget my lunch on the counter. C'est la vie! And all this time, I've been fighting the natural order of the universe by trying to use my resources with 100% productivity, and then getting mad at myself when I can't, reprimanding myself for "wasting" time and energy and money. I realize that my tendencies towards scatter-brained distractibility mean I might need more of a buffer than some of you hyper-focused lot out there, but even the most organized, efficient, frugal individual cannot control the inevitability of money/time/energy-consuming events like flat tires, stolen wallets, food poisoning, and traffic jams. It's just entropy, the inevitable and steady deterioration of a system.
I also realized that in those moments when I become even more obsessed with productivity, usually in response to one of these incidents, because I feel like I have to make up the time and compensate for my foolishness, the anxiety that ensues usually makes me even more scatter-brained and unfocussed, which makes me even less productive. Then add on top of that the energy used in getting mad at myself, and I end up making things worse rather than better. Finally, we could get all philosophical and ask what it even means to be "productive" and why it is so bloody important. Is my day worth less if I don't accomplish some task on my To Do list? Do I have less value if I am not constantly ProtestantWorkEthic-productive?
The lesson learned then is this: entropy is inevitable. What I can control is my attitude and approach to this inevitability. I can transfer positive energy grounded in the wisdom of acceptance, or I can transfer negative energy fueled by piling on the wouldcouldashouldas.
The choice seems stupidly obvious.
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