We Are *Not* Okay

In this week's Hard Stop, I am sharing the Introduction to the book. I'd love to hear if you resonate with Jane in this intro (or John). If you want to see more after "There is a Better Way" section, click on the link in the comments. Or, if you get this in your email inbox, you can go to ginaboedeker.com and download a sample.

I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments:

Meet Jane.

Jane works all day as a health care director at a hospital.?

This morning, like yesterday morning, the morning before that, and the morning before that— every morning that she can remember, really—she wakes up tired. She had a long night of tossing and turning; the upcoming day’s responsibilities were on her mind as she struggled to get just a little bit more much-needed sleep. She quickly showers, gets dressed, quickly brushes through her hair, and slaps on some makeup before running downstairs. She yells at her kids to get up, get moving, and runs through the house getting their things together so they will be on time for the bus, grabbing her bag so she, too, can make it to work on time. En route to her office, she runs through a drive-through coffee shop for the necessary triple shot espresso and a muffin.

At work, she’s running on adrenaline, yet tired. It’s hard to stay awake. She is in back-to-back meetings all morning, she has a big project deadline coming up, and hasn’t had a moment to think about it, much less work on it, given her Zoom and in-person meeting marathons. She grabs some takeout that she wolfs down during a meeting, liberally turning off the camera when she needs to chew, and starts to feel the impact of her restless sleep. So, after lunch, she picks up another coffee and a sweet from the break room to get through the rest of the afternoon.

She spends the afternoon working on her imminent deadline, but has to run out right at 4:30 to get her kids to their music lessons. While out, she grabs her drycleaning and picks up some things she needs for dinner. She preps dinner and, while it’s cooking in the oven, she walks around, picking up legos, books, and discarded socks (everywhere!) in the effort of combatting the tidal wave of messiness for one more day. She sits to eat dinner with her family, cleans up all the dishes and puts the kitchen back in order, gets the kids to begrudgingly brush their teeth, get ready for bed, and turn off devices.?

By the time she looks at the clock, it’s 9:15 and she’s fall-down tired, but too wired to sleep, and she hasn’t had a moment to herself all day—not to mention time to spend with her partner. So, she pours a glass of wine, logs into Netflix to watch her newest series obsession, and spends some “quality time” with her partner. Before she knows it, she wakes up at midnight, having fallen asleep on the couch while watching her show. She gets up, washes her face, brushes her teeth, and falls down onto her bed, but she’s woken up enough now that her mind is racing with thoughts about everything she has to do tomorrow. She tosses and turns, thinks about the upcoming day, and pleads to whatever in the universe is out there listening to please just give her a few hours of precious sleep.?

Then she does it again the next day.

Jane is in trouble. She’s in a cycle that’s harming her health and impacting the quality of her life and that of those around her. But here is the kicker. On paper, she has everything she has always wanted. She has a good job, a loving partner, two kids, a beautiful home, friends (that she doesn’t get to see enough, but she has them), and a supportive extended family. She “has it all.”?

But, she doesn’t feel that way. She doesn’t feel much of anything. She’s too rushed. Too tired. Going through the motions too much to stop and assess what’s working, what’s not working, where she is, where she wants to go.

I’ve been Jane. Maybe you have. Maybe you feel like her now. And in speaking with so many people over the years about this topic, I’ve met so many Janes (and a lot of Johns). We’re everywhere. We’re tired. We’re burned out. We’re running on fumes.?

Are you going from activity to activity, meeting to meeting, responsibility to responsibility at such a pace that you barely have time to come up for air, take a pause, and ask yourself, “Is there a better way? And, if there is a better way (there is!—we’ll get there shortly), how in the heck do I get there?”

If so, this book is for you. And you get to that “better way” by doing this. Pausing. Taking time for yourself. Reading this book. Doing the exercises. This is your start. You’ll also get there by stopping thought patterns, habits, and routines that are getting in your way. You get there by acknowledging where you are and where you want to go. I know that not one more thing can fit on your to-do list. I know you’re exhausted. You’re struggling, and you simply cannot take on one more thing.?

You don’t have to.?

There Is Another Way?

(To see more about the other way, download the sample and I'll let you know when the book launches in a few weeks!)