Unplug.

Wow. Friday. It couldn’t come fast enough for me. What about you? Were you also counting the seconds? Or maybe your week was infinitely better and you are all good. If so, I’m happy for you. If not, and you are feeling as I am, then I’m sending you a virtual hug.

I want to wrap up this week by talking about the concept of rebooting or restarting. I’ve talked about this, I’m sure of it, but it is so connected to what we’ve been chatting about that I have to dip back into this pool of goodness again.

A reboot is not unlike a pause or a breath. Taking those moments to look at something anew gives you an opportunity to be more measured about your approach. Approach to what, you ask?

Well, let’s go back to what we’ve chatted about this week, shall we? Basically, I have been feeling disconnected lately. I described that the disconnection I’ve been feeling was “solved” or I attempted to solve it, as many do, by throwing myself into everything else. I avoided getting to the root of my disconnect because it felt too stressful. I feel overwhelmed by everything, the results of my exploration could be scary, and I wasn’t sure that I was ready to actually take action on anything (thus the exercise would be moot). This is common af too. Many of us seek ways to alleviate the anxiety that we feel and often those methods do not include attacking the source of that anxiety. We will and wish it away instead of doing the work.

Yesterday I expanded on the notion that part of the fix for disconnection can be fostering unhealthy connections with others. We seek a way to dull the pain we are feeling. Of course, the way in which we are approaching the situation will likely lead to pain down the road, but we are willing to accept that pain at a later date, knowing that we feel okay right now. Ya know, hit the button for the morphine drip now and deal with the real pain later.

I’m not judging that position because clearly I’ve been there. There is something to be said for that too. Sometimes we need a break before we dive into the great unknown. Sometimes we need to indulge the fantasy of a fix before we accept the reality of the brokenness. The idea is to not break from the exercise FOREVER, but rather to step back long enough to ready yourself for the journey.

You might be guessing that this is where the unplugging occurs. Right? Yup. This is THE PLACE. What I am going to ask of you is that you make the choice to reboot and structure that decision so that it best serves you. Meaning, you don’t let yourself be carried away in the moment and ease into some sort of permanent sense of disconnectedness. That usually manifests in depression and a whole host of other issues (I’ve been there) and so, I would strongly encourage you away from that particular decision. My disclaimer, of course, is that sometimes the choice is made for us and we find ourselves lost. It happens. We need some help at that point, and hopefully help is near and available. For many of us, there is a choice and thus, I am encouraging you to just do it.

What does that look like? Well, first you identify that something feels a bit off for you. You recognize the disconnect or maybe you notice the behavior you are engaging in as a response to the disconnect. Either way, it doesn’t matter. I’ll be honest, for me, this isn’t something really incredibly obvious. At all. It’s rather subtle. I just feel off. Spacy. Sad. Just a little left of normal (or my normal at least). I feel like I’m going through the motions but I’m not fully experiencing anything around me. I feel a low level of anxiety just humming within me, at all times. Nothing that is attributable to one thing in particular, but just there, waiting, nagging.

Maybe you don’t feel anything. That’s possible. You may have no idea at all that things are off with you. That means you have disconnected from yourself too. Many levels of separation are existing simultaneously. That’s why I would encourage you to go through this exercise I’m about to describe periodically, no matter what your situation is and how you are feeling. It will not hurt you. It will only help you. You will only begin climbing towards a better place from HERE (or there).

How do you reboot? Well you have to first stop talking to people. I know that sounds strange, but it’s true. You have to stop gabbing about every little thing to every person that you talk to. Maybe you don’t talk to many people. That’s okay. You also need to disconnect from social media. Bear in mind that this is a quick fix. This is not something you are going to do for a year.

There are other things you have to stop doing but that is going to be very specific to who you are as a human. I can’t really tell you that. You have to look at the things that soak up your attention and you have to take a few steps away from them. It may be for an hour or a day or a week or a month. Again, this is very specific to you. You have to do it for long enough so that you can mostly clear your head. I say mostly because we often can’t clear our heads completely and that’s okay. I just need you to clear it as much as possible. That’s all. Just enough so that rational and complete thoughts can creep in. Just enough so that you can start to really ask yourself what’s bothering you and so you can feel calm enough to do something about it.

I am not suggesting this is easy. It’s not. It’s very very hard. But it’s just the beginning of this journey. That’s all. Just breathe, take a step back, and then we can start to step forward again.

We will continue next week, so no worries.

Have a great weekend y’all.

L.