The Simple Sophisticate - Intelligent Living Paired with Signature Style
Education:Self-Improvement
"To embrace leisure, we don't have to let go of progress. [Our] constant pushing is now impeding our progress. We work best when we allow for flexibility in our habits . . . [w]e can and must stop treating ourselves like machines that can be driven and pumped and amped and hacked. Instead of limiting and constraining our essential natures, we can celebrate our humanness at work and in idleness. We can better understand our own natures and abilities. We can lean in not to our work but to our inherent gifts." —Celeste Headlee Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing , and Underliving
For the past 10 weeks I have had the good fortune to go to work with both of my dogs. Why? Because I have been working from home.
I am able to take them for a short walk about the neighborhood before I step into my office and remote classroom, then take a break around 10:30 am as we sit on the garden porch, soaking in some sunshine and thinking about what I might want to enjoy for lunch in a few hours time. Lunch is leisurely because I can cook it, savor it, not be rushed to eat it or interrupted and our afternoon outing after about 70-90 minutes of work after lunch is to the mailbox and about the neighborhood. Returning to the office if need be to tie up loose ends, check my work email one more time (I only check my school email three times a day), when the day concludes, I am not exhausted, but I do feel productive.
Admittedly, the scenario I shared above is due to an unwanted global occurrence, and I miss my in-person connections with my students and colleagues, but what I do not miss is the excessive expectation to always be checking my email, regularly being interrupted so that I lose my focus/students' focus and requirement for a long inflexible work day (meaning not healthy breaks, a constant expectation of being "on"), and being rewarded for giving more beyond the work day even if it reduces the quality of my home life and personal relationships.
I am not complaining directly about a system that surrounds so many of us, but trying to be honest about the reality of why I was quietly thankful to have the time at home these past 10 weeks to catch my breath. I did my best to examine why, and while the emotional toll for those of us fortunate enough not to have our health and livelihoods taken away was unhealthy and exhausting, overall, I found great refuge and restoration this spring whilst staying at home, finding a schedule that worked for me as I continued to remotely teach and blog and just be home.
I also found much more time to read books that have been patiently sitting in my shopping cart, and two books furthered my exploration into how exactly improve the working environment when we begin to step back into the workplace. I have a few ideas to share in today's podcast episode.
Visit the full Show Notes on The Simply Luxurious Life — thesimplyluxuriouslife.com/podcast283324: 13 Ideas for Being Extraordinary at the Ordinary
323: The Art of Savoring: 6 Everyday Moments to Savor, Part Deux
322: Everyday Parisian Blogger, Rebecca Plotnick on Traveling to Paris during Covid
321: 9 Tips for Resetting into a Life Rhythm to Harmonize with Your Life's Desired Composition
320: What If . . . This Was the Year It All Came Together? Are You Ready?
319: How to Trust, How to Be Trustworthy and How Understanding Both Will Transform Your Entire Life
318: How to Become A Secure Adult in Relationships
317: How to Handle Travel Plans that Go Awry
316: How to Cultivate A Life Full of Vitality (and how it contributes to your overall well-being)
315: Being in Love, Being HSP and Being at Peace with Ourselves and the One We Love
314: Dive Deep into Life Instead of Paddling on the Surface
313: The Importance of Finding Meaning in Life: 9 Lessons taught by Viktor E. Frankl
312: The New Hello, my conversation with The Confidence Project founder Tracy Hooper
311: How Accepting Your Mortality Sets You Free to Live More Deeply
Season 8 Schedule of the Podcast Announced
310: Murder in Provence, M.L. Longworth Talks about Her Series Coming to BritBox
309: Let's Travel to Paris! My Discussion with Paris Perfect Vacation Rentals' Founder Madelyn Byrne
308: 15 Ideas for Welcoming Provence Style into Your Home & Garden
307: How to Step into your Fullest True Self — The Way of Integrity, as taught by Martha Beck
306: 25 British Petit Plaisirs (and a new category for all of TSLL's Simple Pleasures)
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