To preface this, I get and am thankful for these ‘first world problems.’  Nevertheless, these are now top of mind for me so even though they likely appear frivolous to many, they still occupy my brain enough to put them on paper.

I’m all about getting tasks done – big and small goals I never stop setting for myself.  Learn Spanish, finish planning a weekend away, set up a babysitter for next week, and so on. All filed neatly away in my ‘done’ folder driving internal satisfaction.  This week though, I accomplished the biggest goal of all – I went to see ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ at 12:20pm on a Tuesday.

It was a brilliantly liberating milestone that is worthy of a post in it of itself.  As with everything in life, I approached this year with clear plans underscoring the privilege of having so much time to myself, in what seemed like forever.  Clearly I couldn’t ‘waste the year’.  My brain constantly told me that I must accomplish something substantive while here, learn new hobbies or pick up new skills and transform my life completely.  And so, with what appeared to be extra time in absence of hours in the office, I piled on numerous goals to feel productive and take advantage of every minute.  It didn’t seem enough to set up our lives here, figure out our house and schools and get into a good work-out routine.  I also had to cultivate hobbies, learn photography, experience Tango shows, learn the culture and history of BA, tour all the museums, taste all the steaks, assimilate into the school with all the moms and teachers, plan weekend trips, homeschool kids in the afternoon, and so on.

It was overwhelming and tiring.  There was so much to do every day and clearly not enough hours.  I needed a ‘to do list’ and daily schedules to manage my time, otherwise too much of it was ‘being wasted’ with my addiction to the New York Times.  And although initially it appeared that I would have an abundance of spare hours without working, becoming a full-time care giver without any outside help required more effort than I had originally anticipated.  Rob and I are simply highly glorified stay-at-home-parents.  It’s unique that we are doing it silmoutnously while being financially independent, in a new country with a new language and culture.  But all those things don’t change the fact that there is still SO MUCH TO DO TO RAISE KIDS.  

It was also easy, familiar and satisfying to stay busy in an environment where everything else was new.  Yet, something felt off.  I thought that once I arrived here I would be able to slow down.  I thought that I would no longer get anxious in a grocery store line if it was longer than I had anticipated.  I thought that I would easily learn how to live in the moment and enjoy every new experience at a level deeper than I had before.  All I needed was that extra time, but the moment I had it, I filled it with things to keep me busy to feel more comfortable.

I began to try to understand why I felt this pressure to accomplish something, be productive, and stay busy.  The feeling was definitely partly powered by the constant, “What are you going to do with your year off?” question that never stopped.  It was around before we left the States and often crept into the first few minutes of conversation when we met new people here.  But to be honest, most of it was also driven by the pressure I put on myself.  It turns out that it is difficult to transform from an A-type person who has been trained my whole life to be productive and optimize every spare minute to one who can easily slow down.

Perhaps part of the problem is the expectation on how we acquire new skills and hobbies.  This piece recently explored a question of why we don’t have that many hobbies anymore, generally.  Besides not having time (which doesn’t seem to be as big of a hurdle for me at the moment), there is an added pressure of cultivating hobbies at which one is excellent – otherwise it’s not worth the time or effort to try.  So I better come back speaking Spanish fluently (which I can’t foresee happening) or why try?  I need to get published somewhere, or what’s the point of improving my writing skills?  I can’t just snap pics with my snazzy new camera, I better be on manual mode at all times exploring different combinations of lighting and composition for that next best Instagram photo. The pressure seemed endless.

I started craving change. As it happens, for our three-month mark we took a long weekend trip to Colonia where I truly, for the first time in a couple of months, relaxed. Once we returned, I was quick to jump back into a schedule, but alas, I got ill with shingles almost immediately and was bed-ridden for over a week.  In all,  I had over two weeks of doing…well, nothing.

And it was amazing.  I spent a lot of time reading and watching ‘This Week Tonight’ without feeling guilty since I wasn’t capable of doing much else. I listened to all the Dailys. I slept.  The break also gave me a moment to pause and provided an unexpected chance to rethink my goals.  I liked not doing anything, surprisingly.  I wrote a lot of thoughts down and realized that my original thinking seemed somewhat outdated.

After enjoying many ‘wasted’ hours, I recognized that my goal shouldn’t be to accomplish anything, but instead to evolve as a person, chill out a bit and have more fun. So I’m no longer going to try to ‘optimize’ the year, at least not in the way I defined it before.  Instead, I’m going to let go of all of the expectations I have put on myself and focus on what makes me happy, without guilt.  I need room and time to breathe.  Make new friends.  Dance. Procrastinate.  Experience new things, places, foods, and countries at my own pace.  Become ‘local’. Work out more. And read all the news and books and  watch all the movies that I want.  Everything else, including all hobbies, blogs, ability to formulate complete sentences in Spanish etc. is simply an added bonus which I may not get to.  If I do happen to pick up new skills and hobbies, I want to do it for the sake of having fun, not anything else in particular, as stressed in this Smarter Living Article.  It is going to be OK if I don’t speak Spanish fluently or my photos don’t inspire anyone at the end of the trip.

If I don’t slow down,  I now see that this  year may quickly become equivalent to one of the previous years with work meetings replaced by museum visits. I’m not going to lie, this change won’t be easy for me.  Perhaps it took ten days of me not doing anything to realize it, but now that I’ve experienced it, I need to at least try to slow down. Don’t get me wrong.  I won’t get rid of my ‘to do’ list tomorrow – that would be CRAZY!

But, with pure joy earlier this week I went to see ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ on a Tuesday in the middle of the day without any guilt (to be sure, it was a horribly rainy dark day prohibiting many other options… 🙂 )