Lessons of the Season – The Mind and Body Connection
Lessons of the Season – The Mind and Body Connection
I’m getting out of bed around the time that I was already arriving at the office. I’m back to my three day a week work week, short days at that for now. By June 1st, I’ll feel guilty enough to add a few more hours to the work day, although not days to the week. After seven years I know that this schedule works for me. The work gets done. Isn’t that all that matters? Better to be efficient and have time to myself than spend all my time at the office.
I’m making plans, seeing friends and family. I have my life back. For 24 years, life comes to almost a complete halt from February 15th – April 15th. Six days work weeks, long hours, a single minded focus – work, work, work. And then, not so much. That’s not to say that I become irresponsible after April 15th. It’s hard to be irresponsible when you own your own business. It’s just that without the pressure of the deadlines, I take my time, carefully doing my best work on my terms. I just don’t have the self-imposed pressure of the season hanging over my head. A Self-imposed deadline that is essentially meaningless because I can always apply for an extension.
Everyone has deadlines to meet. But ask any accountant how they survive tax season and you’ll probably get many different answers. Ask the same persons what utter relief they feel when it ends and you’ll get the same answer – pure joy!
I’ve been at this game (on my own) for 24 years (over 30 years if you add in my prior work experience). You’d think that by now I’d have it down to a science. And in many ways I do. But every year I am surprised at how the more things stay the same, the more they change. There is something new every season that takes me by surprise. Sometimes the surprise is good, other times, not so good. After each year I take stock, analyzing what worked and what didn’t. Life lessons…lessons of the season.
In 2007, it was my taking an entire day off in March to do an out of town speaking engagement for my creative business. It was the best March 22nd of my life – a beautiful crisp almost spring day, a nice drive from Chicago to Milwaukee with one of my best friends for company and assistance. In the middle of tax season I got to share my passion, my life balance lessons at a conference for mortgage bankers. A woman came up to me before the session began to say hello. We had friends in common from college and had gone to high school together (in Wisconsin) 35 years before (ouch that dates me!). I sold a few books, made some new connections. I had a wonderful day not doing tax returns. I got paid more to present the workshop than I would have made for an entire day of tax returns. There was no way that I was going to pass up the opportunity and no way that I did. I took a day off during tax season and my practice did not fall apart.
The next week I became so sick that I had to take another day off. It started in my throat a few days before and slowly became something much more. In the past, if I got a cold or the flu I persevered. Not this time, flu shot not withstanding. My best friend came to my rescue in the middle of the night. I couldn’t swallow, had the chills, swollen glands and was truly scared to go to sleep. I never remember that ever happening before and hope it doesn’t happen again. She didn’t leave until 5:00 PM the next day, knowing that if she did, I’d probably head straight to the office. Being sick caught me by surprise because luckily I’ve managed to usually stave off the flu bug until after my April 15th deadlines have passed. It was always as if my mind and body knew when they could let me down. Doing the mental brain work that I do is hard enough. Trying to do so with a pounding head cold or the flu is beyond brutal.
Lesson learned – the season did not fall apart because I was not there every single day. The pressures were self-imposed, rightfully so because of the workload. But even during the season, I could be flexible to do take a day off for my creative business or be human and be sick.
Fast forward to January 2008 – I’m tired even before the rat race begins. Year-end planning was a bit busier than usual. Or so it seemed to me. My last hurrah best friend January spa vacation in Mexico was as relaxing as it was intended to be. But my energy simply wasn’t up to par upon my return.
Normally I increase my work hours slowly – adding a half hour to the work day every week or so. 6:30 becomes 7:00. 7:00 becomes 7:30. 7:30 becomes 8:00 and then 8:30 and at the very end 9:00. I have never burned the midnight oil. I’m a morning worker, always have been. So as the work load increases, I get the hardest work done in the morning, saving certain work that does not ‘tax’ my brain (all pun intended) for the early evening hours. I can easily cut and paste and sign my name with the television on in the background in the early evening hours. That is, as long as my hands hold out. The last few years, as the hours have increased, my hands have had a mind of their own. As I picked up the pace in mid-February suddenly my hands, especially my right dominant hand began to swell, ache and simply shut down. Not using them was simply not an option.
My solution was opening my mind and body to acupuncture. Someone suggested it and given my level of pain and discomfort, I was willing to try anything. My body already had positively responded to regular massage and chiropractic work over the years. Learning from the past (more lessons of the season), my work week ends now each Saturday afternoon with a regular scheduled appointment to calm my mind and heal my body.
So this year I headed straight to acupuncture to jump start my energy level, the last Monday that I’d be able to leave for a 5:00 PM appointment. My mind is ready to begin the process anew. My mental energy is surely there. Without trying my body wakes up – no alarm. I’m at the office by 6:30 am, 7:00 at the latest. But this year, my body is not following suit. My acupuncturist takes my pulse, checks my tongue and asks me the usual questions. But then she adds one that catches me off guard. She asks me about my knee. And I respond, my knee’s fine, I’ve never complained about my knee before.
And then the next afternoon, something about my knee is off. I’m not the kind of person who takes a suggestion and then manifests it. We have a huge snow storm and I’m wondering how to either shovel the driveway or walk to public transportation. Either way requires more of my leg than I have to give. As I’m pondering my decision, a neighbor is outside at 6:30 AM shoveling for me, simply because he’s a nice guy. He’ll do so without asking most of the rest of this snowy, busy season. What a neighborly gesture just when I needed it.
I think my acupuncturist is a witch doctor at first. But something in my kidney pulse related to the knee and she must have sensed it in advance of the problem. I didn’t pull anything that I’m aware of working out with my trainer the Sunday before or during my 20 minute treadmill routine that I still find time for.
I can barely make it from the parking lot to the office, a 3 block walk that I’ve made without incident for over 20 years, without stopping. I go to visit my parents in Florida for a week, unable to walk outside in the glorious sunshine after leaving the cold and constant snow of Chicago behind. I am needless to say not happy. I’m dragging my leg, knowing that I’m throwing the rest of my body out of alignment. And while most of my friends would head straight to a medical doctor, I just don’t think that’s where the problem lies. The pain got so bad that I almost took my doctor brother up on giving me a cortisone shot. Almost…but I didn’t. While the pain was there some days, other days I was pain free. And I really like the eastern medicine route, as does my body.
The thought comes to mind that maybe this was my hands for the season. And frankly, since writing and computer work was critical to my work, the trade-off of the hands for the knee was one I was willing to make. My best friend uses the A word (arthritis) quietly. I of course do not want to hear it. Because each year that I’ve experienced these physical ailments, they went away after the busy season was over.
My hands blew up two years in a row on the same exact date. The second year, I was prepared, my acupuncture appointments already lined up. But I was stunned none the less at the timing. The throbbing kept me up at night. The pain was especially critical early in the morning and lasted 10 days. By then, the acupuncture treatments seemed to create a sense of normalcy and relief.
So this year, if it was my knees instead of my hands, it was a trade-off I was willing to make. I’m convinced that my mind is mentally ready. I do not feel stressed. But my body isn’t listening to my mind. My body somehow knows something that I don’t.
As with many physical ailments, sometimes you feel good in the morning and things get worse as the day progresses. I’m used to getting up and down all day long, getting input forms out of the cabinet and files out of the drawers. I do not want to be stuck at my desk all day long. Getting up gives me a chance to stretch my body and to clear my head.
But my knee is not cooperating. I find that I needed to end the work day at 7 P.M. My leg hurt too much, elevated during the day or not. I was just tired. Yes, I was still working a twelve hour plus day. This was more than most would endure, but less than I was used to during the season. For whatever reason, my body was telling me something. And the good thing was that I was listening. So this tax season, I left the office every day at 7:00 PM. No ramping up to the late night hours. That extra hour was spent at home, crashed on the couch, chilling at the end of the day.
And something miraculous happened. I had the most productive season I’ve ever had. Leaving at 7:00 PM allowed me to be fresh the next day. My brain was on fire. I saw things that my exhaustion might have otherwise missed. I questioned other accountant’s work. They too were working long and hard hours, stressed during the season. And every time I questioned someone else’s work, I was right to do so. My planning suggestions were brilliant (if I must say so myself). I knew when to convince my clients to ask for the extra extension time for a clearer look (some clients truly need to be convinced). It’s not that I did bad work in prior years. It’s just that this year I knew that I was mentally on top of my game. I had the same number of billable hours as in the past. The work day was in fact shorter. I was simply more productive when I was there.
Why? - Because I listened to my body. I am convinced that my knee was telling me something. In fact, post season there have been a few flair-ups. I’ve noticed that when I’m stressed, my knee starts to hurt. My right hand did flair up – a month later than in past years. But while I woke up with my right hand tight and “gnarly”, by the time I got to work, I was able to work through the day. Arthritis? Maybe. But if it’s a combination of the aging process, the stress of the season has more to do with it than anything else. Because after the hours go back to my version of normal (a less than 5 day work week), the issues disappear.
My body was telling me something. I swear it was saying – “Excuse me, but we liked working 3 days a week. What’s with the increase in hours?” The good news is that I listened. I limited my hours to something more manageable.
The lesson of this season was to listen to my body. The better lesson is that I won’t work past 7:00 PM ever again during the season. I simply don’t have to. I know that I can be productive, happy, and a bit more rested and mentally alert working a little less. I can work smarter. Everything gets done. It always does. I just needed to integrate my mind and body at the same time. The life lessons that I’ve learned over the years is that when I give myself something one year, I try not to take it away the next. If I survived this season only working until 7:00PM, then I can survive the next season in exactly the same way. And every season after that!
In the process of listening to my body, I had the best season I’ve had in 24 years. Good for me! To know that next year, as I head into my 25th year of business, I’ll be leaving the office no later than 7:00 PM means that not only did I listen, I learned. It’s good to know that after all these years; I’m still learning new lessons from my life and my business.
Lessons of the Season The Mind and Body Connection - To learn more about this author, visit Debbie Lessin's Website.
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A month has almost passed since my big deadline. I’m no longer waking several times during the night, thinking that might be time to get up and go to work. I’m able to stay up past 10:00 PM, thankful that I live in a Central Standard time zone. I can watch television without falling asleep on the couch. And I can even read more than five pages of a book before I turn out the lights to go to sleep. It n no longer takes me two months to finish a truly enjoyable novel that I’d otherwise have torn through in a few days, a week at most.
I’m getting out of bed around the time that I was already arriving at the office. I’m back to my three day a week work week, short days at that for now. By June 1st, I’ll feel guilty enough to add a few more hours to the work day, although not days to the week. After seven years I know that this schedule works for me. The work gets done. Isn’t that all that matters? Better to be efficient and have time to myself than spend all my time at the office.
I’m making plans, seeing friends and family. I have my life back. For 24 years, life comes to almost a complete halt from February 15th – April 15th. Six days work weeks, long hours, a single minded focus – work, work, work. And then, not so much. That’s not to say that I become irresponsible after April 15th. It’s hard to be irresponsible when you own your own business. It’s just that without the pressure of the deadlines, I take my time, carefully doing my best work on my terms. I just don’t have the self-imposed pressure of the season hanging over my head. A Self-imposed deadline that is essentially meaningless because I can always apply for an extension.
Everyone has deadlines to meet. But ask any accountant how they survive tax season and you’ll probably get many different answers. Ask the same persons what utter relief they feel when it ends and you’ll get the same answer – pure joy!
I’ve been at this game (on my own) for 24 years (over 30 years if you add in my prior work experience). You’d think that by now I’d have it down to a science. And in many ways I do. But every year I am surprised at how the more things stay the same, the more they change. There is something new every season that takes me by surprise. Sometimes the surprise is good, other times, not so good. After each year I take stock, analyzing what worked and what didn’t. Life lessons…lessons of the season.
In 2007, it was my taking an entire day off in March to do an out of town speaking engagement for my creative business. It was the best March 22nd of my life – a beautiful crisp almost spring day, a nice drive from Chicago to Milwaukee with one of my best friends for company and assistance. In the middle of tax season I got to share my passion, my life balance lessons at a conference for mortgage bankers. A woman came up to me before the session began to say hello. We had friends in common from college and had gone to high school together (in Wisconsin) 35 years before (ouch that dates me!). I sold a few books, made some new connections. I had a wonderful day not doing tax returns. I got paid more to present the workshop than I would have made for an entire day of tax returns. There was no way that I was going to pass up the opportunity and no way that I did. I took a day off during tax season and my practice did not fall apart.
The next week I became so sick that I had to take another day off. It started in my throat a few days before and slowly became something much more. In the past, if I got a cold or the flu I persevered. Not this time, flu shot not withstanding. My best friend came to my rescue in the middle of the night. I couldn’t swallow, had the chills, swollen glands and was truly scared to go to sleep. I never remember that ever happening before and hope it doesn’t happen again. She didn’t leave until 5:00 PM the next day, knowing that if she did, I’d probably head straight to the office. Being sick caught me by surprise because luckily I’ve managed to usually stave off the flu bug until after my April 15th deadlines have passed. It was always as if my mind and body knew when they could let me down. Doing the mental brain work that I do is hard enough. Trying to do so with a pounding head cold or the flu is beyond brutal.
Lesson learned – the season did not fall apart because I was not there every single day. The pressures were self-imposed, rightfully so because of the workload. But even during the season, I could be flexible to do take a day off for my creative business or be human and be sick.
Fast forward to January 2008 – I’m tired even before the rat race begins. Year-end planning was a bit busier than usual. Or so it seemed to me. My last hurrah best friend January spa vacation in Mexico was as relaxing as it was intended to be. But my energy simply wasn’t up to par upon my return.
Normally I increase my work hours slowly – adding a half hour to the work day every week or so. 6:30 becomes 7:00. 7:00 becomes 7:30. 7:30 becomes 8:00 and then 8:30 and at the very end 9:00. I have never burned the midnight oil. I’m a morning worker, always have been. So as the work load increases, I get the hardest work done in the morning, saving certain work that does not ‘tax’ my brain (all pun intended) for the early evening hours. I can easily cut and paste and sign my name with the television on in the background in the early evening hours. That is, as long as my hands hold out. The last few years, as the hours have increased, my hands have had a mind of their own. As I picked up the pace in mid-February suddenly my hands, especially my right dominant hand began to swell, ache and simply shut down. Not using them was simply not an option.
My solution was opening my mind and body to acupuncture. Someone suggested it and given my level of pain and discomfort, I was willing to try anything. My body already had positively responded to regular massage and chiropractic work over the years. Learning from the past (more lessons of the season), my work week ends now each Saturday afternoon with a regular scheduled appointment to calm my mind and heal my body.
So this year I headed straight to acupuncture to jump start my energy level, the last Monday that I’d be able to leave for a 5:00 PM appointment. My mind is ready to begin the process anew. My mental energy is surely there. Without trying my body wakes up – no alarm. I’m at the office by 6:30 am, 7:00 at the latest. But this year, my body is not following suit. My acupuncturist takes my pulse, checks my tongue and asks me the usual questions. But then she adds one that catches me off guard. She asks me about my knee. And I respond, my knee’s fine, I’ve never complained about my knee before.
And then the next afternoon, something about my knee is off. I’m not the kind of person who takes a suggestion and then manifests it. We have a huge snow storm and I’m wondering how to either shovel the driveway or walk to public transportation. Either way requires more of my leg than I have to give. As I’m pondering my decision, a neighbor is outside at 6:30 AM shoveling for me, simply because he’s a nice guy. He’ll do so without asking most of the rest of this snowy, busy season. What a neighborly gesture just when I needed it.
I think my acupuncturist is a witch doctor at first. But something in my kidney pulse related to the knee and she must have sensed it in advance of the problem. I didn’t pull anything that I’m aware of working out with my trainer the Sunday before or during my 20 minute treadmill routine that I still find time for.
I can barely make it from the parking lot to the office, a 3 block walk that I’ve made without incident for over 20 years, without stopping. I go to visit my parents in Florida for a week, unable to walk outside in the glorious sunshine after leaving the cold and constant snow of Chicago behind. I am needless to say not happy. I’m dragging my leg, knowing that I’m throwing the rest of my body out of alignment. And while most of my friends would head straight to a medical doctor, I just don’t think that’s where the problem lies. The pain got so bad that I almost took my doctor brother up on giving me a cortisone shot. Almost…but I didn’t. While the pain was there some days, other days I was pain free. And I really like the eastern medicine route, as does my body.
The thought comes to mind that maybe this was my hands for the season. And frankly, since writing and computer work was critical to my work, the trade-off of the hands for the knee was one I was willing to make. My best friend uses the A word (arthritis) quietly. I of course do not want to hear it. Because each year that I’ve experienced these physical ailments, they went away after the busy season was over.
My hands blew up two years in a row on the same exact date. The second year, I was prepared, my acupuncture appointments already lined up. But I was stunned none the less at the timing. The throbbing kept me up at night. The pain was especially critical early in the morning and lasted 10 days. By then, the acupuncture treatments seemed to create a sense of normalcy and relief.
So this year, if it was my knees instead of my hands, it was a trade-off I was willing to make. I’m convinced that my mind is mentally ready. I do not feel stressed. But my body isn’t listening to my mind. My body somehow knows something that I don’t.
As with many physical ailments, sometimes you feel good in the morning and things get worse as the day progresses. I’m used to getting up and down all day long, getting input forms out of the cabinet and files out of the drawers. I do not want to be stuck at my desk all day long. Getting up gives me a chance to stretch my body and to clear my head.
But my knee is not cooperating. I find that I needed to end the work day at 7 P.M. My leg hurt too much, elevated during the day or not. I was just tired. Yes, I was still working a twelve hour plus day. This was more than most would endure, but less than I was used to during the season. For whatever reason, my body was telling me something. And the good thing was that I was listening. So this tax season, I left the office every day at 7:00 PM. No ramping up to the late night hours. That extra hour was spent at home, crashed on the couch, chilling at the end of the day.
And something miraculous happened. I had the most productive season I’ve ever had. Leaving at 7:00 PM allowed me to be fresh the next day. My brain was on fire. I saw things that my exhaustion might have otherwise missed. I questioned other accountant’s work. They too were working long and hard hours, stressed during the season. And every time I questioned someone else’s work, I was right to do so. My planning suggestions were brilliant (if I must say so myself). I knew when to convince my clients to ask for the extra extension time for a clearer look (some clients truly need to be convinced). It’s not that I did bad work in prior years. It’s just that this year I knew that I was mentally on top of my game. I had the same number of billable hours as in the past. The work day was in fact shorter. I was simply more productive when I was there.
Why? - Because I listened to my body. I am convinced that my knee was telling me something. In fact, post season there have been a few flair-ups. I’ve noticed that when I’m stressed, my knee starts to hurt. My right hand did flair up – a month later than in past years. But while I woke up with my right hand tight and “gnarly”, by the time I got to work, I was able to work through the day. Arthritis? Maybe. But if it’s a combination of the aging process, the stress of the season has more to do with it than anything else. Because after the hours go back to my version of normal (a less than 5 day work week), the issues disappear.
My body was telling me something. I swear it was saying – “Excuse me, but we liked working 3 days a week. What’s with the increase in hours?” The good news is that I listened. I limited my hours to something more manageable.
The lesson of this season was to listen to my body. The better lesson is that I won’t work past 7:00 PM ever again during the season. I simply don’t have to. I know that I can be productive, happy, and a bit more rested and mentally alert working a little less. I can work smarter. Everything gets done. It always does. I just needed to integrate my mind and body at the same time. The life lessons that I’ve learned over the years is that when I give myself something one year, I try not to take it away the next. If I survived this season only working until 7:00PM, then I can survive the next season in exactly the same way. And every season after that!
In the process of listening to my body, I had the best season I’ve had in 24 years. Good for me! To know that next year, as I head into my 25th year of business, I’ll be leaving the office no later than 7:00 PM means that not only did I listen, I learned. It’s good to know that after all these years; I’m still learning new lessons from my life and my business.
Lessons of the Season The Mind and Body Connection - To learn more about this author, visit Debbie Lessin's Website.
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Joe DagerJoe Dager is President of Business901, a progressive coaching company providing no-nonsense direction in areas such as Lean Six Sigma Marketing and organized referral marketing. What others say: In the past 20 years, Joe and I have collaborated on many difficult issues. Joe’s ability to combine his expertise with “out of the box” thinking is unsurpassed. He has always delivered quickly, cost effectively and with ingenuity. A brilliant mind that is always a pleasure to work with.” - James R. If you want to learn more about Business901, start a conversation with us. We can be found @ Web/Blog: Business901.com Web/Blog: FundingYourNonprofit.com LinkedIn Profile Follow me on Twitter - Visit Joe Dager's Website |
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