Home from a beautiful holiday and I’m feeling it’s time for a reset. But jet-lag and life-lag are teaching me that reset can mean rest as much as anything!
Home from a beautiful holiday overseas and I’m feeling it’s time for a reset. It was always my plan to come home after this break and get stuck into my writing, business, coaching and ecourses. I know where I want to go with it all and I have more open space to work. Yet I come home feeling that the jet-lag has morphed into a kind of life-lag. I can’t seem to quite get into synch with it all.
Do you ever have that feeling? Like your plans are known, but you can’t quite reach them or enact them? That you know the timing and can write the schedule but it keeps pushing out because you are not up to it? It feels like you are out of body and can’t quite connect the pieces to make them happen.
Life-lag seems to be the best way to describe it. Circumstances mean that you haven’t been able to keep up with yourself or your plans for some time, so you start to feel permanently in a state of lag. I’m thinking it’s all about needing to learn to rest as part of resetting, acknowledging that life-lag means you are still catching up with it all.
There’s really no need to push so hard. What is this pressure I put on myself? It’s something I need to consider and take into account.
Being away, coming home
Being away meant enjoying being in the moment and that was important and special. One thing about travel is that being away from your usual surrounds and commitments makes enjoying the moment much easier. I imagine that’s a reason why people seek the experience of travel at times. Your normal life circumstances are changed. You are more likely to eat out, for example, and not have to make plans for daily tasks like buying food and cooking. Everything is new and fresh and your senses are revitalised.
Coming home, I have felt really excited to make a new start. But as I said on Instagram recently for this image below, snapped looking out at the ocean I wanted to dive into but was too tired to get to, it does all feel a bit raw coming back home. It’s like a reset, a restart, which I’d anticipated and looked forward to after a break away. But I am having trouble getting to it in real life.
Symbols to reset for a new start
As I worked through this time, the Aces kept coming up in Tarot, signalling fresh starts of all kinds. I want to work on my business plan, realign priorities and time for that and life generally: family, friends, writing, coaching. Finish my book and see it out in the world. But yes, it does feel a little tender as you come home, stepping back, resetting, looking at things a little differently and imagining next steps. Reality hits and collides with the fresh start aspirations, along with jet-lag and it all starts to feel out of reach again.
A New Moon also aligned with our homecoming, throwing a focus on starting afresh. As my friend Jennifer Cockcroft reminded me on IG: “lots of r words”: reset, raw, restart, rejuvenate, refresh, reboot, recharge, realign.
So what to do with all these Aces and plans to reset? Maybe it is just the cosmic energies, Mercury Retrograde (just finished as I write!) causing havoc recently? Perhaps life-lag really is a thing and I need time to catch up with myself and rest before I launch ahead again.
I’m thinking my cat, Azzie, is really on to something!
Reset, jet-lag and life-lag, travel and rest
There’s no doubt that jet-lag is a thing. I don’t usually suffer too badly but my partner was also sick on our return home within a few days. We had sleepless nights from that. Suddenly we were on weird sleep cycles again and staring up at the ceiling for long hours during the night. Our reset suddenly became quite problematic.
And then it felt like all of life was lagging. A gap between my plans and where I wanted to be. Definitely a chasm between the energy I needed and what I had. I returned to swimming and yoga last week which both helped me feel more connected with my body. Sleep is returning now in more natural patterns which I am grateful for.
The life-lag is something I am learning from. Maybe it is too early to get out the door with all my plans just now. Even though I’d made this plan, it doesn’t mean it was a good one or the right one. After all the recent years of challenge, one thing after the other, it doesn’t mean one holiday renders you all ready to go, perfect in mind and body.
And travel itself, although wonderful and inspiring, can be tiring, especially for introverts with all that sensory and people input. I loved it all but my introvert soul needs to recharge again with time alone.
Perhaps this life-lag is all about balancing my personality needs and time alone, and rejuvenation, Four of Swords style, is what is needed. I had the best time, seeing so much, meeting so many online friends in real life and making many new friends. But all that extraverting sensing and interaction can take its toll and some quiet writing time is what I need, no pressure.
Four of Swords – letting it rest and synthesise
Speaking of the Four of Swords, it’s a card that has been on my mind. So I checked in with the Spolia Tarot to see what it has to say about this time of reset. A very wise deck, it reminds me that this time is about synthesis:
This is the creation of an intellectual foundation. For that, knowledge has to become almost unconscious, it has to move from remembering facts from your cramming session to an ease with handling the information. It requires synthesis.
We are reminded that we have done the work: the swords are on the wall. We can still be working intellectually, reshaping, crafting all the inputs we have gathered. All the work we have done can be honoured by resting and allowing it to connect and compost, without so much active engagement on our part.
What I’m thinking about: my wholehearted self-leadership questions
In the midst of all of this travel and homecoming, I have been thinking and reflecting a lot. I welcome any thoughts and input you might have in this reset phase.
I focus on wholehearted self-leadership in my business and personal focus. I’m always seeking input and connection via coaching, colleagues, online friends, books and courses. But I’m constantly also reflecting on my key questions at any time. Here’s a snapshot of this now in this reset phase.
The things that are composting for me right now include:
- How can I find out what the Quiet Writing community needs and wants?
- Perhaps a survey of readers and subscribers would be helpful for getting input?
- How can I serve and provide value most effectively?
- What would help better connection within our community?
- Where does tarot fit with my life and business?
- How do I share my tarot insights in a way that helps people and is balanced?
- Where does tarot with my blogging schedule?
- How can I finish my book draft now and edit it meaningfully myself before I seek outside help?
- And then, how much outside help is needed?
- How can I revamp my website so it’s more focused on my business as well as my blog and writing?
The questions can go round and round though at times and I am learning I need to rest more in this reset phase. Allowing answers to come through rest and recuperation, not pushing so hard, seems a valuable part of reset.
Rest not quitting as part of reset
Of course, feelings of giving up and hopelessness can come up too when we are not pushing as hard as we think we should. We don’t quite measure up to where we thought we would be. Thoughts like, “I’ll never finish writing that book! I’ll never see it out in the world!” for example, have started to run around my head. But as this post and quote reminded me today on LinkedIn via Andrew Johnson, rest and relaxation are a critical part of resilience:
If you get tired, learn to rest not to quit!
Banksy
A very valuable reminder. Reset is as much about resting and reflecting as anything. It doesn’t mean we are failing or need to quit!
And you?
Are you finding you need rest as part of your reset right now?
Has travel or holiday time left you strangely feeling in need of rest?
Does personality come into it for you with your need for rest?
Do you struggle with the need to keep going when rest is probably the best reset you can focus on?
Do rest and quitting get tangled up for you too sometimes?
Welcome your thoughts on these or any of my wholehearted self-leadership questions to guide me and others in our work. Just post in the comments or on social media posts on Facebook or Instagram.
Found this too while thinking about jet-lag and life-lag! You might enjoy it if you find the jet-lag/life-lag experience resonates with you: Jet-lag? More like life-lag
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nice concept of ‘life-lag’: captures not only the post travel syndrom but also those overload times. often thought we could use a reset button like a computer. Clears out the accumulated detritus, goes to a basic state, ready for action …. you post includes many ideas. this brief comment only touches on one.
Thanks for your thoughts! It’s truly been a reset time in many ways and I think for many people other than me. This Full Moon also offering an opportunity to reflect and work out what’s important in moving on.