Is it spring yet? Ways to get yourself out of a funk, seasonal or otherwise EP 446

00:00:09
Speaker 1: Hi.

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Speaker 2: I'm Laura Vanderkamp. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist, and speaker.

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Speaker 3: And I'm Sarah hart Hunger, a mother of three, practicing physician, writer, and course creator. We are two working parents who love our careers and our families.

00:00:24
Speaker 2: Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun. From figuring out childcare to mapping out long.

00:00:33
Speaker 1: Term career goals.

00:00:34
Speaker 2: We want you to get the most out of life.

00:00:41
Speaker 1: Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura.

00:00:43
Speaker 2: This episode is airing in mid February of twenty twenty six. This may be a time of year where people are asking is it spring yet?

00:00:51
Speaker 1: Hence the title of this episode. Is it spring yet?

00:00:54
Speaker 2: No?

00:00:54
Speaker 1: Sadly, for many of us, it is not. But this episode is how to get yourself.

00:00:58
Speaker 2: Out of a funk if you are sort of feeling I'm tired of winter at this point. For many of us, we are long into winter in this season. There are ways to make life feel a little bit better. Although Sarah, you are enjoying wonderful weather as we speak.

00:01:13
Speaker 3: Yeah, I always feel so bad and I'm like, I don't know how bleak or how much I'm getting myself through anything, But I mean to be fair. Okay, weatherwise, yes, this is our beautiful time of year, but in terms of just cadence wise, it could still feel like a slog because it can be a longer phase between vacations or like big holidays to look forward to, and people can kind of start January off really strong and then all those things that felt exciting start to feel a little bit more like reality sets in in February. So I think these tips still apply even though not gonna lie. It's our perfect outside season right now.

00:01:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, so each year I kind of have to make my winter fun list to get myself excited about the season.

00:01:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, I can't wait to hear about your winter fun list. You're going to go through some of your victories, so.

00:02:01
Speaker 2: Well, I actually did a lot the weekend before we are recording this, I actually cranked through several of them. I went ice skating, So I had gone before Christmas with three of my children. Two of them had basically said like never again. I mean, I hope never again is strong, but one was still willing to go with me, so we went.

00:02:21
Speaker 1: The two of us went this weekend and that was a lot of fun.

00:02:25
Speaker 2: It snowed, so I went sledding and I really enjoyed that. Just whooping down the hill in my front yard. That is a treat to do and there is snow on the ground. I went to restaurants with fireplaces more than one. I picked up Starbucks from a local Starbucks that it turned out how a fireplace. I didn't even know it did, and so then I walked in. I was like, wait, there's a fireplace. I'll have to linger here sometime. And then we went out to dinner at the Mexican place you have been to with us. We didn't sit by the fire though, so I'm not sure if he counts. Were kind of in the heated garden area. And then I went on Sunday, Jasper's home for the weekend for the long weekend, and he and I went and worked at Panera.

00:03:05
Speaker 1: And our local Panera has a fireplace, so that was great. It was nice. It was lovely.

00:03:09
Speaker 3: Fireplaces at chain stores.

00:03:11
Speaker 1: This is like, wow, I know it's a thing.

00:03:14
Speaker 2: It's a thing in our cold weather area, and especially with the snow coming down outside, it was particularly that us magical.

00:03:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was good.

00:03:22
Speaker 3: I haven't had like specific winter fun activities. I don't create a list for this season like that, but since I did kind of have a number of fun activities on my twenty twenty six list, I've kind of been leaning more into that, like making sure I get in my two date nights a month, saying yes to friend hangs kind of whenever the opportunity arises, and I feel like playing piano was kind of like cozy winter fun, so I've been doing that.

00:03:47
Speaker 2: I feel like that kind of counts. Yeah, yeah, no, that sounds good. So I have a confession to make. Though we started this episode of like get yourself out of a funk, on some level, the sort of weeks around Christmas were so stressful that now that we are back in our normal life, like the fact that it's cold and dark early doesn't necessarily bother me that much. I'm like so excited about having it be the normal routine and nothing huge that needs to be dealt with at the moment, I've actually been feeling kind of good about it because, I mean, before the hut, I mean there was a lot of travel over the time with the Big Galapago's trip, which was amazing but was not a low stress trip to haul nine people around, I mean seven people around internationally for nine days Christmas getting all the presents and stuff done, and then I hosted my entire extended family for a formal dinner on Christmas Day itself, during which my husband had gotten sick like hours beforehand, so he was like out of commission, so I was doing it all on my own. It's just a lot of a lot of things that I had been sick before Christmas too, like I had had stomach bug and then I got a horrible cold on top of the stomach book Like these are really bad combination, Like don't get those two together. And coming out of that, I was like, all that has to happen as the kids go to school and activities.

00:05:08
Speaker 3: Well, and having school and activities, and that regular childcare can be something to sabor after a period of I don't know, just more irregularities, let's say. And so I guess this is our reminder to be like, you know what, if everyone's healthy and we're attending our regular rhythms and maybe sneaking in a few little bits of fun, and sometimes that can be comforting.

00:05:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, No, it's good to have time where your adventures are more of the little adventure variety, and the things that are coming due are only normal.

00:05:38
Speaker 1: Things that are coming doe, not so crazy.

00:05:41
Speaker 2: But there's a couple of things that you can do if you are experiencing sort of the winter blues at this time of the year, if you're looking to get yourself out of a funk because it does not spring yet. I don't know what the groundhog will have said as we were recording this prior to February second, but whatever the groundhog said, it can still.

00:05:58
Speaker 1: Be a long stretch of time.

00:06:00
Speaker 2: One thing you could do is to actually start planning your next vacation if you haven't already. Even if you have your next like really big vacation, like your week in the summer is already planned, if you're traveling somewhere, maybe it's a little thing you want to plan, like a weekend away, or even like visiting a friend overnight or for a day trip somewhere.

00:06:19
Speaker 1: This can really help with giving you something to anticipate. Oh, I mean, I am so here for this.

00:06:24
Speaker 3: I love planning both types of trips, both the little weekend, like we're actually working on planning a little beach weekend, just with one of my kids friends and their parents, like just kind of came came together kind of quick, but made.

00:06:36
Speaker 1: Me so happy.

00:06:37
Speaker 3: There is just like that special anticipatory fund of deciding to do something in the future. And you can really lean into it if you're in a mood and get very granular and you don't have to commit necessarily, but I will if I'm really like in a funk spend time. Okay, this is one of my only uses of AI, to be honest, but like, give me a bunch of itineraries in Maui with this age kids with like price estimates and like it just like I don't know, look at all the possibilities and to start putting things together. So I really do enjoy a good anticipatory joy planning travel session.

00:07:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, Well, I have a little trip to Florida coming up in early March and the Sarah and I will be recording and working and doing a bunch of things to plan our content for the next year. It's still fun. I booked myself a room that looks out over the ocean and it'll be warm and that will feel nice in March.

00:07:30
Speaker 3: Oh, it's going to be great. Yeah, we have reproductive, but it's a treat too.

00:07:35
Speaker 2: Another thing you can do as part of your weekly planning. Do a fun audit. Now, I love this phrase, Sarah. I think I got this from you. But a fun audit, because it's not like an audit is not fun if anyone has ever been audited, like, not fun at all. But juxtaposing those two words is a little jarring, but it makes you think about it, and it is very similar. You look at everything and ask yourself, where is the fun?

00:07:58
Speaker 1: Do you do this?

00:07:59
Speaker 3: Yes? And I actually issued a fund citation to somebody recently. I wrote a log post and she was like, I want to have more fun. And then she listed a bunch of goals and none of them were fun, like none of them like it was like they more taxes and brush my teeth for longer.

00:08:11
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm making that up, but like, that doesn't say they want fun.

00:08:13
Speaker 3: And so I was like, I am hereby issuing you an official fund citation, you must add more fun to your list under penalty anyway. But yes, it is jarring, but it's true and some of us really need it. I decided to lean into just having an entire category of fun to make sure I have more fun on my calendar, and I really do try to look at the week as a whole and be like, is there anything on there that is feels exciting? And then I'm looking forward to And if the answer is no, I try to fit in something tiny, even if it's like get my nails done on the way home from work.

00:08:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no.

00:08:45
Speaker 2: It definitely is something I've been asking myself, like, as I'm looking forward to the next week, I'm doing my weekly planning, what am I genuinely looking forward to? Right and not just like, oh, it's good that our family is doing this. No, no, no, Like I want to genuinely be looking forward to something, and so you figure out what is that and if it isn't on there, well that means, you know, I.

00:09:07
Speaker 1: Need to send some texts to friends.

00:09:10
Speaker 2: I need to add something like I want to do and take myself out for lunch or go run in a cool place that I haven't been to lately.

00:09:20
Speaker 1: Any little thing like that can be helpful.

00:09:23
Speaker 2: And then I also try and do it retrospectively as well, like when I keep my time log. So I've been tracking my time for ages now, but it's a Monday to Monday log.

00:09:32
Speaker 1: And so Monday, I'm.

00:09:33
Speaker 2: Archiving the previous week's log and I take a moment to look over it and do a retrospective sort of fun audit, like what did I do that I enjoyed?

00:09:41
Speaker 1: Was there anything that was really a highlight of that week?

00:09:44
Speaker 2: Or you know, what were the activities that sort of stand out as being little adventures or fun stuff I put in? And usually there's something because of the prospective fun audit, but if there isn't, that's a point to note and that I need to do better in.

00:09:59
Speaker 3: That category totally because it's going to make a difference. So I like that you can have a fun audit in either direction. Well, let's take a quick break and we are going to be back with some more tips that we came up with. If you happen to be finding yourself in a bit of a funk right now, whether it's winter related or otherwise.

00:10:29
Speaker 1: Well we are back with this is it Spring yet?

00:10:31
Speaker 2: Episode? How to get yourself out of a funk? We've been talking about doing a fun audit of your calendar. Another thing you can commit to doing. I have a rule of having one big adventure one little adventure each week, but really leaning into the little adventure part, especially during winter, is I think helpful because it's often hard to leave the house if you are somewhere where it is dark and cold and snowy, and leaving the house involves lots of extra gear that isn't fun to put on, whether it's boots and hats and gloves and things like that. So anyway, it's not exciting necessarily to leave the house. You need an extra nudge to get yourself to do it. The other problem, of course, is sometimes in this type of year, people are coming out of the holidays. Maybe you had an expensive vacation or presence or anything like that. It may not be that you want to spend a ton of money at this point of the year. If that is the case, then looking for low cost adventures is wise probably more challenging in winter because there's not like the fun summer outdoor stuff that you can just stop by and see. As much in my part of the world, Sarah, there probably is, but really commit yourself to as part of your planning looking around for stuff like that. Right, What are the free or cheap little adventures you can do? You can check event calendars like get yourself on the email lists for any venues in your area, any like community centers if you are part of a house of worship, sometimes there's things like that, like I know, my church has a movie night that's like open to the community and people can come in and eat snacks and watch the movie and things like that. There's probably things like that in your community that you can avail yourself of.

00:12:10
Speaker 3: And sometimes the nature stuff can still be good. I mean, it obviously depends on where you are, but if you're not spending tons of time out there, you could do a quick trail, especially because like a little bit of snow, it can be beautiful and it might be less crowded, which is a huge bonus. I mean, well, this is not a little adventure, but we got to see Yellowstone in the snow and there were really not very many people there. But I'm sure there is a very scaled down version of that in your local neighborhood hike.

00:12:37
Speaker 2: I was going to say, I mean a group that's called the a bridal Wood Trails Association, that's a trail association around here. You could join for a very minimal amount of money, but then they have guided hikes over the course of the year, and so I saw there was one this week that's going to be a swift hike in the snow through a bunch of trails in our area. So that's sort of the equivalent of of Sarah's Yellowstone. No, and probably no wolves, but it will be very beautiful.

00:13:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, And sometimes, just like once you get past that initial torture of getting outside again, especially if it's it's hard to come into spending hours outside when you're cold, because you're gonna get very cold, but you can do like thirty minutes, you know, especially if you're moving around.

00:13:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, No, I spent a fun hour outside in the snow yesterday.

00:13:21
Speaker 1: Henry and I were kind of.

00:13:22
Speaker 2: Playing out there and he wound up staying out for a long time, and I thought he'd be getting cold, but he was just so excited by the snow that somehow he forgot that he was cold, which is good.

00:13:31
Speaker 3: My kids always forget their cold when there's a lot of snow. It's for us, it's like a big knocklet tape. But I'm like, how are you even I don't even know I'd be dead, and you're like super happy making angels.

00:13:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you're all wet and cold, and yet somehow it's not bad. Another thing to.

00:13:45
Speaker 2: Pay attention to with this of like it's hard to get out the door, like doing fun stuff with your golden hours. So this is the phrase I'm using to describe the time after work and before bed, particularly like on weekdays, so I think about Monday to Thursday. It is so hard to use this time. Well, I mean, everyone's tired, you don't have a whole lot of energy, Like, there are things you have to do right in terms of making sure everyone's fed, or getting to their activities, getting to bed, whoever needs homework, supervision, or showers.

00:14:13
Speaker 1: Like, there's stuff that has to happen. So it's hard to sort of put something fun into that time.

00:14:18
Speaker 2: And it doesn't have to be elaborate, but it probably shouldn't be nothing because there usually is at least some time. You're probably gonna have at least thirty minutes of discretionary time, even if it's chopped up like fifteen minutes and fifteen minutes, it's there. If you track your time, you're gonna see it. The question is what you do with it. And so as part of my time tracking challenge, you did recently I was putting every day on my to do list for the day what my golden hour intention was, and I was doing it, and I think.

00:14:47
Speaker 1: My evenings were a lot better as a result.

00:14:49
Speaker 2: Like I would find thirty minutes to do a puzzle even though it was like nine thirty to ten o'clock and I had just put Henry down. I was kind of just like grumpy about the fact that it has taken as long as it did. But I didn't have to put the other kids turn out the lights until ten, so I was like, thirty minutes I wanted to do thirty minutes of a puzzle. I'm going to go down and do my thirty minutes of a puzzle. And I did, and I was like so much happier with my evening as a result. Or it nudged me to make my teenagers help out with some stuff around the house so I didn't have to come back during a kid activity that I dropped somebody off, and I would have come back to take out the trash and to make sure the six year old showered before too late and got him ready for bed and then gone and picked him up and come back and it.

00:15:27
Speaker 1: But I was like, no older kids. You guys do this.

00:15:31
Speaker 2: I'm just going to stay there. I'm going to stay there at the lesson. I read a magazine.

00:15:34
Speaker 1: It was amazing, Ray, But I wouldn't have followed you back and forth. Oh my goodness.

00:15:38
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, you know I wouldn't have thought to do it if I hadn't like been like no, no, no, I want to have some fun tonight, Like what's my one thing of fun? Now I'm sitting at a lesson reading a magazine. May not strike some people as the epitome of fun, but you know, I like, we take what we can get.

00:15:55
Speaker 3: I think the key word there, I love the word intention. The use of that there is just like, yeah, I'm not just like settling into default mode. If there's like a little bit of time confetti, I have an intention and I'm going to do it. Like for me, the piano playing has kind of filled a little bit of that void. You got to see my time log. What did I do with my golden hours?

00:16:12
Speaker 1: I don't know.

00:16:12
Speaker 3: I played piano. I watched them trashy TV. But I did it in a very intentive like I wanted to. M h.

00:16:19
Speaker 1: I did it and it's totally fine.

00:16:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, as long as it's chosen, right, Like, you don't want to be scrolling around on Netflix, wod what do you want to watch? On it?

00:16:25
Speaker 1: What do you want to watch?

00:16:26
Speaker 2: And like people are like they could have had time to watch a movie, like if their kids are down at like eight and they go to bed at ten thirty, Like you could in fact have watched a movie.

00:16:32
Speaker 1: But like if you spend an hour figuring out what you're.

00:16:34
Speaker 2: Gonna watch, you're not gonna do that, right, Like you have to like have some intention to it. So my golden hour intention for tonight is actually to watch a Sixers game. Ooooh that's fun. That's also on my winter fun list. Is like actually watching basketball. I forget that it's basketball season and then you know, so.

00:16:51
Speaker 3: You're not watching the college football finals. Sorry, I don't mean to take this out of the present moment.

00:16:55
Speaker 2: No oh shoot, that's well, then we're gonna have competition for the See I'm not into the college when I just I don't.

00:17:00
Speaker 1: Care about the teams anymore. Sorry, but but six basketball is so fun to watch.

00:17:05
Speaker 2: Well, maybe we can do both. Maybe we have more than one team back and forth. I also have more than one TV in this house. Sarah. So if I can separate off, like to go to different places.

00:17:14
Speaker 3: I got sixers, you got, you got the football, got the championships.

00:17:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, jeez. Socializing also a good thing.

00:17:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, you have a kind of resolution type thing to do more of the walk and talk with people.

00:17:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just the more. I mean, I am an extrovert. I just am never regretting spending time with other people. And one way in which I'm doing that is I'm trying to do at least one walk and talk per week, meaning like I try to go for a walk most days anyway, And if I could just do it with somebody else on the phone, especially if they're walking, it's super fun. It could be my parent, it could be Laura, it could be like another friend. It could be a friend that lives nearby. I could be a friend that lives far away. That and then also I just have developed a personal policy of like generally saying yes to anything social.

00:17:58
Speaker 2: Now.

00:17:58
Speaker 3: I know there are probably people in different phases of life where they are like I just can't do that, and in fact I need the rest and I need to say no. But I think there's something about maybe like coming out of the young kid phase, where I'm like no, Actually, I am more open and sure. My answer is default to yes unless there's some reason, and it usually does get me out of a funk. It can be hard to go. And by the way, as we were doing this whole discussion, I would have called this episode is my period here.

00:18:24
Speaker 1: Yet there are many things that can put one into a funk. So there you go.

00:18:33
Speaker 3: Okay, but yeah, what is your socializing policy or how do you tend to use that to get yourself out of my mood?

00:18:40
Speaker 1: Yeah?

00:18:40
Speaker 2: Well, I have a couple local friends that I try to get together with fairly regularly, and if I realize it has been a while since I've seen one, then I sort of put an extra push on myself to make sure that there is something on the calendar that we can do. And obviously I enjoy seeing some far flung friends such as yourself on occasion when I can do too, and try to get a couple of those scheduled through the year that I can still see people who are not near me.

00:19:04
Speaker 1: But we love this idea.

00:19:05
Speaker 2: I know we've mentioned it in a previous episode, but I just want to mention it again because I know we have a lot of people here who love organization strategies. And if you are in any sort of sales role, you've probably dealt with a CRM right like a customer relationship manager or client relationship manager, where it reminds you to reach out to people or how often you've read reached out somewhody have you followed up on the you know, but it's very regimented so that you do it right so you don't lose a sale because you forgot to follow up with this guy.

00:19:38
Speaker 1: But we could do the same thing for friends.

00:19:41
Speaker 2: They have a friend CRM and you get reminded to reach out to Elizabeth because you haven't spoken with Elizabeth in a month, and so you're like, oh, well, I better text her and see how things are going. And then Jenny has also not been around recently, and so get in touch with her, and it just reminds you and you might think like, okay, like can't you remember your friends?

00:20:06
Speaker 1: And you do, but life gets busy and.

00:20:10
Speaker 2: It can wind up being longer than you would have wanted it to be, you know, particularly if Jenny and Elizabeth have both been traveling for work a lot lately, or they have been on vacation, and then one of them had to cancel something because their kids were sick, and you know, it just can wind up being longer than you meant it to be, and so it's just a nudge to get it on the calendar.

00:20:30
Speaker 1: I love that.

00:20:31
Speaker 3: And on a completely unplanned note, if someone comes to mind in a positive light, like you see something that reminds me of someone, you should just text them right then and there, Like there's not like get rid of the idea that like they'll be annoyed by it, because if you had a friend zer m, you can then check it off and be like, Okay, good, now I'm up to date with this person. And it blends the I don't know, the planned aspect and the like genuine like I've thought of you kind of an aspect.

00:20:55
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:20:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, anytime you think of somebody, I mean, you should reach out mostly, I mean you put yourself in issues. Like if a friend texted you to see how you were doing, would you be like this is weird, Like no, you'd be like, hey, good to hear from you too, I mean, and I don't think it would even bug you if you always heard from this person on the second of the month, Like that's just when you're the friend's CRM had nudged them to reach out to you. I don't think it would really bother you. You might find it funny once you noticed, But like you know.

00:21:21
Speaker 3: I don't think i'd notice. Although now, like when does Laura text me?

00:21:25
Speaker 1: Is the second of the month. I don't know the second of the month.

00:21:28
Speaker 3: I'm texting you all the time, It's true, but hmmm, no, that's great. I don't think I would notice. Actually, if I had a friend that, like, you know, especially if they kind of couched it with some sort of like, hey, I was drinking your favorite trinke at Starbucks and I thought of you.

00:21:41
Speaker 1: On the second of the month, because I always do exactly. I love it.

00:21:46
Speaker 2: All Right, we're gonna take one more quick ad break, and then we'll be back with more ways to get yourself out of a funk. Well, we are back talking about is it spring yet? Ways to get yourself out of a funk? If you are feeling particularly sort of in a mood this time of year, if it is dark and cold where you are, if it is a long way since your last vacation before your next one, feeling like life is kind of one thing after another, so we talked about free and low cost little adventures. Obviously, you can put money into things, Sarah, If you are buying yourself treats, since we know you have an allowance, what kind of treats do you wind up buying yourself?

00:22:33
Speaker 3: I would say my top treats are manny petties, stationary items from jetpens, which is like delayed gratification but still, and some kind of warm, delicious drink like Starbucks is like so so stereotyped, but you know what, when I really need a treat, that mocha is there for me, or maybe just a cappuccino about like, it makes me feel cared for and I enjoy it.

00:22:55
Speaker 1: You enjoy it. That's good. That's good. Your treats? What are your treats? What are my treats?

00:23:00
Speaker 2: Well, I mean Starbucks sadly has become enough of a regular thing that is not so much a treat anymore. I have kids who are really into it, so I kind of indulge that and with them, but I do on occasion, like order lunch. I love that, And I mean part of the thing of working from home is that it would be a pain to go out for lunch anywhere, like I'd have to get my car, drive ten to fifteen minutes somewhere and then do it, like I tend not to do that. I also tend not to order lunch because I'm kind of cheap. But you know, I'm like once every two weeks or so, I could. I could let myself do that, and so I've been trying to nudge myself to make that happen.

00:23:37
Speaker 3: Super fun, especially if it's something that you would never you know, be able to make from leftover.

00:23:41
Speaker 1: It's like sushi. Yeah, although I think things have gone right. I order a salid from this place.

00:23:48
Speaker 2: I won't name them, but I'm sure people can figure out what it is if you want to.

00:23:52
Speaker 1: And something's been wrong with the order the past two times.

00:23:54
Speaker 2: This past time, like the solid dressing didn't come with it, so I was like, well, cheez okay, this is no fun. And I didn't have any really dressing in the tredge. So I was looking online to see if I can find a dupe recipe for like the salad dressing that goes on and it happens to have.

00:24:10
Speaker 1: Halopenos in it.

00:24:11
Speaker 2: And I had halopenios in the house because we'd made guacamole like two days before, and people who read my blog post about this, No, I made the dressing. It was fine, but I was very tired, and I went to go take a nap, and I went to take out my contacts and I'd washed my hands but not well enough, wearing hot sauce in my eyes.

00:24:28
Speaker 1: It was great. That is rough. That is so rough. So my treat was not as much of a treat as I thought my treat would be.

00:24:34
Speaker 2: So maybe I'll order from somewhere else next time, but it would still be nice to have lunch delivered. You can also turn work into something of a treat. Now, maybe not your whole job. It might not be much of a treat, but there's often some sort of work that you really enjoy and it might be worth seeking out a little bit more of that if that is something that could happen in your life, where even just it's like.

00:25:01
Speaker 1: A speculative project you want to try.

00:25:03
Speaker 2: And like a meeting gets canceled instead of just doing your email, do that right, yeah, and use that time for something fun.

00:25:09
Speaker 3: Yes, Or lean into the kind of collegiality of like just hanging out with people and finding out more about their lives and kind of making friends at work. I recently started up a book club at work. I don't know what moved me to do that, but we're talking like personal development type books, not my own book because that would be kind of self promoting. But anyway, we'll see how it goes. I'm kind of excited.

00:25:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, no, that will be fun to see, how you know, just have a project with colleagues is fun, especially if I mean if it's something you enjoy doing work wise as a project. Getting staffed on a project with somebody you genuinely like can make the entire experience of work very different, and that is worth seeking out too. Sir, Shall we skip over to the five minute uplifters? You have a long list of things that are like little your little uplifters. Can we mentioned the wallow first? Okay, fine, we can wallow. This was supposed to be a positive episode.

00:26:00
Speaker 3: A positive episode, but I mean, I don't know. Sometimes you just want to lean in and you can be like silly about it, like let yourself go over the top, Like what movie is it?

00:26:08
Speaker 1: I think it's is it.

00:26:09
Speaker 3: Bridge Jones' Star where she's like oh bum us, you know, like that song's playing and she's got like the boggy going on, and like maybe doing that with a friend would actually be so bad that it's good kind of a thing. And you can all you can laugh about your sorrows and sometimes you know, you can play obscenely sad music, but like, I don't know, after a certain point, it's almost funny.

00:26:28
Speaker 1: So I think the wallow the can be therapeutic.

00:26:32
Speaker 2: All right, So you could wallow, maybe not all the way to spring, but a night, yeah, like one night, one night of wallow.

00:26:40
Speaker 1: Okay, we will allow for that. Now you're five minute uplifters.

00:26:43
Speaker 3: Okay, I came up with these them all by myself. Okay, number one bye myself.

00:26:50
Speaker 1: I didn't plan that. Okay, number one. Play a song. It does not have to be all by myself. It could be a happy song.

00:26:56
Speaker 3: Maybe not the song happy because that that song's a lot, but play a song that makes you.

00:27:00
Speaker 1: You could play.

00:27:02
Speaker 3: A song meaning not just to get your phone out, go to Spotify, but like go to the piano or go to whatever instrument of toys or sing. And I am really into banging out canceled on the piano because it's just got it good. Just feels good to play that, especially if you're in a mood. You could get something scented going. So this could be a candle that just like makes you feel good, or a great room spray. This one's kind of cheating off myself, but a hot beverage just can be that cozy kind of comfort. My friend just gifted me some chime mix, so I'm excited to have that kind of ready made option ready to go. You could text a friend a ridiculous meme.

00:27:38
Speaker 1: You could do.

00:27:39
Speaker 3: A New York Times game. I mean I always do them anyway, but if you don't usually do them, try them. They're so fun. Like the Mini is a crossroad puzzle that you do as fast as you can, and they always make me happy. You could walk outside and just look for any signs of seasonal change. I mean with Laura, like, it's gonna be very obvious signs here. It might be more subtle signs, but can bring comfort in five minutes. A sheet mask like one of those Korean face masks, and just close your eyes and relax and breathe in the scent. You could look at pictures of past fun on your phone, like look at all your past Christmas vacations or summer whatever. And then finally a little antispiatory, Fine, do a quick Google search for like upcoming performances or plays or concerts or even movies in your areas. Maybe you could get something on the calendar that's like low key within just a few minutes, all right, Yeah.

00:28:26
Speaker 2: Never know. Maybe there's like a big stadium tour going on the summer and you want to have that on your calendar. If you know you're gonna need a ticket for something on August second. Good to know now you can look all looking forward to it all the way till August second.

00:28:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was gonna say I the season will change. It's sometimes subtle here too.

00:28:40
Speaker 2: I mean the lenten roses, right, the hellibores are out very early. But that's a sign you can see in February walking around, and all of a sudden there's something growing in the garden coming up, or little tiny shoots peeking up, and eventually it's so much that everything is going green. But those first little tips of the daft as they come up are subtle but worth looking for, and you can often see them not too far from now.

00:29:07
Speaker 1: Even in my part of the world. So yeah, keep your eyes open, see what you see.

00:29:11
Speaker 2: So this week's question, it's a kind of best of both worlds. Future listener, although listening now, I'm pregnant with my first kid. I love my work. I'm planning on taking my company's offered maternity leave and then going back and hopefully working more or less as I have been before. I am lining up childcare with that in mine. But as I have been doing this, a lot of people have said to me, oh, just you wait, you'll feel differently once.

00:29:41
Speaker 1: You have the baby. Really is that a thing? Why?

00:29:46
Speaker 3: You should have seen my facial expression during Laura's just you wait, just you wait?

00:29:51
Speaker 1: Those are our favorite three words of parenting, aren't they? Totally? My favorite? Freeze? Ever?

00:29:56
Speaker 3: I mean, okay, I'm not gonna stay into this microphone that your life is not going to change or feel quite different. My life did feel quite different in let's say, twenty twelve fall versus twenty ten fall, very very different structure, schedule, et cetera. Did my deepest desires and the way I felt about my job change very much?

00:30:16
Speaker 1: I don't think so.

00:30:18
Speaker 3: And I do think there's like this delicate dance you're gonna have some probably not always, but many people are gonna have some primal urgings like I cannot leave this helpless baby behind. Some people won't, but some people will. I feel like I had a little bit of that, But then I also had primal urgings of oh my gosh, I want to go out in the world and talk and like, I don't know, have some control over my minute to minute existence, and that those two are not necessarily easy to do at the same time, and I still enjoyed my job. I still enjoyed it, just like I enjoyed it prior. And I felt like there were positives and negatives to going back to work, but.

00:30:53
Speaker 1: Many more positives.

00:30:55
Speaker 3: And I guess I would just say it's probably easier to go in with the assumption that you will enjoy going back to work, because it's pretty easy to maybe cancel that daycare or un higher than nanny versus the other way around.

00:31:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, I gotta say I'm very very suspicious of people who are like, oh, once I saw the baby, everything change.

00:31:14
Speaker 1: I'm like, Okay, life is not a constant epiphany.

00:31:17
Speaker 2: Like I know, I write personal essays and they are all structured around epiphanies. But I'm always like laughing when I read yet another piece from the same authors having yet another life changing epiphany.

00:31:28
Speaker 1: I'm like, how much can your life change? I'm sorry?

00:31:31
Speaker 2: Like, if you know what you love doing, and you have done the hard work of like building a career doing something you love that's in your zone of genius, you are going to be the same person after having a baby, Like you're gonna have an amazing kid, you find your kid amazing, and you're gonna still want to you building your amazing life with your amazing kid. Like, I am so offended by the idea that somebody who loves what they do and has so many wonderful gifts to offer the world would somehow decide that's all worthless because they gave birth right.

00:32:06
Speaker 3: And not to mention how incredibly gendered this argument is, Like how sexist is that nobody's telling the dads, Oh, you're not going to want to go back to work after that baby comes, everything's going to change.

00:32:18
Speaker 1: Like that sounds silly, right, and yet so why are people putting that on young moms? I don't really know.

00:32:27
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a lot of people who are not so into what they're doing professionally and babies are a very good reason to shift gears, and so a lot.

00:32:37
Speaker 3: Of people do or maybe they truly enjoy it more and they have.

00:32:44
Speaker 2: But I just don't think that, like the idea that, oh, I will never want to like earn money to support my family because I have a kid, Like, what is that?

00:32:55
Speaker 1: I don't know.

00:32:56
Speaker 2: It's just it's such a strange thing to be saying to people. I think people are saying it have a lot of baggage of their own. So yeah, anyway, that's my vander rant there. But the good news is, of course, there's a lot of ways to make sure you get a lot of time with your kid, even if you are for working full time. I mean, a lot of times people are saying things like this, have no idea where the time is really going. And like, you work forty hours a week, you sleep eight hours a night, you got seventy two hours for other things. You've heard that number a million times on this show. You're going to spend a lot of those seventy two hours with your kid because they're around all the time, and so you will be spending the time with them. My guess is you will be able to structure your amazing job in ways to allow for family time. If you want, you can read I know how she does it for some inspiration on that. I would also say, though, if you are looking to sort of keep going with your life professionally as it is, and you want to give yourself the best chance of that there are certain ways to structure your childcare then that This is something I think we've learned the hard way over many years. Daycare is wonderful. If you are doing daycare, you need a very strong backup system because your kid will be sick a lot, and that's just the nature of being in an environment, no matter how the much they clean it. Like kids touch the same toys and then they put their fingers in their mouths and so they will pass around germs. Your kid will be sick for probably six weeks over the winter, and if you cannot miss six weeks of work and continue your career as before, then you'll need to figure some good backup system out for that to make sure you have that something that you could call at seven am to come and you know if your kid can't go to daycare that day and know that you would still make whatever important meeting you had to do. That is why a lot of people who do want to continue charging forward in their careers wind up hiring nannies is because you have less of that last minute germ thing from your kids. Many times, adult nannies are less likely to get sick for six weeks over the winter, so you have that more support. But even so, people can wind up or got an a fender bender on the way there and or late, or you know whatever. All sorts of things can happen, and they need to go on vacations and have pay time off and all that, so you need a backup for that too. So I think you might also want to consider are you going to want to do some evening hours, Like are you gonna want the flexibility to take a client out to dinner? And if you do, and if your partner can cover it, that's awesome, But if you're going to need some backup for both of you, because it might be a possibility for either of you, then you'll need somebody who has availability sometimes in the evening. A lot of times people want to rest and recover on the weekend. You can trade off with your partner with one kid. That's probably a pretty easy way to do. It, but if you start having two or three, it might help to bring in some fresh blood over the weekend as well. So booking somebody for a few hours on the weekend so that both of you can rest and relax and then hit Monday ready to go is probably important. So you might consider maybe sort of a one point five employee situation if you are looking to have the support that would allow you to keep going. So just something to keep in mind with that.

00:36:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, the right support does make all the difference, and it really is, I mean hard. Not every career makes it easy to do that. We do acknowledge that, but we also have a lot of people listening who are in careers where it is a reality, especially between the two working parents, because as we've talked before, you're not just covering you know, it's not just coming out of your salary. It is coming out of the family's earnings. So a lot of people are in a position. I think fewer people do it than could do it.

00:36:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's not a cost. It is an investment in your lifelong earning potential. And again, if you cannot afford it, obviously we totally get that. We are very sympathetic that a lot of careers are not paying as much as it would be necessary to have the sort of support if you don't have close family right by who's willing to.

00:36:53
Speaker 1: Do a lot of stuff.

00:36:55
Speaker 2: But if you are in a high paying career and your partner is too, then there's no reason to suffer or to underinvest in this out of some misguided notion that you shouldn't be spending money on childcare. This is what you should be doing if you want to continue with both of you having career options in the future. Yes, that's another vandorant, sort of another vander rant for sure.

00:37:20
Speaker 1: Okay, so love of the week, Sarah, What do you have for us this week? Yeah? I love trip Advisor.

00:37:28
Speaker 3: Every time I'm shopping for a hotel or even restaurant, I pull it up and I don't feel like I don't give it enough love because I mean, I don't pay for it, and I'm sure they make money by having ads or whatever, but I just feel like I generally have not been steered wrong. So hats off to trip Advisor. Trip Advisor excellent.

00:37:45
Speaker 2: I'm going to say my fireplace, so I have a gas fireplace in my office. We put that in when we did the renovation and what I just remember to turn it on because it's very easy. It's not all I have to make a fire just with my remote control. I'm like, uh, this is so nice and it makes me feel a little bit more creative. And I don't keep it on that long because sometimes it gets a little hot and dry in there if I keep it on. But you know, having it on for thirty minutes just is that extra special thing that can make winter feel better.

00:38:11
Speaker 1: Love it all?

00:38:12
Speaker 2: Right?

00:38:12
Speaker 1: Well, this has been best of both worlds.

00:38:14
Speaker 2: Our Is it Spring yet? Episode how to Get Yourself Out of a Funk. We will be back next week with more on making work and life fit together.

00:38:23
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.

00:38:24
Speaker 3: You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you.

00:38:30
Speaker 2: Can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both Worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together.