I Don't Like Fixed Appointments
This week, I feel extremely busy.
This is not because I have much more to do than I do every other week.
I even have a short week because Thursday is a public holiday.
As far as I can see, things at work are going well, recording for the album is progressing as expected and while there is currently chaos around the house, I know that it is because we painted my husband's room over the weekend and have not put all the things back yet.
So, why do I feel so stressed?
It turns out that for me, the feeling of "stressed and too busy" is not linearly correlated with the number of things I have to do.
Instead, it is tied to how much flexibility I have about when and how I do the things I have to do.
Some weeks, I have much more to do than this week, but none of the things has a specific deadline. I can freely slide things in and out of the calendar as I go and adjust according to how it is going.
This week, I don't have an unusual amount of things to do but more than a few of them have fixed days and times where they need to be done.
Knowing that I have to do ONE thing tomorrow at 2 PM stresses me out much more than knowing I have to do ten things "anytime tomorrow".
Once an appointment is locked in, the rest of the day feels quite cramped. It's as if my natural flow just bumps into the edges of that one blocked two-hour slot on my calendar. This is especially true for appointments that happen in the middle of the day. The more squarely it sits in the centre, the more stressed about it I feel.
On one side, this is irritating. I feel stressed when I don't even "have a good reason".
On the other hand, this is really good to know. It means I don't necessarily have to control the number of things on my plate as tightly as I thought I might have to. I just have to reduce the number of firmly locked-in non-negotiables.
In practice, it means I can do as many flexible things as I like because the more I move, the more energy I have for moving more. It also means I don't want to have more than two immovable appointments a week and I do not want to have them on consecutive days.
Sometimes, you don’t feel busy because there is too much to do. You feel busy because you have no autonomy over when things happen. Loosening up on the calendar and limiting the fixed appointments can help with that. Perhaps, you’ll be surprised by how much you still do even if you don’t fix it quite as firmly on your calendar.
