Yesterday was a very tiring day. First thing in the morning, we took our car to be serviced, which it badly needed. Then we took BART to Emeryville, where we ate both breakfast and lunch, did some work, and ran a great number of errands. Late in the afternoon, we returned to El Cerrito, picked up the car, run many more errands, and returned home in exhaustion.
I’ve noticed quite often that when I’m very tired, or in some other way out of balance, I tend to make bad decisions. Yesterday, for example, even though I wanted to eat a healthy lunch, I ended up choosing something deep-fried. My intentions were good, but I felt overwhelmed when it came to the actual decision. The food court was too big, I had had too much sun and not enough water, my heavy bag hurt my shoulders, and I was tired of being out among so many people. I picked the easiest thing, and regretted it when it wasn’t even very tasty. Moreover, by dinnertime I was ready to eat out again, and was saved only by the healthy kale and black-eyed-pea soup we had waiting in the fridge. I was so weary and dehydrated and hot, and for me, that always means the path of least resistance. As it was, we had our healthy dinner, but the dinner dishes are still unwashed… when we have a dishwasher!!
I was thinking about this this morning, and it occurred to me that this tendency — to make easy, but regrettable, choices when I’m out of balance — is what makes it so important for me to have rituals. Just as a nighttime driver needs highway reflectors to keep him in his lane, I need my daily touchpoints to keep me on track. Here in the new house, I have settled into a morning routine that sets a peaceful, balanced tone for my entire day. I get up between 7 and 7:30, set the teakettle to boil while I unload the dishwasher, and make myself a satisfying breakfast (often hot buckwheat cereal with nuts and dried fruit, a boiled egg, and a piece of fruit). While I eat, I write my morning pages, which gives me a chance to think over the events of the previous day and plan today’s activities. (Usually all this happens to the chorus of hungry kitties trying to get my attention!) After I finish my breakfast and my pages, I clean up, feed the kitties, brush my teeth, and check my email. There are other rituals built into my day as well, including a noontime lunch and a six o’clock dinner, and powering off the computer at nine for a wind-down with Erik. But the morning ritual is the easiest one to keep, just because it’s the first thing I do each day. Each time I skip a routine, the likelier it is that the rest of my day will get out of whack. It’s like alignment in a yoga practice: if there’s something out of line in your hip, then your knee will also be out of place, and the same for your foot, and the other way around, too. Misalignment has a long reach.
What I realized this morning, while I was thinking about yesterday’s events, is that rituals not only make it easier to make good choices — because they acquire the force of habit — but they help prevent all those little misalignments in the first place: sleep deprivation, dehydration, hunger, lack of exercise, and so forth. Of course, it’s possible that this isn’t true for everyone; some people seem to thrive on unpredictability and constant flux. But I like the structure my rituals give me. It may seem like my aim is to do the same thing every day, but that’s not the way it is at all. No two days are ever the same; I am never the same person two days in a row. But change is easier for me to deal with when it’s grounded in the foundation of my daily routines. Without those touchpoints, I’m easily led off track.
satsumabug.com | Lisa Hsia 