\u2018I can’t think about that right now. If I do, I’ll go crazy. I’ll think about that tomorrow.\u2019<\/p>\n
-Scarlett O\u2019Hara, Gone With the Wind<\/p>\n
I have often felt like Scarlett.\u00a0 Not so much the civilization-ending chaos and despair, but the feeling of being overwhelmed, and simply unable to process one more thought today.<\/p>\n
All too often my mind seems a jumble of different thoughts, ping-ponging one to another.\u00a0 I’ll be writing an email, and remember I need to reschedule a doctor\u2019s appointment, and pick up the phone, the email temporarily forgotten.\u00a0 Then I remember, I need to confirm the babysitter and send a quick text.\u00a0 Or I\u2019ll go upstairs to bring down laundry, and end up watering plants or distracted by the kids, and then come back down without the laundry at all.<\/p>\n
My work days seem no exception, always working on one thing, and then being interrupted by an email, the phone, or my own thoughts.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re told not to put off what you can do today. I’ve\u00a0always espoused\u00a0to the idea of doing more, not leaving things until tomorrow.\u00a0 Sometimes it feels better to get it done quickly today, even if it means not as well, or in a less satisfying way.\u00a0 We\u2019ve all become excellent multi-taskers in our busier than thou society; I\u2019ve often dreamed of a having a body double, so I could get more done.\u00a0 How convenient it would be if I could have a clone to help me?\u00a0 This idea is as satisfying to me as the dream of being in two places at once, recalling straddling the state line as a kid, one foot in PA, and the other triumphantly in MD.<\/p>\n
But, it turns out that it\u2019s all a fallacy.\u00a0 We can\u2019t really be in two places at once, or multitask at all; instead our brains switch back and forth between a series of tasks. \u00a0This shifting is happening so quickly, that to us it may be imperceptible. But, the reality is our brains aren\u2019t proficient at doing this, so we end up spending more time transitioning back and forth between the tasks, losing our train of thought, and then picking it up again. Over time, it can take its toll.<\/p>\n
In this same way, our brains can\u2019t process different types of thought at the same time. We all know that tight feeling stress produces. That sense of foreboding, made worse by knowing there isn\u2019t one specific action you can take right now to resolve it.\u00a0 You breathe more shallowly.\u00a0 You may feel slightly nauseous. It\u2019s difficult to focus on other tasks.\u00a0 Your mind wants to churn on the problem with focused intensity, until it seems the most important thing.\u00a0 I know this feeling all too well.<\/p>\n
During my holiday break I decided to catch up on some photo projects, updating the kids\u2019 albums. Surprisingly, I couldn\u2019t find a picture of my daughter blowing out her birthday candles. Worse, when I tried to remember, I couldn\u2019t recall what we had done that weekend.\u00a0 As I looked through different folders for the photos, I also discovered some pictures of my son in his infancy, but was shocked I couldn\u2019t really remember those times either.<\/p>\n
It made me wonder, how much space is there in our brains?\u00a0 Looking back, much of the past several years has passed in a fog of stress, worry, and work.\u00a0 I realized I wasn\u2019t focused on the kids in the evenings when they were home.\u00a0 My mind was still busy sorting out work issues or fretting over project details I didn\u2019t have control over. Had all that worrying prevented me from making memories of my children over the years?<\/p>\n
One line in a song by my husband\u2019s favorite artist, comes to mind:<\/p>\n
Worry\u2026Worry, worry, worry, worry…Worry just will not seem to leave my mind alone<\/p>\n
-Ray Lamontagne, Trouble<\/p>\n
The beats in this song seem to match the timpani in my mind, repeating whatever is troubling me over and over.\u00a0 It is truly difficult to push it aside, even when I know I need to move on and think about something else.<\/p>\n
After reading some articles and watching a very interesting TED talk on the subject, I realized it was true.\u00a0 Our brains are very preoccupied when processing stress, part of our fight or flight mechanism. When this interference is occurring, the process by which the pre-frontal cortex creates working memory is disrupted.<\/p>\n
Stress related glucocorticoids also impact the ability of the hippocampus to grow new neurons, without which it cannot convert short-term memory to long-term memories.\u00a0 It boils down to, if we are distracted, we aren\u2019t really experiencing that moment live, and can\u2019t be expected to recall it later.<\/p>\n
This is really interesting to me.\u00a0 While it\u2019s easy to dismiss living in the moment as philosophy du jour, it becomes a bit more personal when you realize worrying about every insignificant little thing can get in the way of remembering the big things.<\/p>\n
Today is my husband\u2019s 40th<\/sup> birthday.\u00a0 While there\u2019s a tendency to see this as a monumental event, equally valid is the viewpoint that it\u2019s just another day among many in a lifetime. \u00a0All days are equally important in the possibility they hold to experience something truly wonderful and memorable.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a day for celebration, worthwhile of attention, but, also a time to reflect that time is finite, of duration unknown to all of us.\u00a0 Every day is an opportunity to create lasting memories. \u00a0I\u2019d rather have less to recall, but be able to remember it vividly, with fondness, than cram in so much of everything that I forget the good with the bad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u2018I can’t think about that right now. If I do, I’ll go crazy. I’ll think about that tomorrow.\u2019 -Scarlett O\u2019Hara, Gone With the Wind I have often felt like Scarlett.\u00a0 Not so much the civilization-ending chaos and despair, but the feeling of being overwhelmed, and simply unable to process one more thought today. All too… Continue reading I’ll Think About That Tomorrow<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-94","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p78aL7-1w","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=94"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":106,"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94\/revisions\/106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=94"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=94"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynnricker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=94"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}