Amy Swift Crosby

Summer, for many of us, impacts productivity, disrupts established processes and changes the pace we strive to hit the rest of the months of the year. More than any of the other seasons, it forces us to make tradeoffs, to negotiate for the summer pleasures that can only be done during these magical months. For me, there’s always something that ‘has to give’ to make room for everything else I want to savor.

Hot days are the reason to power down early, to cancel meetings; days off are legitimate needs more than they are guilty pleasures. Deadlines are accommodated, whereas new initiatives — and the requisite heavy lifting — those, we wave off to fall.

In July and August, we forgive erratic, work-disrupting kids’ schedules and colleagues’ inconvenient vacation notices because, for this fleeting period, work can wait. There’s an unspoken, collective agreement that because summer is a rare window of time, all is forgiven. It provides the ultimate “hard out,” a season that demands we milk every minute, without judgment.

But the transitional days between the end of August and early September feel less clear. Cues that point to more prescribed rhythms compete with our lingering desires to be spontaneous and open-ended. These weeks have us in a collective no-man’s land of bumpy starts, even for those of us ready and wanting of more structure. It’s easy to feel (temporarily) unmoored as expectations shift.

This was especially true for me as I sat down to write one recent morning, the first uninterrupted personal work day in (many) weeks. In spite of the numerous messaging projects I’ve completed for others this summer (it’s not as though I didn’t work), I found myself undone. I’d even go as far as to say panicked – by a palpable sense of incongruence. Was it my unusually quiet house, with kids now back in school? Was it an over-stuffed in-box, full of unanswered emails? Maybe.

But if I’m honest, the unexpected strangeness hit me as I began this blog entry. Sentences that usually come so easily felt rusty and punishing. After a six-week hiatus from personal writing — a self-imposed pause intended to uncover new perspectives and be present to other areas of my life — the exercise of unearthing clear dialogue, in this format, was sharply awkward.

I can’t tell you that a flash of regret didn’t seize me, because it did.

Please tell me you’re having a similarly clumsy transition.

Should I have been here, at my keyboard, so as not to lose all the momentum that suddenly appears to have evaporated? 

Is the consequence of enjoying more summer —time, people, experiences — the loss of something else — art, progress, life’s work?

(This is long, but if this sensation is at all familiar, stay with me.)

As I thought back to why I chose to break the status quo, I was reminded of how fatigued I’d felt last spring, bored by the inescapable expressions of my own stirrings. Have you ever tired of your own output? I remember craving a new way to relate to the observations that have defined my work, a desire to evolve in some way. Maybe this acute, uninspired slump was the toll to be paid on the road to creative rehab. 

But that narrative feels too punitive. Why is the nature of internal dialogue so sacrificial? Why is enjoying our lives — themselves works of art — often characterized as hedonistic? Could the real price of mental rest — especially because what was gained was both novel and meaningful — be thought of as walking down a path without footprints? Could we gently remind ourselves that we have not undone hard fought achievements but are simply in the realm of the unfamiliar?

Transitions don’t always appear productive, on the outside.
Nor are they very comfortable, on the inside.
But they are, quite often, the precursor to the new story we’ve asked for.

I’m not sure any of us have any clue to what we’ve released or acquired until we get back into relationship with it. It’s in the doing that we see what percolated and grew while we stepped away from it, particularly for those of us who create something…from nothing.

Sometimes the world invites us to a conversation we can’t refuse, and the roar of a wonderful, important, or worthwhile force takes over. But it doesn’t mean whatever has gone quiet, set aside for rest or recalibration, isn’t making its own magic while you’re not watching.

I get the sense that a new path is waiting, once my feet hit the ground. It may be overgrown, thorny and even a little formidable, looking at it right now. But trusting that there’s a way through it, that the part of me that churns and moves isn’t so much dormant but unexplored, is one reassurance that helped me take this first step.

How are you, friend?

Sometimes I go to bed at night with a deep sense of reward. Finally, I think to no one but myself, a nice, long stretch of rest before I face all of the decisions, demands, and solutions to be required of me tomorrow.

But then… the next morning comes — about 5:15 am usually (thank you enthusiastic birds of New England) and I wake up thinking: Already? Seriously? Is it time to do this again?

For me, it’s not about dreading my day or resisting the phase of life or work I’m in. Of course, some weeks feel mentally heavier, while others more light/productive. Yet others create the sensation of bailing water out of a sinking boat. But this life… especially when you bite off a big chunk of it — whether creative, financial, managerial, analytical, intellectual, operational, emotional, parental — or any other role that shoulders the wellness or future of something or someone important, is demanding as fudge.

It’s so interesting to me to observe that as we grow in our vocations and are able to take on more risk or responsibility, we must also grow internal capacity to bear more uncertainty. But being metaphorically out of breath and in an almost constant state of whiplash… ain’t no way to live.

For me, this past month proved to be opaque. What I thought would happen, develop, grow, become real…showed up as something completely different…and with many a curveball. Because the reverse pattern seemed to repeat itself, I decided to start looking at things like the flow of a river; “where the water flows, so shall we go.” Corny, yes – but I needed it.

If the meeting seemed difficult to nail down, I released my need to have it.
If the person didn’t seem sure, I prepared to let them go.
If the idea didn’t resonate, I put it away for later.

Sometimes the world/ universe/ spirit/friends are throwing up roadblocks to steer you in a different direction or help you see an alternate route. I’m trying to watch for those now, instead of muscling through with an unyielding force. Which isn’t to say I’m not persistent and determined, but there’s something to be said for observing the flow. While you know clichés give me hives (but here goes), “meant to be” usually presents as the right time, place, words, opportunity — a sign of some kind, or ease, that reassures.

Exhaustion comes from thinking you have to deal with it all.

Restoration comes when you realize a lot of “dealing with it” may have nothing to do with you.

Who’s taking up space? Are they paying rent, or squatting?

Forgive the self-focused angle this week — but it does the best job of explaining what you could easily apply to your own life if it resonates.

Sometimes (but not often enough) I have the forethought to take inventory of the “tenants” residing in my thoughts. These are threads of a conversation I might only be having with myself, that have become semi-permanent without my realizing it. Recognizing them is a contemplative exercise that requires some wherewithal and practice. Why? Because it requires a thought looking inside a thought, as they tend to camouflage themselves as “normal.” In reality, they’re depleting, diminishing and distracting. But I don’t tend to challenge them because I get slowly used to co-habitation.

I wouldn’t call them a belief system as much as a more contained grievance, regret or worry.

Having participated in my share of brand-related hospitality and real estate projects, I tend to think of it in exactly those terms.

A (good) real estate developer considers a property (like a mixed-use office campus or a retail lifestyle center) in a host of ways. The questions contemplated are often:

What is the optimal ecosystem? Will big, established brands balance smaller, riskier concepts and together will they create something authentic? Compelling? Is there a juicy anchor tenant paying a lion’s share of the rent, but who can attract complementary businesses?
Will the addition of one tenant turn off a series of others? And, at what cost?

As anyone who reads this blog knows, there’s not a lot of daylight between my musings and a (good) metaphor; I love them. But the reason I like this one is because life doesn’t always feel intentional in the way that decisions made by real estate professionals are. We’re “in” properties of our own making, yet not always of our own design.

So I’ve started to distinguish my literal tenants from my invisible but nevertheless vocal ones. Realizing there was a difference was a victory in and of itself.

There are the tenants that see the light of day — professional commitments, family time, hobbies, personal work, cultivating curiosity and interests — even common stressors around deadlines, finances, and relationships qualify. You could say that these are the tenants of our days. This stuff is obvious and makes for the ingredients for a full and meaningful life (managing this is its own mission.)

But there are other tenants that are unseen, that can’t be spotted on a schedule, but who, like a squatter, are uninvited occupants in our minds. They tend to be demanding, entitled, and perpetually unsatisfied. Some are old scripts. Others are punishing messages about what we haven’t yet started, completed, or might never get to, despite deep and sincere desires. Fleeting bouts of this can be expected; but when a stray idea sets up shop, a good property manager notices — and investigates.

We all want good tenants — which is to say inspired, benevolent streams of consciousness. But there’s a certain amount of rigor required to spot the sneaky ones taking up space, not just for days or weeks, but months…who have no storefront.

Some hidden occupants are great — like an idea percolating that hasn’t taken shape. But when they feel more like anxieties, chronic frustrations or mounting crises, they affect the whole “property” in ways seen and unseen.

I like to know who and what I’m hosting, so I can evict them if necessary. Giving them notice is a matter of seeing them, as a first step. They may not leave, and a resolution may not be clear to me, but they can’t be there without permission from the landlord (me), either.

Even when I can’t give them the boot entirely — because they’re thoughts, after all – the conversation often reveals something I need to see.

What to do with them depends on what they tell me.

Wife. Of. The Owner.

Isn’t it interesting that in 2018, the woman in a partnership could still be considered a plus-one to the boss?

I actually don’t think anyone using this title means any harm, but when I was on the receiving end of it the other day, I was reminded of how ubiquitous these unintended slights really are.

As the co-owner of a new business, I was in a delightful conversation with a new employee who, at the end of the conversation, gave me a compliment that included her excitement at talking to “the wife of the owner.” I offered an alternate title for myself to her which was, “I think you mean the co-owner.”

While I wasn’t upset, something changed in me. In that moment, I became personally invested in stopping the marginalization of anyone — from the subtle gestures to the more glaring ones. If a 23-year old, financially independent, highly educated, engaged citizen-of-the-world can make this mistake, it can happen to anyone.

I know our antennae are all rather “up” lately on this — but I don’t think there is any stance that is too vigilant on this topic. As someone who works behind the scenes for brands, I’ve gotten very used to seeing my work out in the public, on Instagram, in the communal zeitgeist — with zero attribution. Such is a life in brand strategy and advertising- -often invisible to the majority of the world. And that’s okay. But when I see that same standard applied to the woman behind the work in a myriad of other situations, it strikes a nerve. Maybe it even lights a fire.

If anyone has ever wondered why women (or anyone who feels unseen) “seem so angry,” it’s because we are so ducking tired of holding 15 balls in the air and still delivering high caliber work, only to be treated as a side dish to the main one. This comes in too many formats and contexts to list, from domestic and family contributions to vocational and professional ones – but I can assume that anyone reading this has been that person at least once, if not dozens of times. Feeling invisible, when you’re hauling a load, is one of the worst kinds of slights.

To those who find themselves in positions to change this, course correct or otherwise give credit where it is due, please do it. This is not a directive to men or women but to all of us — to acknowledge work (and workload) and to celebrate where it’s earned.

In a different situation that swirls at the center of my orbit lately, someone did that for me. And I won’t soon forget it. Thanks, Doug.