In week 26, September 2020, I watched a UCSF video about ergonomics that talked about the importance switching between sitting, standing and moving every hour. Another idea was about converting video calls to audio calls to have some variation.

My mother also told me about the benefits of taking many mini-breaks throughout the day (like a 3 minute meditation break) both for mental health and eye health.

It’s been tricky to learn to take time off when I can’t go anywhere (whether because of pandemic or smoke or need for childcare etc.). But I’m learned to pay attention when I tend to be more irritable or angry in meetings (and I’ve started to learn which meetings I routinely manifest these reactions to). It’s an indicator I need time off, less work pressure, or at minimum, need a break from meetings to use my time however I need to, which is usually a blend of cleaning/organizing the house and catching up on some of my writing or thinking.

In week 30, Dr. Sakar wrote a great blog post about the importance of rest.

In week 35 I reflected on the important of white space: Negative space in art, white space in grant writing – it’s important to give the brain spaces to rest.

I’ve been trying to block off my calendar for a week of no meetings roughly ever quarter – it feels selfish, but I’m told this is also called “healthy boundaries”. In the first few years after my father died, it gave me days to grieve and hike and bike. But I could also choose to work on high-importance and urgent work activities. The quality of my work and thinking has been a lot higher for giving myself more freedom and space to feel feelings as needed, whereas I unconsciously compartmentalize more when I have a ton of meetings.