These are lessons I keep re-learning about how I function through dramatic change, adapted from my week 2 and week 5 pandemic letters:

Transitions are hard. Even when you're moving into a situation that might be "better" for you, or for your family. There are always disappointments, anger, losses. Extra kindness, gentleness, understanding is necessary.

Prioritize ways to stay healthy. Sleep, exercise, hydrating, eating things to support you, are all crucial for the whole family. Yep, exercise often eats into "work time", but better than then into sleep time. These are the building blocks of resilience. I (try to) track when I am doing activities that support resilience in a daily or weekly calendar (i.e. exercise, meditate, journal, cry, talk to friends, etc) just to give myself credit what I’m doing and motivation to keep going.

Dramatically lower expectations. Sometimes life cannot continue on as normal, especially when there are lots of changes ahead. In fact, sometimes trying to do "normal things" can feel too hard, and remind us of the before times. Renegotiate work deadlines where possible, expect to be unproductive and inefficient, don’t try to "keep up" with whatever people around us might seem like they're doing. Try to be transparent about what we can't do rather than sacrifice to "make things work". And then track and appreciate what does get done.

Set and share boundaries: I’m practicing being honest about what I can and can't do, first with myself and my family and then with others. This can be hard, because I can do a lot; the question is at what cost and for how long and to whom. It’s important to say outloud to our families: you matter more than my work. For work responsibilities, I then communicate these limits and either renegotiate expectations or recruit colleagues to help with things I can't do. I also choose the things that feel important to me, personally, in that moment, not just what I'm "supposed" to do.

Reorganize to-do list by cognitive load: At the top, I list, things that take small amount of bandwidth/brainpower, and broken down into small amounts of time (for example, read a paragraph of paper I need to give edits on); on the bottom, I list things that take more time and brainpower (actually EDIT a paragraph of said paper). It might be that I only get 1 or 2 things done per-work shift if I can prevent myself from multi-tasking or reading the news.

Prioritizing and focusing amid overwhelm: I’ve done this in different ways. One way was to create a community for accountability and support, e.g. on Slack or Teams, and create a channel called #smallgoals. In it, I posted one small thing to get done in the next, say, 30-45 minutes. It just helped me put aside other possibilities and focus for a bit. Another way I did this was by setting 3 goals each day: 1 for wellness, 1 for a first-author project, and 1 for a coauthored project or service.

Take a week to experiment with routines/schedule and figure out what is/isn't working. Early in the pandemic we figured out that our house needed to minimize decisions, and adults needed big blocks of time to work, so we created a schedule that stayed pretty consistent, with Sam working mornings and getting Theo exercise, and me working afternoons and Sam and Theo making dinner.

For a week or two I tracked what we actually did, and how things went. I tried not to dwell on "supposed tos" (or epic tantrums) and instead focused on things that were actually leading to good outcomes. I discovered that everyone in the house needs to exercise daily (Theo twice daily); playing calming music throughout lunch and dinner promoted Theo sleeping; and that we all needed sleep and exercise more than we needed 8 hour workdays (which thankfully, our efficiency compensated for).

Make time to feel feelings. This may not be a problem you have, but it’s one I have. When in the acute phase of grieving my dad, I thought that if I let myself feel the feelings I would never STOP feeling them. In fact, giving myself time and space to let the feelings bubble to the surface and then to feel them as hard as I can in that moment actually seems to make them pass through faster. I feel more balanced on the other side. I realize feelings are piling up when I feel more tired/need lots more sleep, or am more angry/irritable than usual.

When I have time/energy/bandwidth, I try to appreciate beauty, be in the moment, recognize privilege. I use Instagram as a way to document and share beauty (and ruthlessly unfollow/hide anything that makes me feel worse about my life). Gratitude journals are another version of this practice. Evidence indicates spending just 2 weeks of noting 3 things you are grateful for every day can have benefits that last 6 months later.

Practice grace, forgiveness, and understanding. Kids are exasperating. When raised voices inevitably occur, we try to give lots of hugs and say: "I apologize. Let me try that again. I have big feelings. I would like to communicate them more clearly." Everyone is dealing with a ton of change, mostly in ways we aren't aware of, and perhaps not doing what we think they should. The world is changing daily, and we are all scrambling to keep up within our own circumstances.

Practicing compassion toward myself and others. My mother and I were talking this morning about how much we've learned in the last two years about living in the present amid uncertainty and expected loss, about learning to allow sadness and joy to co-exist. My mom also has a business/leadership business, and she posted about these concepts here.