Balance Does Not Exist

An update on the Year of Slow.

Simpler times, getting that Instagram shot in Rome

I’m writing to you today from my local YMCA, where I’m sitting in the wifi cafe, trying to muster up the focus to write something coherent to you.

In last week’s letter, which I sent from a hotel room in Bend, Oregon, I asked myself what was going on with the Year of Slow. Today I’m answering that question, for you and for myself.

If you are new here, some quick backstory. I first found myself on the journey of Slow after burning out and landing in the hospital after the Real Self-Care book launch (pretty embarrassing after writing a book called Real Self-Care!). I declared the Fall of Slow, and practiced what I preached. It felt really good. I came into 2024 wanting to maintain a whole Year of Slow.

But, low and behold, even with me saying no to nearly every invitation that crossed my desk, March took me to SXSW, to Maryland for Kaiser’s Mid-Atlantic group, and to LA for The Report on the Status of Women and Girls in California. April felt like a whirlwind between Italy and Oregon. I know, world’s smallest violin/ humble-brag (see below on privilege).

Bottom line, I’m finding myself in a familiar place — rushed, behind on everything, and having a hard time hearing myself.

Woof.

People often talk about balance as if it’s the missing piece of the jig-saw puzzle that is making an income while also parenting or caregiving and, also, striving for decent mental health and, at times, be able to thrive as opposed to just to survive. Yet, if you are reading this email, you, like me, probably have some feelings about the word balance. I often say, “You can’t meditate your way out of a 40-hour work week with no childcare.” Switch out mediate with balance, and the pithy phrase still works.

Over the past year the way I got myself through my Book Launch Burnout (can we make this a DSM diagnosis?) was, in addition to real self-care, to be Slow. I define Slow as:

• Permission to Stop

• Permission to Play

• Permission to Go Internal

Slow is not stagnant. And, Slow, like real self-care, is not a replacement for top-down investment in social support like paid parental leave or dependable health insurance. Slow is a framework that helps me make decisions from a place of clarity and agency as opposed to fear or ego. It goes beyond balance, which is outcome focused thus partially out of our control, and is inward focused (like real self-care).

To be clear, all of this falls squarely in the category of “Very Good Problems to Have.” My fortunate position is due in large part to luck, and to the sacrifices and risks my immigrant parents and grandparents took (e.g. privilege). Yes, I’ve also had to work my ass off to get here, *and* my hard work led to my cushy position of trying to find “balance” amidst a very full and well-resourced life because of where I started. We could go back and forth about where the percentages land, as I am a woman of color and have had my share of traumas. On balance, I think it’s fair to say that privilege/luck/the family I was born into/when I was born, all played a significant role.

Now, on to my thoughts on Slow.

After my health issues last year, I joined the YMCA. My local Y is a <10 minute drive from our house. It has a lovely indoor track and and pool/hot tub. Physical health has always been my achilles heel. I don’t like working out. I still love my cheeseburgers and bread, even though I found out last year that my cholesterol is elevated.

While I’ve never enjoyed full on exercise, I do enjoy walking. I don’t need it to be scenic - I listen to audiobooks, podcasts, think about my writing, let my mind wander. The indoor track is perfect. About once a week or so, I’ll take a dip in the jacuzzi — usually accompanied by several Eastern European grandmas chatting after their water aerobics class.¹

The Y is not fancy, but it gets the job done. If I think about it, I like that it’s not fancy. It’s a third space that meets all my needs. It has great wifi and a cafe area where on any given weekday you can find three to five people taking work calls. It’s conducive to the way I like to work, which is in many short bursts spread out throughout the morning, afternoon, and evening. On weeks where I’m not traveling, I will work from the YMCA two to three times a week (I see patients virtually from my home office 2 days a week).

The unexpected complication is that what constitutes my work has changed. I wasn’t expecting to enjoy public speaking as much as I have. And to be totally frank, I wasn’t expecting to be so good at it and to have so many people who want to bring me out to talk to them.

I genuinely love being in front of a room teaching. I’ve learned that I’m capable of holding an audience and that I’m a good story teller. I derive energy from engaging directly with people and contemplating their needs and questions.

The downside is that traveling sucks my energy and my productivity. I don’t like being away from K now that he’s old enough to realize that I’m gone. I don’t like flying, and I get thrown off when my routine is disrupted. I’m an introvert at my core and require weekly unstructured alone time to write and to create.

When I first started traveling to speak, I assumed that I’d be able to use all of my time on the plane doing my “busy work” — finishing notes, responding to emails, looking at contracts. I also mistakenly assumed that only my travel week would be thrown off.

But now I have more data. It turns out, in practice, I’m only productive on the way to the speaking gig. On the way back, I am dead. Shell of a human. I usually end up spending the flight back watching re-runs of The Office or whatever show is on the little screen. I get back and am playing catch up which bleeds into the following week. If I have a sick kid or if J is traveling or if I’m on the road two weeks in a row? It’s a mess.

Now, again, this is all in the best of circumstances - meaning a dual income household with full time daycare during the week and baby sitting help for a couple hours most weekends.

I could have never predicted that Real Self-Care would bring me here and I’m grateful to have such a full life.

This is the part where I’m supposed to have an answer for you, but I really don’t.

By the time I edit this letter to make it somewhat more readable than my natural stream of conscious, it will be evening. I’ll have finished dinner and bedtime and will be heading to pilates for the first time in a month.

It’s still a lot (too much) and I am moving (too fast). But, by writing this letter to you, I stopped (long enough to collect my thoughts and write them down), played (writing, when I’m doing it in the way I want to be, is play for me), and went internal (to think about what it is that’s making things feel more rushed lately).

And, with the sliver of Slow I gave myself today, I’m feeling more compassion for myself. As a mom, a partner, a doctor, an author, who is walking into a new stage of her career, trying to figure out what is up and what is down.

Thanks for being here with me,

xo,

Pooja

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From the Real Self-Care Archives

If you found today’s newsletter helpful, you will enjoy these companion pieces. Paid subscribers get full access to the archives. If you are a free subscriber, you’ll see a brief preview.

The Fall of Slow is the Year of Slow

On Confidence

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You are reading Real Self-Care, the email newsletter written by psychiatrist and best-selling author Dr. Pooja Lakshmin MD.

1. Funny story, one time an Eastern European grandma pointed to my AirPods, and asked what they were. “These are headphones, I’m listening to a podcast.” Her response: “What’s a podcast?”…so I took my headphones out, and had a conversation with her instead of listening to two people I don’t know have a conversation with each other :P