Relax, Goddamnit

I have always been good at working hard, sometimes to the point of disappearing inside the work itself. Lately I have been thinking more about slowing down. This is the story of what happened when someone I love suggested exactly that.

This morning I was catching up with one of my closest friends from my graduate school days. From 2003 through 2008 we were in the trenches together: classes, practicums, comprehensive exams, research assistantships, teaching appointments, and the long, winding marathon of writing and defending our dissertations. I spent more hours with my five classmates than I did with my husband, and this particular friend loved to make fun of my grind. She teased me for rewriting my notes after every class, for the notecards I made about everything, and for the way I would forget to pee or eat because I was so absorbed in my work. I was the butt of many of her loving jokes, and there was plenty to laugh about.

My intense work ethic carried me far, but it also cost me more than I can quantify. I earned my Ph.D. on schedule, even though I had two babies along the way. If I had not been so hard wired to perform, it probably would have taken me longer. But the pace that helped me succeed also kept me from living my life fully. Even then I knew that rushing through my own experience was not healthy, but I could not stop myself.

This morning I was telling my friend about my current project, the long and ongoing process of editing my memoir. I am working with an agent who has become a true partner in the revision process. I trust her, and she is pushing me to make the book as strong and honest as it can be. That means I am now on what feels like revision number nine hundred and fifty seven, and I am starting to feel a little worn thin. I told my friend that the experience reminds me of writing my dissertation. I poured so much labor and love into that document. Each time I completed a draft, I handed it to my committee only to be met with overwhelming edits and the instruction to revise again. Over and over. Until I could hardly separate myself from the work I had poured into it. Until I was sick of looking at my own words.

The difference this time is that my manuscript is not made of cold research facts. These chapters hold the emotions, struggles, relationships, and traumas that make up my life. Revising them is not like revising a research paper. It feels less like editing a manuscript and more like revising my entire life.

My friend listened patiently, as she always does. Then she quietly asked if I could slow down. I laughed and replied incredulously, have you met me? She gently pointed out that the only timeline I am on these days is a self imposed one. Her words landed because she was right. I can choose to slow down. No one is pushing me to work at the pace I am choosing.

Here is the uncomfortable truth: slowing down brings me tremendous discomfort. I know this is a kind of golden cage. I have the privilege of time and control over my schedule, and yet I fill that space with pressure. For me, the hard part is not the work itself. The hard part is doing less. The hard part is letting something be unfinished. The hard part is taking my edits slowly and being a good enough student rather than the perfect one.

Good enough. That phrase comes from the concept of the good enough mother, a term coined by the pediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott. He believed that children do not need perfect mothers. They need mothers who are present, responsive, and human. The child grows not because the mother gets everything right, but because she adapts, repairs, and shows up in an ordinary and consistent way. I have spent years helping patients internalize this idea. I believe in it deeply. I have never had an easy time applying it to myself.

Perfectionism is efficient, but it is also protective. Forward motion keeps me from sitting still with the parts of me that never learned how to rest. Slowing down opens space I am not always sure how to fill. It leaves me alone with myself in a way that still feels uncomfortable. It is easier to keep pushing than it is to tolerate the quiet that follows when I stop.

I could offer a wise reflection about balance here, something about finding a middle ground between ambition and ease. But the truth is, I like the forward motion. I do not want to stop. What I want is to learn how to move without gripping so tightly. I want to remember that pausing is not the same thing as quitting. I want to trust that the work will still be there after a breath.

My friend was offering me something I try to offer others. She was reminding me that the life I am living is happening right now, not after the next revision, or the one after that. She was reminding me that good enough is not failure. It is permission. It is space. It is a measure of success I have never been good at claiming.

I am not sure I can slow down in the way she hopes I will. But I can try to look up a little more often. I can take a breath and notice the life that is happening around me while I am busy documenting the one that already happened.

And maybe that is the good enough version of slowing down. At least for today.