A Recipe for Tirelessness

RESTING AIN'T EASY

I am resting on my couch after a fun weekend getaway with my cousin to see Usher in Las Vegas. We didn't rush and did everything I didn't plan on! This is a major win if you know how I used to treat life. I told a few people I'd sleep when I'm dead in my 20s and it wasn't because I was partying all night.

I deserve to rest. You deserve to rest. We don't have to earn it either.

Someone described me as tireless earlier this month, and it upset me. What a transformative moment - I didn't celebrate this like I may have just a few years ago. Nonetheless, I had to unpack why I was upset. It was clearly well-intended, but I couldn't ignore it as harmful and reckless use of language. It feels like a vestigial expression of cultural inheritances we are vehemently refusing to reckon as a nation by educating ourselves about our origins and the audacity that got us here.

If you are human, you get tired. If you are a dog, you get tired. My kitten in all of his extreme energy bursts, eventually gets tired.

Here is proof.

Whew, there I said it. Holding it in was work, and I got tired.

Let's talk about ways I'm living my best life (read intentionally resting) and giving people the wrong impression so you can do it too. I'll be sure to close with some tips, I promise.

RESTLESS CHATTER ABOUT RESTING

The conversations around rest are all through my timelines - soft girl life, radical rest, and rest as resistance/activism.

The most valuable thing that has come out of all this banter has been the curiosity and commitment it has sparked personally and professionally.

WERK + WERK + WERK = SUCKSESS

My Name is Uniqueka Walcott, and I'm a recovering workaholic.

I'll let you know how I got here.

I grew up watching my mother and others work 2+ jobs to survive. I tried taking that same work ethic into college and corporate.

Eventually, I promised myself never to have to work two jobs or weekends again. I'd done both, but I had yet to witness many single women do it - so this was a significant commitment.

Even as a college student, I almost always had a full-time load of classes, a part-time plus job (about 30 hours was typical), a campus work-study job, and an internship simultaneously. Plus, I rarely took the summer off from classes. I was also very involved in other organizations.

TEACH THEM EARLY - JUST NOT THIS ETHIC

As much as I'd love to blame this pattern on college pressure, I'd burned myself down noticeably the first time in high school. I constantly checked my wrist for the time and got my stomach in total knots - as a 15-year-old - for running late to the next thing on my calendar. It's why I don't wear a watch well into my 30s.

By my junior year of high school, I was in 9 organizations and serving in active leadership roles for 8 of the 9 organizations: Marching Band, Beta Club, National Honors Society, Science Olympiad, Spanish Honors Society, Gwinnett Student Leadership Team...I can't even remember them all. However, when my health set me down at 16 years old, I counted them and realized I was outside my mind for thinking I needed all these things to earn my way into college.

Do well in school (read - anything less than an A is deficient and unacceptable), get a scholarship, and GRADUATE (not just go) college so you can get a good job. This is the formula my parents and many people around me sold as the secret to success.

The formulaic plan failed fast. The new plan included getting a 2nd job before the 4th of July and canceling my freshman dorm reservations and class schedule at Hampton University for the upcoming August. More unexpected mishaps took place, and our family needed the money.

I say this to clarify how normalized this work addiction was before I left home and to illustrate how dangerous it is to have more faith in cultural formulas than divine timing.

REST BEFORE YOU GET TIRED

Here are a few ways I've gotten intentional about resting. I am sharing the secret sauce so you can look tireless, too.

1) Slow down. Working with Goddess Annika Ford years ago helped drive this point home. She has a book called the S.T.O.P. Principle that I recommend. She is why my alarm goes off on a specific day as a reminder to slow down.

2) Calm Down. Make ease/rest a part of your daily routine. I do this by allowing an additional 5+ minutes in my shower routine to put on my favorite lotion and perfume gently. This is usually where I catch myself before I lean back into my old habit of attacking the day. Attacking the day looks like a frenzy. Did I leave my matcha latte in the microwave? Feed the cat? Send off that email I drafted; nope, it's still in drafts from yesterday ...

Calm cancels the game of whack-a-mole, where I react to everything that crops up and sends my schedule into a spiral. Calm allows me to tell people, "let me get back to you" instead of "yes," which is expensive when you don't have enough information or bandwidth.

3) Learning what adds sparkle. I might sometimes be tired, but the solution isn't necessarily a nap. The way we study our pets, spouses, and children to understand their unspoken or poorly expressed needs - we should also examine ourselves. Do I need more play time? Do I need a snack break? A day off? A change of scenery from at home to the office or coffee shop? Do I need creative rest where I stop making all the things that come to mind and enjoy what I've already made?

4) Learning what dims my shine. This has two categories - people and things/activities. Telfar might be for everyone, but I am not, and I'm learning to be okay with this fact. (Psst, neither are you.)

Enjoying time with people is one thing. However, loaning myself to people or things that don't add value is canceled in this two-thousand and twenty-third year of our Lord. Free is also revoked. Also, not being free doesn't mean money needs to be exchanged. Please take a look and make revisions as you see fit for your life. You get to define how much value an activity or interaction brings and if it is an appropriate way to manage your energy budget.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Uniqueka Walcott, CPSM is a sister, daughter, wife and proposal professional who loves to write and talk about the human side of careers. In April 2021, she launched a show entitled Career Conversations where she holds space to hear how we are all more than our job titles.

www.uniquekawalcott.com is where you can find interviews with people as far away as Australia and in as broadly different professions as data science and mortuary services

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Uniqueka is a proud graduate of Georgia State University - where she earned her B.A. in Journalism by way of Fort Valley State University and Georgia Perimeter College. Her favorite things include tea, nail polish, and purses.

She is available for freelance writing and public speaking opportunities that align with her values and expertise.