Lisa notes

Can You Do It Slower?

By LisaNotes March 12, 2024 Curiosity: One Word 2024, My stories, Now 29 Comments

“Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.”
~ Winnie the Pooh

Hurry Through This

As I wind down for the day, I flip through my podcast queue. I want something interesting to listen to as I tidy up the house, brush my teeth, and get ready for bed.

If I hurry through these tasks now, I can squeeze in more time later to read my stack of books.

I find the podcast episode on The Drive that my friend Kay recommended about time, productivity, and purpose. It sounds perfect for me. I check my settings to listen at 2x speed, and plug in my earbuds.

As it begins, I become more curious about what I’m doing as I listen . . . and scurry about.

I identify the tension: Hurrying is uncomfortable. But not finishing things is also uncomfortable. When you think you have more to do than time to do it, shouldn’t you speed up?

I get lost in the thought and miss a few minutes of the podcast. I’m not concentrating well. I rewind, and reduce the speed I’m listening from 2x to 1.5x.

This is still normal, right? To rush through a podcast about not rushing?

Think About Your 4,000 Weeks

I continue listening as the host Peter Attria interviews his guest Oliver Burkeman about Burkeman’s bestseller, Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals.

I remember reading the book when it was first published in 2021. It felt profound to me then and I’ve since returned to it over and over. [I wrote about it here, and about my friend who didn’t get his 4,000 weeks. The book also made my list of 7 New Books to Make You a Better Person.]

But maybe the lessons have worn off?

I remain curious as the discussion continues in the podcast.

  • About the struggle we have with the finite nature of time (definitely!)
  • About how productivity often turns into a trap (been there)
  • About the myth that if we can be more efficient, we’ll have more time and feel more in control (for sure)

I relate to each item.

“Productivity is a trap. Becoming more efficient just makes you more rushed (and also lonelier). Trying to clear the decks simply makes them fill up again faster.”

By now I’m more than curious. I’m convicted.

If You Slow Down . . .

I adjust the setting of the podcast one final time: from 1.5x to 1x, the normal speed of the conversation as they were speaking it, and the correct speed I need to process what I’m hearing. The message for me in this episode deserves more attention.

But slowing down feels counterintuitive to accomplishing what I want.

  • Projects will be left unfinished.
  • Podcasts will go unheard.
  • Blog posts will go unwritten.

Yet when I slow down, I do notice more. I savor more. I feel more rested. I actually feel more joy. Maybe I’m not designed for super speed. I’m made for my own pace, a Lisa-pace.

I finish the podcast. I pull up highlights I wrote in 2021 from Four Thousand Weeks. Oliver Burkeman’s words come to life again as I read:

“What’s needed is a kind of anti-skill: not the counterproductive strategy of trying to make yourself more efficient, but rather a willingness to resist such urges—to learn to stay with the anxiety of feeling overwhelmed, of not being on top of everything, without automatically responding by trying to fit more in.”

Instead of pushing away the angst of “too much to do” by doing more, surrender to it.

“Choose uncomfortable enlargement over comfortable diminishment whenever you can.”

Make peace with the discomfort of never finishing. Delete a few projects altogether. Burn a few bridges of tasks impossible to complete.

“We’ll do almost anything to avoid burning our bridges, to keep alive the fantasy of a future unconstrained by limitation, yet having burned them, we’re generally pleased that we did so.”

Accepting our limitations is progress towards growth.

Then . . . Stop

And at the end of the day? Stop. Even with tabs still open, emails unfinished, and kitchen uncleaned.

“Be willing to stop when your daily time is up, even when you’re bursting with energy and feel as though you could get much more done.”

I’ll never be on top of it all. No matter how fast I run or how efficient I operate. Completing it all is an illusion, a false promise of certainty and security.

I delete a few more newsletter subscriptions, a few more podcasts, return a few more unfinished books. My present moments are limited and used best when unhurried.

Freedom comes when I lay down doing more things, and focus on doing fewer things, the ones that matter the most to me.

Slow down to live more.

I’ll still listen to some podcasts at 1.5x speed and even 2x speed, but when it really matters, I hope I’ll slow down to 1x more often. How’s your speed?

Share your thoughts in the comments.

Read more about time:

10 Myths (And Realities) About That Fight You Just Had With Your Partner

By LisaNotes March 8, 2024 Book reviews, Relationships 8 Comments

Why is this happening to me?

Something has gone terribly wrong. Tears are falling now. Doesn’t he realize how painful this is?

It was a weekday morning, post-retirement. My husband Jeff was piddling around the house when he got a grand idea: he would clean out the toy closet today.

It sounded like a wonderful idea. We’d talked for weeks about the need for it.

But an hour later, why were we arguing about it? Why was I now crying about it?

How You Fight

Like many fights between long-term partners, the fight wasn’t really about the problem at hand.

As Julie and John Gottman write about in their excellent new book, Fight Right, a classic fight between partners is often about . . . almost nothing.

Every relationship has conflict. That’s normal. Humans are going to get angry with each other. (If you never have conflict in a relationship? It might be a sign you’re not close.)

What matters isn’t that you fight. What matters is how you fight.

Top 10 Myths About Conflict

In Fight Right: How Successful Couples Turn Conflict Into Connection, the Gottmans lay out their top ten myths about conflict.

Fight Right

Here are the 10 myths in brief. They go into much more detail in the book.

See if you recognize your latest fight in one of these.

  • Myth #1: Once we find a solution to the big fight we’re having right now, we’ll be all set—no more fighting!
    Reality: Most conflicts are perpetual.
    ~
  • Myth #2: If conflict exists in our relationship, we’re not supposed to be together.
    Reality: Conflict is unavoidable, even for the happiest of couples.
    ~
  • Myth #3: A conflict is a problem to be solved.
    Reality: We manage most of our conflicts through continuing dialogue—we don’t resolve them.
    ~
  • Myth #4: One of us is right, and one of us is wrong.
    Reality: Both partners’ experiences and points of view are valid.
    ~
  • Myth #5: Men are more logical than women; women are more emotional than men.
    Reality: Logic and emotion do not have genders.
    ~
  • Myth #6: The best conflict management is logical, rational, and unemotional.
    Reality: Neuropsychological research has shown that emotions and logical thinking are intertwined when it comes to problem-solving. One can’t problem-solve well without information derived from one’s emotions.
    ~
  • Myth #7: Negative emotions are bad and should be avoided.
    Reality: There is nothing wrong with anger. What matters is how anger is expressed.
    ~
  • Myth #8: Nobody can hurt you unless you let them.
    Reality: We can and do hurt each other.
    ~
  • Myth #9: You have to love yourself before you can love somebody else.
    Reality: We all have enduring vulnerabilities—triggers, traumas, wounds that may never fully heal—and these vulnerabilities may lead us to not perfectly love ourselves.
    ~
  • Myth #10: To be “allowed” to have needs, we have to justify or explain them.
    Reality: Human beings are pack animals; we are built to have needs, as our needs bind us together and help us thrive…together.
    – from Fight Right, by John and Julie Gottman

Start Softly

To fight right, the Gottmans say to start softly. In 97% of our fights, the first three minutes of a fight set the tone for the rest of the conversation. If we start harshly, we immediately put the other person on the defense, which is a horrible start.

Instead, start this way:

“I feel (emotion) about (situation/problem) and I need (your positive need).”

And if you’re the one on the listening side? They say your first job is to fully understand the complaint.

  • Ask clarifying questions.
  • Summarize what you hear.
  • Make sure you understand.
  • Avoid defending and rebutting.

Then as you continue the discussion:

  • Stick to one issue at a time.
  • Focus on this situation only.
  • Be curious.
  • Stay as positive as possible.
  • Be the best version of yourself you can be.

Solve the Moment, Not the Whole Conflict

“During a fight, you don’t have to solve the whole conflict. In fact, you shouldn’t try. Instead, solve the moment.

“We can disagree and still be on each other’s side. In conflict, your mission is to allow yourself to be vulnerable.

“This is what ‘solving the moment’ is all about—reframing the goal at this stage of conflict so that your primary objective is to find out more about what your partner is thinking and feeling and needing, and express that yourself before trying to progress to persuasion and compromise.”

The Gottmans say we may need to recalibrate the goal for a fight:

“The goal is not to win. The goal is not to persuade your partner of something. The goal is not to come up with a solution to the problem. Right now, the goal is not even to find a compromise! (This is coming later.)

The goal is to fight with more positivity than negativity.“

And if you become overwhelmed in the middle of it all? Ask to take a break from each other—from 20 minutes to 24 hours. Just commit to returning to the conversation, and preferably with an open mind.

After the fight, the Gottmans list ways to make repairs. “It’s one of the main things that separates the masters of love from the disasters.” You’ll find them all in the book.

Closeness for the Win

With Jeff and me that morning, we finally figured out that our arguments weren’t really about where to store the Clue game, whether to donate the extra blocks or not, or how many puzzles to keep.

It wasn’t about those things at all.

Instead, it was about what the cleaning the toy closet represented to me, which was an immense loss and grief. With each toy, I associated a memory of good times past with our own daughters, and a sadness that not all my grandchildren are here now to play with the items.

Once I took responsibility for and exposed my vulnerable emotions, the arguing went away. We still didn’t agree on which shelf to keep the Play-Doh, but now we understood it didn’t really matter.

We felt close again.

We had solved the moment.

Have you read Fight Right? I highly recommend it!

Which myth do you need to stop believing? Share your thoughts in the comments.

My thanks to Netgalley and Rodale
for the review copy of Fight Right.

Welcome the Outsider

By LisaNotes March 5, 2024 Community, Discrimination, Encouragement, Hope, My stories, Welcome 37 Comments

Have Enough Favorites?

It’s been a few years now, but I remember the night Brian brought me Vietnamese spring rolls.

He had made spring rolls a couple weeks earlier and brought them to our English as a Second Language class. But I wasn’t there that week. With no time to make homemade rolls again the following week just for me, he bought some from a local Vietnamese restaurant.

He pulled out the takeout box for me to have.

Vietnamese food is an unknown to me. I’m not adventurous in the food department. I like what I like. I have enough favorite foods already; why would I need to try new ones?

But having a Vietnamese friend was once an unknown to me, too.

When New Is Uncomfortable

Brian isn’t his original name. It’s the name he gave himself when he came to America a few months earlier from his home in Vietnam. It’s easier to say.

When I wanted to learn how to pronounce his real name anyway, he laughed and gently told me it would be too hard. I could just call him Brian. He liked that name.

Learning new things can be uncomfortable. Meeting new people even more so. Especially when you speak different languages. It feels rude to ask someone to repeat a word over and over because you can’t understand what they’re saying. Or to be asked in return to speak slower because they’re lost.

Differences often separate us. It’s hard to jump the hurdles to find commonalities. It takes energy and motivation. And time.

To practice his English, Brian prefered real conversations with a native speaker instead of learning through a workbook. So for an hour and a half each Thursday night week after week, we simply talked.

We worked on his pronunciation skills (the th sound is hard for him) and I explained definitions of words he was unsure of (like meteorologist). But we did so through natural discussions about the differences and similarities in our two cultures of America and Vietnam. Weddings, clothing, schools, food, family, holidays, religion.

It Goes Both Ways

As I learned more about Brian’s culture, I learned more about mine, too. Sometimes I’m proud of it; sometimes I’m shamed. The Vietnamese do many things better, some things worse, just like we do.

Even though our sounds differ, our minds search for similar information, our hearts feel the same emotions, our souls want the same connections.

The teaching and learning didn’t go only one direction, but back and forth, round and round.

One word at a time, one conversation at a time, the teacher/student dynamic broke down. It grew into friend-to-friend.

Welcome Home

Despite the hindrances, it’s possible to overcome barriers and reconnect in meaningful ways.

Granted, it takes more effort to understand each other when we don’t sound the same. We have to think harder, lean in, listen closer.

Welcoming the outsider often feels awkward. But we’ve all been the stranger. We know what it means to have received hospitality as a stranger as well as to extend hospitality to the strangers around us. To help others feel at home.

Our efforts are worth it when we discover our common humanity.

I opened the takeout box to try a spring roll. It looked as foreign as it was. I timidly dipped a corner of the rice paper into the sauce. Brian urged me to dunk it more fully. I tried it.

It was good, but it tasted alien to my American tastebuds. I would need a few more bites.

Spring Rolls

When I got home, I encouraged my husband Jeff to try one, too. He did. The culture was spreading. We’d never had Vietnamese food in our mouths—in our house—and now we had both experienced it.

It was no longer an unknown.

Welcome home.

* * *

When have you been an outsider? When have you welcomed the stranger?

Please share your thoughts in the comments.

revised from the archives

On the Blog—February 2024

By LisaNotes February 29, 2024 Archives No Comments

Here are brief summaries and links to posts on the blog, Lisa notes, from February 2024.

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See previous months’ archives here

7 Books I Recommend—February 2024

By LisaNotes February 29, 2024 Books I Recommend 17 Comments

“If you allow it
reading will seep into your bones
saturating you with fluidity
allowing you to move
more gracefully
through the world
than you would have
without that book
you just finished.”
– Lisa Burgess

Here are 6 nonfiction books + 1 novel I recommend from what I finished reading in February 2024. 

[See previously recommended books here]

NONFICTION

1. Killers of the Flower Moon
The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI
by David Grann

Killers of the Flower Moon

This book reads like a novel (you may have seen the movie already). But unfortunately, the ghastly story is true, not fiction. In the 1920s, members of the Osage nation in Oklahoma were overflowing with money from oil discovered on their land. But one by one, they were being murdered. A chilling story, but an important one to remember as part of our nation’s history.

2. Have a Beautiful, Terrible Day!
Daily Meditations for the Ups, Downs & In-Betweens
by Kate Bowler

Have a Beautiful Terrible Day

Kate Bowler is expert at making us feel better about bad things. She doesn’t use false positivity but rather acknowledges that life can be tough, yet together we can get through it anyway. These short spiritual reflections are easy to read and poignant.

[My review is here of Have a Beautiful, Terrible Day!]

3. Not the End of the World
How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet
by Hannah Ritchie

Not the End of the World

If you’re feeling depressed or powerless about what’s happening to our planet, Hannah Ritchie gives you hope in this book as she also gives good suggestions to practice. She’s packed it full of scientific yet easy-to-understand data. I highly recommend it for all of us because all of us are contributors in both helpful and unhelpful ways to our changing climate. It’s critical that we each step up as responsible participants in caring for Earth, for our own lives today as well as for the people coming after us.

[My review is here of Not the End of the World]

4. Fight Right
How Successful Couples Turn Conflict into Connection
by Julie Schwartz Gottman, John M. Gottman

Fight Right

This will likely make my Top 10 list of favorite books read in 2024. It’s so practical and encouraging for establishing better connections with the partners we love. The Gottmans have been doing scientific relationship research for years and years, and this book is fruit of that work. Very engaging.

[My review here of Fight Right]

5. You Are the One You’ve Been Waiting For
Applying Internal Family Systems to Intimate Relationships
by Richard C. Schwartz

You Are the One You've Been Waiting For

I’ve recently been hearing more and more about Internal Family Systems (IFS) theory on podcasts, other books, and from friends. This book is by the originator of the theory, Richard Schwartz, and is specifically geared to cultivating and connecting all parts of ourselves, resulting in healthier relationships with our partners. (I’m currently reading Schwartz’ original book on this theory, No Bad Parts, with my book club; it is fascinating).

6. The Enneagram of Discernment (Type Five Edition)
The Way of Vocation, Wisdom, and Practice
by Drew Moser

The Enneagram of Discernment

This is another Enneagram book that includes lots of the basics of the Enneagram (for those who are new to it), but it differs from other books in its specific focus on using your personality type to help you make wiser decisions. I wasn’t expecting to find much new information, but I was pleasantly surprised by Moser’s insights that I hadn’t considered yet about myself and others (I’m an Enneagram Five). Another interesting thing about this book is there are nine editions of it, one for each type; the bulk of the book is the same in each edition, but the final chapter is type specific per edition.

[Learn more about the Enneagram in this blog series: 20 Ways to Practice the Enneagram for Spiritual Growth]

FICTION

7. The House in the Cerulean Sea
by T. J. Klune

The House in the Cerulean Sea

Forty-year-old Linus Baker leads a quiet, mundane life as a case worker for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth. . . until he gets reassigned to assess the most unique orphanage in the system. I totally enjoyed this whimsical novel with its unusual characters (it reminded me somewhat of the Harry Potter books). Book 2 of the series, Somewhere Beyond the Sea, will be released September 10, 2024.

WHAT I’M READING NOW

  • The Lost for Words Bookshop
    by Stephanie Butland
  • The Light We Give
    How Sikh Wisdom Can Transform Your Life
    by Simran Jeet Singh
  • No Bad Parts
    Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model
    by Richard C. Schwartz
  • Build the Life You Want
    The Art and Science of Getting Happier
    by Arthur C. Brooks
  • Supercommunicators
    How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection
    by Charles Duhigg

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What good book have you read lately? Please share in the comments.

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Share 4 Somethings—February 2024

By LisaNotes February 27, 2024 Life updates 20 Comments

For the 2024 edition of “Share 4 Somethings,” Jennifer asks us to share each month:

  1. Something loved and/or disliked
  2. Something accomplished
  3. Something improved upon and/or that needs improvement
  4. Something noticed

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Something Loved

  • FIGHT RIGHT

I finished up this fantastic book last week. I will write a full review soon. But in the meantime, I’ve already been recommending it to people in my life.

Fight Right by John and Julie Gottman is full of practical and insightful advice about how to have clearer and more productive discussions with your partner, without it leading to even more conflict.

One of the big takeaways for me is: stop assuming you can solve every disagreement. You can’t. Much of the time, simply understanding each other’s viewpoints is a win itself.

Fight Right

 ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Something Accomplished

  • A MONTH OF YOGA WITH ADRIENNE

I don’t do yoga regularly. But the past few Januaries, I’ve attempted to participate in a 30 day yoga journey with Adriene (and her sweet dog Benji) via Youtube.

In January 2022, I completed it mid-March. In 2023, I stopped midway in January because my feet and knees hurt too bad to keep going.

But this January, I completed every single day, in real time, of Flow: A 30 Day Yoga Journey.

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The key this year? Modify, modify, modify. I worked within my own limits and didn’t push myself to do all the moves that Adrienne does (as if anyone can do all she does!).

I enjoyed it more than ever this year. (Maybe I won’t wait until January 2025 to do yoga again.)

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~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Something that Needs Improvement

  • DECLUTTERING MY KINDLE (AGAIN!)

It’s happened again. I have downloaded so many sample books to my Kindle that I’m feeling overwhelmed by them. Awhile back I made a major effort to either read or skim all the samples I’d accumulated, then delete them all. I succeeded. It felt freeing.

Of course I’ve since added more. No problem. That’s to be expected. It’s helpful to look over a book’s content to decide if I want to bother finding and reading the whole book or not.

The problem is when the number added greatly exceeds the number I actually look at.

I need another mass cleaning soon because I’ll never have enough time to read all the books I’d like to. There are too many!

Fun and relevant memory from Facebook today:

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~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Something Noticed

  • SMALLER GOALS

My overall One Word of the Year is Curiosity. But every two weeks, I focus on a separate word related to Curiosity. For February the two extra words have been Mindfulness and Concentration.

What I’m noticing is this: Instead of writing only “Mindfulness” on my calendar, I also added the word SLOW. I’ve found that when I slow down, I automatically become more mindful and curious.

And instead of writing only “Concentration” this week, I’m also writing STOP MULTITASKING. Because when I remember to do only one thing at a time, I’m far more likely to give it my full concentration, and thus be more curious.

What is something you are loving, accomplishing, improving, or noticing this month?

Share your thoughts in the comments.

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