Learnings from 2022

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm exhausted.

Sure, I might be coming through the other side of that pesky Covid lookalike virus that's doing the rounds, but really do I have good reason to be so mentally tired?

In some ways, it's been a busy year. I changed jobs in June, which was a pretty seismic shift having thrown my heart and soul into the last role for almost six years. It was a busy-ish summer with trips to Madrid and Edinburgh – getting engaged and finally getting Covid. But again, that's not really an explanation for feeling mental fatigue.

I think if the last few years have taught me anything – other than to never trust a Tory – it's that our minds and our bodies are incredibly complex and sometimes fragile things. The periods we spent in lockdown and furlough allowed me to attune myself a little better to what my body was telling me. Without the constant ping of work e-mails and general subsidence of work stress, I found that taking more time to enjoy the little things in life was hugely beneficial for my mental health.

The flip side to doing things you enjoy, such as eating copious amounts of banana bread, is that it's not so great for your physical health. It took me a good while to get back into playing five-a-side football regularly when sports were allowed again in 2021. That wasn't because of a lack of interest in playing, but because my physical fitness had gone to hell.

Although 2020-21 had cleared up my longstanding achilles tendonitis, I went back to football and swiftly wrecked my foot, heel and side in separate incidents. As Anna would remind me (constantly), I had become very injury-prone and I should complain about it much less. Whilst being lectured about physical wellbeing from the sickliest person I know was a tough pill to swallow, she wasn't wrong. Because I wasn't physically fit at all, each injury was taking up to a month to recover from.

Despite getting injured over and over, I just wanted to push through it, but I had to remember I was three years older than when we played pre-Covid. My enthusiasm to get back out on the pitch just meant I was breaking down again with something else because I was still compensating for another injury.

It wasn't until about July/August that I could get back to playing twice a week regularly and without repeated injury. Slowly, I've felt the fitness coming back. There's still a hell of a lot of work to be done, but that's a major aim for 2023: keeping that up, and throwing some extra gym sessions into the mix.

I have no doubt that a general decline in physical fitness and weight gain has a part to play in feeling tired, but in truth, I feel more mentally exhausted than physically.

As pathetic as it sounds, the general shitshow that is the UK political and economic landscape plays a part – as does seasonal affective disorder. The former is a personal affliction with which I really need to do a better job of getting to grips.

At the end of the day, there's a definite correlation between ignorance and bliss. I've never been one to enjoy ignorance, but then I've hardly developed a reputation as a blissful man. I need to find a balance between switching off emotional attachment to events completely outside of my control, whilst still being interested enough to enjoy reading up on them.

The latter of the two issues, the seasonal affective disorder, is really only something I've figured out over the last few years. The dark nights in the North East (sunset tonight was just after half 3 in the afternoon!) really do take a toll. I know plenty of people revel in the early nights, but I categorically do not.

The cut-off for me seems to be when gets dark when you get up for work and it's dark when you clock off. My mood just falls through the floor. The cold doesn't help, but it's predominantly the light. Maybe we should move somewhere...

In any case, being aware of these issues is presumably the first step toward resolving them. With that in mind, I'm setting a few aspirations for 2023.

In recent years, I've become a real creature of habit and routine, probably to a fault, and change disrupts that. But it's been about 18 months since Covid caused any lockdowns, and six months since I changed jobs. I think six months is about the right length of time to settle into something new, so I'm determined that I can forge some new, healthy habits and routines in the New Year.

I also need to stop beating myself up for not achieving everything I want to on a single day. That's an unhealthy trait I developed in my last job, where the volume of demands led to a workload-management technique where I had to have workplace success every single day. That could be ticking off something substantial on the to-do list, garnering positive feedback from someone, and generally just being closer to success than the previous day. None of those are bad things to aim for, but the reality is that you don't need them on every single day. Marathon, not a sprint, and all that.

We should know in the first few months of 2023 whether a move to Madrid is viable and genuinely on the cards. Regardless of whether we end up moving, I want to do a lot more living positively next year. I have gotten out of a workplace that was increasingly toxic for my health and settled happily into a much more positive one. No more keeping my head above water on a day-to-day basis; there's no need to do that anymore. Instead, I can focus on long-term objectives and balance that with a better work/life schedule that helps tackle the negatives.

So, whilst exhausted, I do feel optimistic. I owe some of that to Elon Musk and the fact that he's Kwartenged my favourite social media platform. Whilst I'm doing my best to build up a Mastodon follower list that keeps me in the loop, there's no doubt I'm slightly less clued up (and also substantially less outraged/despondent on a daily basis!). Everything in moderation, as they say, and there's a definite balance to be found next year.

All in all, it's okay to be tired. I read once that it takes twice as long as a traumatic period to recover from it. The last few years have been pretty traumatic. It's cold, it's dark and the Conservatives are still in power. Elon Musk has destroyed one of my favourite things. We're still in limbo about a move to Spain, and the mortgage is about to go through the roof. It's okay to be a bit drained, sometimes.  

As a final thought, I think the incessant beaming of high-octane fun and activity drilled into your skull via social media also sets a very false perception of the world of others around you. It's very easy to take a scroll through Instagram and think, "My god, someone's gone to Bali and someone's at a party and someone's done a hike and three people managed to get their bloody wedding's boxed off in December". I bet they're all pretty tired too.