Don’t take your boots off…
“Don't take your boots off," was the unsolicited advice I recently gave to my partner.
We were backpacking the Cape Chignecto trail, and he had stopped for the third time in three hours to take his boots off and let his feet breathe.
I don't know where exactly this advice came from, I just know that as a young woman hiking and backpacking in the Rockies I learned that if you wanted to finish the hike you had to keep moving. Even when your boots were killing you. Whatever blisters and sores you had on your feet were not going to benefit from 10 minutes of air and sunlight if you just have to put your boots back on. In fact, in my experience it just makes everything worse. You just have to readjust to whatever pain or discomfort you have as soon as you start walking again. The best thing is to just keep your boots on, and just keep walking. This was my partner's first backpacking excursion, I thought my advice was helpful.
Well. He threw that advice back at me yesterday.
Having taking last week off work I was descending into that deep dark hole I get into after a vacation. When I realize that taking one week off means I now have two weeks of work to do in one week, plus all the unexpected crises I didn't deal with while I was away. I know that this is a problem of my own invention, and within my control to solve. I've been working on it for two years in fact - systematizing what I do and learning how to delegate. But the pandemic screwed my plans up pretty royally, and new challenges have made things even worse. But, I'm working on it. I was complaining about how much I had to do and all the things that had gone wrong in my absence.
“Don't take your boots off,” he said.
I did though. I actually turned my phone off for the better part of four days and I took my boots off. It was magical. My brain rested and I detoxed from my devices to the point where I couldn't remember who was working what shift at the taproom at any given moment, or what beer was supposed to ship to which customer on which day. I needed to take my boots off.
But it wasn't the end of the hike. So now, putting them back on sucks.
August was a chaotic shit show for me and September will likely be more of the same, but different of course. I struggle with my own advice here because I really, truly needed this break. I was teetering on the edge of burnout.
Right now, as I prepare to go back to work this morning, I am experiencing the pain of putting my boots back on. And I'm understanding why my partner threw that advice back at me (with love, I know).
Perhaps I should have said, take your boots off when you really need to.
Knowing that every time you do, it is going to be harder and harder to put them back on. But also knowing it's a choice.
We were given some other advice prior to our backpacking adventure. A friend told us that when you are going uphill, take very small steps. Oddly, no one had ever given me that advice in my 20’s, but I am forever grateful that my 45-year-old body heard that loud and clear. I don't think I could have carried my pack all 52 km without it.
I'm trying to think of my business as being at Day 3 of a 4-day backpacking trip. This pandemic has been long, and hard. It feels like I can't go any further. I took my boots off and I rested for a while.
But I'm not done.
So as I go back to work I am inspecting my blisters and sores and protecting them with moleskin. I am giving myself grace and treating myself with compassion. I am carefully lacing up my boots, making myself as comfortable as possible and I'm reminding myself that the view will be worth it. I am telling myself I can make it to the top if I just take small steps.
One foot in front of the other.
Cape Chignecto, Nova Scotia