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Dear Undisclosed {Company-Name Omitted} Recipients, (there are many of you on
this list, all receiving this for something you said to me, somewhat in
confidence)
I would like to tell you a 100% true tale and then challenge
you.
In the not distant past, I was diagnosed with cancer, had
surgery, and spent six months undergoing chemotherapy and radiation.
A few short years later, I once again had cancer. The first
surgery was six hours. Chemotherapy was far more grueling the second time around.
And then the second surgery, of the eight required, was thirteen hours on the
table. It was days before I could stand again.
It was weeks before I could comfortably walk about the house
without being exhausted.
But slowly, as I recovered, I would take short walks, a few
times a day. I would walk a couple houses up my street. After a few days, I
could walk a few houses further up the street. Eventually, even though it often
required a nap after, I was walking two miles (3km) a day.
At some point, I committed to myself to walking two miles a
day outside and away. (Outside being easy for a California girl.) I would
literally walk away from my home, walk away from concerns, walk away from
reminders of going-ons (a doctor bill on the coffee table, pills on the
night-side table, etc). I would look and really see my surrounding; I would see
the flowers and the birds, notice interesting bumper stickers, or kids’ toys in
yards.
Despite theoretically being very ill, I started feeling
better than I ever had.
I decided I needed to commit to this as a life-style.
For the most part, I have.
But life does rear its ugly head and we get easily
entrenched in it. We are all entrenched in work. We are all OVERLY entrenched
in work.
I am hoping the most difficult part is past, and I think it
is time to force this to be the case.
For me, that means reverting to my commitment of walking
away, literally, by at least a mile, every day. It is not just the health of
moving away from the computer, but the mental step away from the
responsibility.
So, with that tale, I would like to challenge all of you
too, to commit to both literally and mentally moving away from work for some
time every day. Do something physical to get the blood moving. Do something mental
where words like should, must, finish, do, etc, they are all banished from your
thought stream.
It is time to re-establish your well-being, and remember you
are ENTIRELY entitled to your well-being.
And thus, I challenge you.
