power hour

The (handmade, terribly thoughtful) holiday gift from my sister—a pottery box with my favorite Avett Brothers lyric + my favorite animal—that I hadn’t acknowledged with a proper thank you note. Not cool, Dimity, not cool.

I was struck down by the sinus crud for two-ish weeks. Grateful it wasn’t the flu, I vacillated between feeling decent-ish and wanting to lie on my side, instruct my one of my kiddos to get the power drill, and have them take it to my temple so I could drain.all.the.mucus.

I didn’t exercise for about two weeks, which was the right call physically—lord knows, there isn’t enough chlorine to kill the snot snakes I was producing—but was tough mentally, especially when I was feeling semi-normal. I missed the regular taste of accomplishment, the crispness and momentum of finishing a task that I might not have necessarily wanted to start, but once I got it, I was so glad I did.

I did use the time to go on a little Gretchen Rubin streak; I have tried to read her books before, but something just didn’t click for me. But Ellie Kempton, nutritional guru in the Train Like a Mother Club, regularly refers to different strategies Better than Before, Rubin’s book about creating habits that stick, so I gave it another go.

Two things stuck with me:
First, writing down a daily schedule. Time for writing. Time for social media. Time for exercise. (Easy to lose when you’re not on a specific training plan.) If I don’t put a time around things (either a specific time or an amount of time), I tend to let one thing (usually social media) gobble up hours without even realizing it.

Power Hour

Second, the Power Hour, 60 minutes of time that she devotes on a regular basis to tasks that don’t have a deadline, yet somehow never seem to disappear from the todo list (and, as such, continually demand mental energy). Because she speaks the truth when she writes, Nothing is more exhausting than the task that is never started.

I commenced a Power Hour on a Saturday morning, and tackled these exciting (albeit disgusting) chores:
—Cleaning out the bathtub drain with a tweezers (my daughter’s hair is crazy thick; despite having a plastic “cap” on the drain, plenty of stragglers get through
—Cleaning out the compost bin in the kitchen (to be sure, I do this pretty regularly, but I dread it)
—Dropping off a pile of toys + too-small clothes at Goodwill (a 3-minute drive from our house)
—Writing a way overdue thank-you note (and finally removing my tail from between my legs)
—Registering 11yo for two summer camps (slightly deadline-ish, but there was wiggle room)

I gotta say, it felt surprisingly good to pull clumps of hair out (and not have to buy another bottle of Draino), get rid of the Goodwill piles sitting next to the door, actually put some words on paper that I have composed in my head for weeks.

I checked my watch regularly as I whirred through the tasks. The challenge of getting in all of it within an hour was oddly thrilling, in the same way that going to a new grocery store is thrilling. (Will they have different flavors of my favorite yogurt? The suspense!)

Was my first Power Hour the same as soaking a sports bra? Not quite. But it was beyond lovely to have those tasks cleared from my mental slate. I highly recommend it, especially if you have the sinus crud or another sidelining situation.

I’m back to exercising, so my head is now clear in more ways that one. But not for long…I’m slowly accumulating tasks for my next Power Hour.

Have you Power Hour’ed before? If not, what’s your strategy for getting to those tasks you’d rather not do?