Today feels “heavy.”

It was 38ºF when I woke up at 5 AM to take Mini out for her morning “business.” That meant having to pull on not just whatever clothes were on the chair by the bed but something extra to help keep me warm. Extra effort when I’ve just woken up… bleh.

I could tell the morning was going to be “heavy.” And by that, I mean I felt a tinge of anxiety about my workload, about the holidays, about various health issues people I love are having. I felt a tingle about money, about the email promotion I keep forgetting to set up, about the writing I’m not doing because of other things that have intruded on that time. It just felt like everything was an extra effort today. Even coffee felt like work.

When I feel like that, it’s hard to face the morning routine. Each morning for me starts with a series of tasks, including some journaling and even writing this blog and making a video. All of that takes time—usually about two hours. And that’s time I could be working on the next novel. But I do the things. I keep up the habit. Because despite being able to justify shrugging it off in the name of “more time to write,” this morning routine has become a vital part of my mental health regimen. I do this for you, but I also do it for me.

So what I’m saying is, right around this time each morning I have to make a choice. Do the thing, or don’t do the thing. And when I’m feeling a little “heavy,” making the choice is just one more weight to bear.

But I have to make the choice.

When you’re facing things like anxiety or feeling overwhelmed or over burdened, the easy thing is to say, “Eh… I’ll let life decide for me.” You back off of making choices—who needs extra work? And you let life happen to you by default. Not choosing lets you ditch one more burden, drop one more bit of weight from your day.

But that’s a problem.

The thing about anxiety, and feeling overwhelmed, and feeling burdened is that these things all naturally rob you of any agency in your own life. You lose autonomy when you can’t make your own choices. Or when you allow choices to be made for you.

For sure, there is something called “decision fatigue.” Famously, this idea has dictated things like fashion trends (or lack thereof) among the Silicon Valley entrepreneur set. Steve Jobs may be the most notable example—he wore jeans and a black turtleneck for a big chunk of his life because it was easier to just have a bunch of those hanging in his closet and pull them on by default. He knew what he was wearing every day, so that was one less decision to fatigue him.

And if your life is just jam-packed with decisions every minute of every day, maybe streamlining and automating some of your baser choices isn’t such a bad idea. Kara loves to point out that I have a “uniform” myself—usually cargo shorts and T-shirts. I’m usually working out of my private home office with no one around, so I don’t really need to “dress to impress.” But maybe I’m thinking of that the wrong way. Maybe I should shake things up, spend a few minutes each morning choosing the look that will convey to me, at least, that I’m successful, or that I’m living a certain lifestyle. How we communicate with ourselves is every bit as important as how we communicate with others.

And that may sound like a bit of a digression, but it actually proves my point.

Every choice we make is us engaging in our own free will, our own agency, our own autonomy. That’s a habit we should cultivate, every minute of our lives.

We can either let life dictate who we are, or we can choose who we will be minute by minute.

I have certain goals and dreams. I have always wanted to be a writer and author. And I accomplished that dream. I did it by changing my mind about accepting what I was getting, hoping one day I’d “get my shot” or I’d suddenly discover pockets of time for writing. My writing career didn’t become a writing career until I made a choice and followed through.

And every time I’ve exercised that ability to choose, it has been me living.

So on days when things feel “heavy,” when the last thing I want is one more decision to make, when it would be so much easier for me to just let the universe happen to me instead of me living in it—those are the days when I most need to choose. Even the small stuff. Especially the small stuff.

I started this post wishing I didn’t have to write it. But I chose to lean in, to get it done. And right now, I feel amazing. I chose to live, and life rewarded me by saying, “You got it.”

Make all the choices.

If you like this post, there’s a blog full of this kind of stuff. And Side Notes is basically an extension of my Note at the End, which you’ll find in all of my novels. And you can find those by clicking here. Share this post with your friends, if you found it helpful. And buy my books if you’d like to support me and my work!

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