How’re you doing? Let me guess. Tired, you’re tired.
You’re too stretched and too stressed and even on Mondays you’re waiting on Friday to come so you can shed the worries of the week and get in your comfy clothes, and eat some comfort food and just detach. Sure, you have invitations for events to go to and events you want to volunteer for, but between the kids or grandkids, the eating healthy, doing the dishes, the laundry, the cleaning up, that show you wanted to binge, the laundry, the raking, the trying to fit a workout in, the phone beeping or buzzing with another alert, working 40 hours or more, someone loudly watching a video in the next room, the Wi-Fi being down, your partner being upset about a social media post a family member made, and all of the other distractions and requests for a small piece of you, who has time to go to events or volunteer?
Sound familiar?
Over the past three to five weeks, most people I’ve spoken with have answered the question “How are you doing?” the same way: with a large, unintended sigh that they don’t even realize their exuding before giving their answer. Everyone’s stress dials have been turned up a couple of notches more than they want to put on, but nobody wants to address it.
The reasons for our stress are obvious, if we stop and think about it for a few moments (which we interestingly don’t do, which is another story for another day). However, if we do think about why we feel this way, some things become readily apparent. Most businesses are understaffed, so unless the business has reduced hours to compensate for the lost labor hours, then someone in this business (and likely several people or all of the staff) are doing more than they used to in order to keep the business going. Even if they’re getting compensated for these extra efforts, it’s still undeniably a strain on them.
Now let’s add the other business stressors like heading into the off-season for tourism-related businesses or retailers needing a big holiday season to get through a perpetually slow first quarter of the year. Let’s add the energy costs of heating your space in the winter — heck, that one goes for businesses and residential.
Now let’s add the political stressors of a branch of our government literally unable to function so government employees aren’t sure if they’ll have money for the holidays if the government shuts down. Add the stress about the incidents in Ukraine, Israel and the Gaza Strip, and how that affects people you know. Now add the political season we’re headed into with ballot initiatives, local elections and a presidential contest, which began earlier than any in my lifetime.
Finally, let’s add your personal stressors — family health, care for those older than you, being a parent to those younger than you, the stress of marriage or dating, inflation, the stress of taking extra school classes, the stresses of being a sports parent or a theater parent, and how your dinner routine is at the whim of a practice schedule or a rehearsal schedule.
We all have constant stressors, and so, for many people, the goal is to get through the work week, and then get yourself around those you feel safe with, where you can be yourself and not worry about the expectations you need to live up to. It makes us perpetually tired.
The result of all of this is people begin to hope for the weekend to get here and literally wish away their time. Think about how sad that is, to wish days would pass so you get a break, and then you wake up five years later and wonder where the time went.
So, what do we do? First, we need to acknowledge this truth: Human interaction is what gives us life! Even for the introverts, being around people and convening is at the very base level of our human instinct, and when we don’t do this — when we don’t connect and engage and be a part of communal events in our region — our lives become less vibrant. The literal definition of community is fellowship through sharing time and common goals for the betterment of the region.
Secondly, we need to prioritize in-person interactions. I think the pandemic set us back here, but it’s time to overcome that. It’s easier to have lunch alone at your desk, but wouldn’t it be more fulfilling to have lunch and meet 11 others at our chamber’s monthly 12@12 series? The likelihood of you saying to your spouse “I met a really interesting person at this lunch event today” are much greater than saying, “Boy, did I have a dynamic Zoom call today!” Remote meetings are fine for maintaining projects but are terrible for fostering meaningful relationships.
There are some great events coming up over the next few months for you to attend or even volunteer at: The Midcoast Tree Festival (Nov. 17-19, 24-26), the BDA’s Early Bird Sale and Bed Races (Nov. 11) and Main Street Bath’s An Old Fashioned Christmas (Nov. 25 through Dec. 23). Not to mention Chamber After Hours (Oct. 18 at Reform P/T in Topsham, Nov. 17 at the Midcoast Tree Festival Opening Night and Dec. 5 at Darling’s Brunswick Ford) and many more events.
We’re letting life pass us by or, worse, wishing it away. Stop doing that. All community organizers agree, if you can only drop by an event for 20 minutes, that’s so much better than not seeing you at all. If you want to volunteer, we’d love to see you there. Whatever you can do to show up at events and activities enriches yourself and our community as a whole. Time is our most precious resource, and we’d love to spend some of ours with you.
You’re a key piece in making our community great. Please, engage now.
Cory King is executive director of the Bath-Brunswick Regional Chamber of Commerce.
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