On momentum

Hi friends,

I'm writing this on the eve of my very early flight to Houston (7:30 am 😩) and two days before one of the biggest trade shows in specialty coffee. I mention "one of the biggest," because I'm really not sure it'll surpass last year's 17k attendee count. I'm expecting to see far less international attendance, due to the travel restrictions and advisories in the last few months. I also know some US people who aren't going because it's located in Texas.

Lately, I've been thinking about momentum, especially around my business, but also around other life things. Getting out of bed has always been rough for me. My workday bed rules are no games, social media, shopping, or email. Once I'm out and about in my morning routine, I have the momentum to keep going.

And when working on projects, like launching a new service, those first few months are A SLOG. I do not wake up excited to program automated workflows or to comb through my contract template to make sure everything makes sense. It doesn't feel like any momentum is happening.

I stopped doing my weekly photo challenge because I lost momentum in one of the challenges and never got it back. It was "levitation" and involved an absurd amount of Photoshopping that I'm still not done with.

In the last 6 months, I've noticed a concerning issue—which I would've never realized had certain global and personal news not occurred—of me having a narrow range of emotions. I had chalked it up to my antianxiety med doing the work of freeing up my mind and therefore, giving me more energy. Like maybe under all this anxiety and depression, this is my true self.

No one tells you how depression symptoms can evolve or be different under meds.

My PCP told me that when people with nearly life-long anxiety have it under control, they realize that anxiety is what has been driving their motivation and momentum. Once it's better managed, there's this feeling of okay, what now?? that depression can take advantage of.

What I've been experiencing, as a side effect of meds, is emotional blunting and it's a weird feeling. I haven't felt the physical elements of emotional extremes like anger, sadness, excitement, joy when the situation calls for it. It's been...just neutral. In the past, I could read or think of something that caused instant anger, but now, it's more like I know I'm (kind of) angry and have no physical sensations that pair with it.

So back to the trade show. Normally, I'm anxious about traveling, the crowd, and losing sleep, and also excited to see friends again. Now, I have a tinge of anxiety and no big excitement to drive my momentum. Logically, I know I'm excited. Physically, I'm not feeling it.

I've increased one of my med doses to see if that will help my momentum. I'm not asking for big mood swings or disproportinate emotional reactions. But it'd be really nice to take some of these emotions and channel them into momentum.

Thank you for reading,

Jenn