Oh dear, Reader.  Whatever brand of thoughts/prayers/vibes that you prefer to send, I could use a few this week.  Every day at my restaurant is a fight to stay afloat.  I thought that last year's multiple forced quarantines and pivots were hard to navigate.  Turns out that not having enough people to man (and woman) our ship is more of a struggle than all others...by a long shot. 

I won't bore you with it all. Suffice to say, I'm on little sleep and under a lot of stress and wonder how I'm going to get through another week. 

But I will.  And so will you. 

I've been thinking a lot lately about how hard it is to keep going when the going gets tough.  Historically, I've fought tough times with extra grit.  I've met the fiercest challenges with my fiercest attitude. I've tackled the heaviest moments of my life by being incredibly...heavy. 

And in the end, I just wind up weighing myself down. 

This past week, I didn't have enough staff to cater an off-site event, so I did it myself. The weight of it all felt overwhelming. I was on fumes.  How was I going to pull off catering in the middle of everything else I had going on? 

By lightening up, that's how.  

Rather than meet the challenge with intensity, I instead put on a little music.  I found a ridiculous mermaid cookie cutter and baked mermaid cookies for that party into the wee hours of the morning.  And I also had a little gin. 

Reader, though the severity of our problems may make us want to get serious, in the end, becoming grave and frustrated doesn't really help.  In fact, it taps us of our energy and makes it harder to get through it all.  Now, I'm sure I won't remember to lighten up every time I'm stressed, but for one moment this week, I caught a glimpse of what it might be like to fight stress with frivolity, and it felt like an epiphany. I'm sharing it here in case it might help you, too.  

With that, let's all try to lighten up this week. See you next Monday. -Em