I have been gone for two weeks, and I kinda feel like I need to explain myself.

Not in the way you explain yourself when something goes wrong. More like in the way you explain yourself when life just kind of showed up all at once and sat down in every chair in the house and made itself very comfortable without asking first.

Here’s what happened.

Work got busy. The kind of busy where you finish the day and realize you've been running at full speed since 7:00 am and somehow the to-do list is longer than when you started, which should be mathematically impossible but here we are.

My son started school. Which isn’t a simple transition for any parent. For us, it’s a challenge because his time is split between a homeschool group and us also being his teachers and responsible for him actually learning something to hopefully someday be a productive, kind member of society.

And my wife and I joined a gym… for the rest of the year.

We joined the gym because the little bit of equipment we’ve accumulated from impulse Amazon purchases and don’t use because it’s really stinkin’ hot in our “garage gym” is not a fitness goal. So, we are going to the gym because 1) we need to, and 2) we paid for memberships through the rest of the year and we are going to get our money's worth out of this thing if it takes everything we have, which, some mornings, it does.

All of it is genuinely, legitimately good. And all of it, simultaneously, is a lot.

So, the newsletter paused.

I made a choice to step back rather than show up at half capacity, because half capacity felt worse to me than honest absence. I'd rather be gone and tell you why than be here and hollow and pretend that's fine. You deserve better than hollow.

When life gets busy like that, the thing that gets sacrificed first is always the stuff that actually keeps you okay. Not the deadlines. Not the obligations. Not the things with consequences attached to them. The other stuff. The rest. The fun. The breathing room. The things that don't have a due date but make everything else survivable.

And what I've learned about surviving busy seasons over the years is this: There are a lot of small things that can actually help, and they're simpler than you'd expect. For me, there were three things over the past two weeks that pulled me back from the edge of running on empty:

The first was cancelling anything that didn't absolutely have to happen. I looked at my calendar like a guy who had finally had enough and I asked, what is actually required and what is just here because I haven't said no yet. There were some work meetings that I didn’t really need to be present for. This newsletter went on pause. A few other things got moved or dropped. Clearing that space didn't make the busyness disappear, but it made it survivable, which is sometimes all you need.

The second was giving myself permission to be good enough instead of perfect. The gym sessions didn't have to be impressive. The meals didn't have to be optimized, as long as it wasn’t takeout everyday. The work didn’t need the usual pretty bows and wrapping. But it got done. Good enough done consistently beats perfect done never every single time, and I had to remind myself of that more than once over the past couple of weeks.

The third was the most important one.

My wife and I went away for a weekend.

We stayed at our favorite bed and breakfast in our favorite town, which is the kind of place that feels like exhaling the moment you walk through the door. And we went to see Jack Johnson in concert, because my wife has always wanted to hear him play Banana Pancakes in person and the universe finally put him close enough to us that we had no good excuse not to go.

He played the song. It was everything she hoped it would be. I watched her face during that song and thought, this is what all the busy is supposed to be for. Moments like this one, right here.

We came home rested, connected, and with that full feeling that makes the loud stuff feel manageable again instead of just relentless… and didn’t even mind that the to-do list took over immediately. We dropped our stuff off, let our dogs out, and ran to the farmer’s market to get some fresh produce for the week ahead before it closed because store bought apples are garbage compared to the local produce stand.

So here's your one thing for this week.

Look at your life right now and ask yourself what you've been cancelling on yourself in order to keep up with everything else. Then put one of those things back. A walk. A dinner. A weekend away. A concert your wife has always wanted to go to.

Whatever your version of Banana Pancakes is, go plan it and enjoy it.

The busy will still be there when you get back. But so will you. And you'll be better at handling it.

I'm glad to be back and I want to celebrate by sending something fun to one of you. I found it in one of the shops we stopped at while we were away and I just needed to buy it to give to someone.

Here's all you have to do. Reply to this newsletter and say hi (or more words, if you'd like). Tell me you're out there. That's it. No contest entry form, no hoops to jump through. Just a reply that lets me know someone is reading this thing and getting something out of it.

I'll pick one person to receive a little duckin' awesome gift from me, just because.

Replies close at the end of the week. Say hi.

And I'm sorry you had to endure two duck puns in this tiny little section.

If anxiety has been showing up loudly in your life lately (or forever), this might be exactly what you need.

On September 15th at 7pm London time (I can’t do the math to tell you your local time, but you get the recording if you attend), psychologist, author and BBC broadcaster Dr Sian Williams is hosting a live online event called Living Well With Anxiety, presented by Action for Happiness. Dr Williams, who works within the NHS supporting people with anxiety, stress and trauma, will share practical and compassionate tools from her book The Power of Anxiety. Rather than treating anxiety as something to fight, she'll show you how to understand it, work with it, and live well alongside it.

It's one hour, it's online, and it sounds genuinely worth your time if anxiety has been a traveling companion you'd like to understand a little better.

It’s free, or you can make a $10 donation to an awesome organization called Action for Happiness.

That's Volume 073. Here's to honest absences, gyms we're determined to get our money out of, kids starting new chapters, and the particular magic of hearing your wife’s favorite song performed live by the person who wrote it.

I'm glad to be back. Thanks for waiting.

Until next time: breathe deep, plan your Banana Pancakes moment, and chill the duck out.

Jason

Research on perfectionism and performance consistently shows that the pursuit of perfect over good enough is associated with higher anxiety, lower productivity, and greater likelihood of avoidance and procrastination. Studies on planned leisure and wellbeing show that deliberately scheduling enjoyable activities produces greater mood benefits than unplanned leisure, partly because anticipation itself generates positive emotion. Research on busyness and cognitive load shows that reducing unnecessary commitments improves decision making, emotional regulation, and overall life satisfaction. Studies on restorative experiences show that brief getaways and changes of environment produce measurable reductions in stress and improvements in mood that persist after returning to normal routine. Research on social connection and shared experiences shows that meaningful experiences with a partner or loved one strengthen relationship quality and produce lasting positive memories.