Who remembers that one Friends episode – The One with the Cop? Or more specifically, the one when Ross tries to get up his apartment stairwell with a large couch. Whenever someone refers to the need to “pivot” our intention as a means of surviving 2020, I can’t help but think of this infamous Friends episode. And man do I empathize with Chandler shouting “shut up, shut up, shut up” in retort.

As we enter the strange world of reopening ourselves to life outside of quarantine, the ability to pivot has never been more necessary while we alter and fluctuate our daily schedules to support guidelines for overall safety. With a large, active family, our day-to-day obligations require a careful, tactical orchestration of time management that is comparable to what I imagine military field operations to be. In all honesty, I thrive in the environment of a plan and find comfort in the consistency of a schedule. The endless stop and go and turn and halt and now you can go of 2020… well it has been one of the hardest challenges for me to grasp.

5 am my alarm sounds. The autumn morning is as pitch black as if it were the middle of the night; making it feel much earlier than it is. My body and mind go to war with what I should do (get up) and what I want to do (sleep). It takes every ounce of determination to haul myself out from under the warm blankets and pull on my workout clothes. It takes even more energy to lace my sneakers and find an online workout that falls within the parameter of time I have before the house wakes up and invades my space. I roll out my workout mat, rub my eyes and take a swig of water. The first 10 minutes are always the hardest. I find myself glaring at the peppy instructor through gritted teeth. I miss my workout friends who used to sweat beside me during my pre-virus fitness hours. I miss my instructors, who know my name and not from a teleprompter listing of usernames. No, I miss the ones who REALLY know me. Know my kids and followed me on social media. Know what recipes I was trying and whose birthday I celebrated the night before. I miss the banter and the laughter. Those first 10 minutes are filled with everything I miss. I move through the movements as instructed. Make adjustments in form and focus on my core. I challenge my strength, my endurance and my will. Eventually, my mind relaxes to the familiar feeling of exerting myself and I except the circumstance as what they are. It is my new normal and it is okay.

Yes, I wake up at 5 am in the morning every damn day. And yes, it is an insane hour that I never saw myself willingly setting my alarm to. Initially, this wakeup call was never intended to be shared with a peppy fitness instructor. This time was actually meant to be shared with absolutely no one but me, myself, and I. The routine began in the early weeks of the pandemic as a way of getting one quiet hour to myself before the rest of the house woke up. I was that desperate for me time! I just needed ONE freakin’ hour – ONE HOUR.

Initially, I loved my early wakeup call. The possibilities are endless at 5 in the morning. I could meditate or journal or write a blog post or pay bills or plan out my day or just have a hot cup of coffee from beginning to end. It really didn’t matter how I spent this time, just as long as I spent it alone. The days when I overslept or had an early rising 4-year-old or heard my husband get up behind me, set a totally different tone to the day from those that started in silence. The peace within the hour was the driving force to get me out of bed regardless of the exhaustion associated with quarantining alongside my 4 offspring all-day-long.

Although 5 am is an extreme, early mornings are not new to me. For the past 16 years (since the birth of child #1), I have woken up early-ish, got kids ready for their day, dropped kids off to various destinations and headed to the gym for one of my many favorite fitness classes. The schedule got me to the gym. The thought of going to the gym helped me maintain a schedule. From 9-11am, for a decade and a half, was designated to my gym time. EVERYTHING else (doctor appointments, teacher meetings, work, coffee dates, playdates, etc.) were planned around those 2 hours. Half of my dedication to this time actually revolved around the work out I received; the other half was the socializing I did with the people I worked out with. I loved this routine and had no intention of ever changing it. Until there was no other choice but to stop it entirely in March 2020.

All of a sudden, a routine that was so naturally a part of my day was taken away. I immediately went to work creating a new one that could bring a sense of normalcy to the chaos.

PIVOT.

While home during quarantine, I ensured 60 minutes between the hours of 9 & 11 were still dedicated to exercise. I moved my fitness regimen to one of a virtual nature, finding comfort in the familiar faces appearing on my monitor each morning. With the continuous fluctuation of kids’ school schedules, work responsibilities and social activities (or lack thereof), the consistency of this routine was a beacon in my day – one that I stubbornly refused to restructure.

And then the new school schedules arrived in my inbox…

PIVOT.

Like many school systems, our elementary schools have elected a hybrid model of learning while we continue to take precautionary measures against the virus. Our particular model consists for 5 half days of learning a week. Cutting my possible work schedule from 8 to 4 hours a day; monopolizing my 16 yearlong dedicated mid-morning workout time with task lists and design projects.  

With the need for consistency and plans, I had to find a time I could dedicate to exercise. Begrudgingly and unavoidably, my 5 am quiet time needed to change. It was the only time in my day I could find when I could dedicate uninterrupted time for myself.

It was hard to give up my quiet time of soulful meditation. My time to write out my thoughts and feelings into my next blog post. The reflective hour when I express my daily gratitude and listed out my goals. That 60 minutes of mapping out my day and setting my mind in the right direction was one I had come to treasure. However, there is a reason I have held a dedicated fitness routine for so long. It makes me feel good. It keeps both my mind and body in check. It is something I can no longer live without.  If this is what it would take, then by God I needed to find a way to do it.

And so, I did.

PIVOT.

Here we are 7 months into the unrecognizable world that we now know as “the new normal” and I have lost count of how many times we have had to pause and do an about face; accommodating guidelines for our own safety. How many times have we had to “PIV-VOT” since we were introduced to the terms “social distance”, “flatten the curve” and “remote learning”? I estimate it to be about 5 billion and twenty-two times (give or take a couple thousand). Keeping a positive attitude and doing what we have to do to get by is exhausting. Especially, when you are dragging yourself out of a comfy warm bed at 5 am to start your new early morning routine. The routine that you have not quite found the  rhythm of a formed habit yet. (sigh)

How relatable is this schedule upheaval to everything we have experienced since March? The unimaginable has become a part of what we do. Wearing a mask for hours at a time. Washing our hands at every sanitizing station we pass. Homeschooling our children. Working from home. Exercising in our living room. Sitting in a hair salon for 2 hours, wearing a mask for the entire time. Driving down familiar roads with the foreign look of masked pedestrians. Life looks so completely different from 7 months ago. Things that seemed impossible March 1 have not only been lived through, but overcome and are now behind us. We have faced so much more than we thought we were capable of and you know what… we are okay. We really are. We are frustrated and totally over it all. But we are all okay.

In that Friends episode, Ross has a vision of how he is going to get his new couch up the stairs to his New York City apartment. He has sketched out what he thinks will be his successful route and who he can enlist to help him. To him, there is no reason why this should not work since he has mapped it out on paper. Things immediately begin to unravel when the wrong friend shows up to help and what he has envisioned falls short in reality. In the end, he winds up with a couch split in two. I, like Ross, continue to sketch out the path of my life. The who, what, when, where of my journey. Sometimes that works. Other times, an international pandemic shows up and blows the plan up in my face; leaving me with a torn up “couch”.

Resiliency is a given for all of us who have had to make sacrifices and do things we never imagined we had the capacity to accomplish (which is… well… all of us). As business owners; we morph into what we need to be to keep our doors open. As parents; we alter our schedules, work later hours, figure out the new math methods – whatever our kids need us to do to assist in their schooling. As individuals; we find a way to stay sane whether through exercise, eating healthy and the (not so) occasional glass of wine. If 2020 has taught us anything, it is that we are far more capable than we ever gave ourselves credit for. Take note of all you have overcome since March. All that is behind you now. Think about how you can apply the lessons from each of these challenges to the ones you are sure to face in the future. I guarantee we are all stronger than we were before.

PIVOT!

Yes, one last pivot. It’s time to flip the narrative. How am I benefitting from all this involuntary flip flopping? I may not have my usual 9am workout Monday through Friday, however there are fantastic local classes I can take on Saturday and Sunday that will bring me to beautiful outdoor spaces or into studios with other live bodies (socially distanced… of course). Also, I may not get my quiet 5am cup of coffee and reflection, but I am getting my workout done early and find a more relaxed flow to the rest of the day. Don’t get me wrong, I still miss aspects of my old normal and I still prefer my extended schedule over the condensed version. I do not love every alteration I have had to make but hopefully there is more to learn from this time in my life and how I continue to navigate through it.

It is the new normal. It looks different. It feels different. The consistency is found in the drive to push through and determination to rise out of this season feeling accomplished with all we have endured. Confident in our ability to thrive when faced with the unimaginable and proud of the grace we give ourselves when we falter.

This is your 5 am wakeup call. Rub your eyes, grit your teeth and find your own rhythm to get you through. You my friend, are more than capable.  It is time to pivot!