Burnt Toast: The Reality of Decision Fatigue in 2021
This photo shows my toast from February 2021. It wasn't my first round of toast from that morning. This was the THIRD set I burned in a 15 minute period.
It was an early morning, there was a lot of chaos, and I was mentally and emotionally fried.
I put the first serving in.
Checked my email.
Got distracted.
Burned it.
I put the second serving in.
Took a phone call.
Got even more distracted.
Burned it.
I put the third serving in.
Tears were welling in my eyes.
Burned it.
Why could I not make the two pieces of toast I broil nearly every single morning?
At the time, I brushed it off as the immense out of stress I was experiencing as I navigated the pandemic as a small business owner.
Many months later, here we are, the pandemic keeps going.
How can we make sure we don't turn into mentally distracted, exhausted, and fried iterations of 3 rounds of burnt toast?
As a generally positive person, I almost deleted this image from phone.
But, part of me wants to remember it.
I want to remember the struggle, so I can be self-aware and intentional when I feel this vibe coming on.
I want to be able to set a boundary when I feel pulled in too many different directions.
I want to celebrate the ways we reformatted the entire infrastructure of our operations time and time again so that we could keep going.
And, when I feel like it has been too long since I've focused on my actual area of expertise (which, ironically, isn't being a public health official), I want to revert my focus back to my passion and things I love.
Turns out, there's a term for the psychological experience of making so many decisions that you lose the willpower to make simple decisions (like pulling bread out of the oven):
Decision Fatigue.
When days, months, and years are spent thinking about high level professional and personal safety, crisis, and risk mitigation, and you have hundreds of people in your care, the outcome is bound to be tiresome. The stakes are high because you want your business- your livelihood- to not only survive, but thrive.
Right now, with any decision made, there are challengers, questioning your strategy and approach. If it doesn't align with their choices and values, it likely impacts your business or relationship. When you work hard to build a brand that's based on the value and success of every child, that's disheartening.
When these huge decisions are happening on the regular, it can be easy to start shutting down. Instead of doing something productive, it is easy to default to doom scrolling or mindless entertainment.
But, like I've said all along, knowledge is power.
That includes in re: to self-awareness.
With the knowledge of decision fatigue being a factor, I've been able to tap into times where I can be more productive and set boundaries for the times when I'm not. I'm giving myself grace and I'm still taking inventory of those surrounding me. It is a time to care for others, but it is also important to care and advocate for yourself.
My new, personal mental shift/ strategy is affirming that we must move towards functioning alongside the crisis versus operating in crisis.
With this shift, it is my hope that the decision fatigue will slowly fade.
We have knowledge.
We have experience.
And, one day, when I look back through my photo album, this burnt toast will represent a period of time where I can take a sigh of relief and say, "wow, I can't believe we made it through that."
(For anyone itching to nerd out on the concept of Decision Fatigue, check out this New York Times Article from 2011.)