Quitting the Hustle: Finding Success in Lowered Expectations

A contributor piece for Portlandmoms.com

I am a verbal processor. The other day I was in the car “processing” this post with my husband searching for the key word to convey what I was leaving behind in the wake of 2017. When I settled on the word “hustle”, he pointed out that #hustle is a mom buzzword plastered on ceramic mugs in kitchens across America. Upon looking up the definition of the word hustle, not surprisingly, there were many. To clarify, I am drawing on these three working definitions as I speak about what it means to hustle. 

Hustle (Verb): 1. To push or force one’s way; jostle or shove.

2. Force (someone) to move hurriedly or unceremoniously in a specified direction.

3. Obtain by forceful action or persuasion.

For the first time in as long as I can remember, I am standing on the back side of December, looking back with fond memories of the holiday season. It was busy, full of birthdays, events, and house guests, and I enjoyed it all! The familiarity of the busyness wasn’t what was different. Presence and fun took the place of something else this year. I left the hustle behind. To be fully transparent, I didn’t leave it behind intentionally. On the contrary, living in the survival zone, I was systematically accomplishing the next task in front of me. In the practice of doing so, I didn’t have time to schedule in my hustle. It happened accidentally, but the payoff was immediate.  My closest loved ones began commenting on the newfound sense of peace in our home. I heeded their feedback and chose to approach this past Christmas with the absence of forceful action or persuasion. I made three key choices in the midst of a full and busy season. They are easy and attainable and might just be the solution needed to lighten the load as a new year begins. 

Lower Your Expectations

Three days before Christmas, and two hours before my out-of-town guests arrived, I was standing in the checkout line at Fred Meyer. After scanning my lot of items, the checker looked up at me a bit perplexed and stated, “I’ll be honest, these are not the typical items I expect to see someone purchasing three days before Christmas.” I had just purchased $94 dollars worth of cleaning supplies and paper products.  As you can imagine, I didn’t get the house dialed in and scrubbed from top to bottom in that short amount of time. But when the doorbell rang and I was midway through vacuuming the house, I left the stress of the unfinished task to be dealt with on a different day. Welcoming family members who had traveled from three different states to arrive in time for Christmas left no time to worry about the carpet. No one noticed anyway. The gift of the holidays is being with people. I quit the hustle of trying to have the house perfect, and instead sat snuggled on the couch with my family and enjoyed another cup of coffee.  

Share the Load

With 16 hungry mouths to feed over a 4-day span, meal planning and food prep are important tasks, yet daunting ones. My tendency is to want to be the “hostess with the mostess” and have every detail in order, but after moving to a new city and a recent major surgery, I knew I wasn’t capable of doing it on my own. So I asked for help. A few conversations later, a plan to share the meal load was in place. Our grocery store “field trip” made the highlight reel. We stopped at Zupans for coffee and a pastry, then walked around looking at all the pretty things. And then we loaded into my minivan and lived our real life in the aisles of Winco. My kitchen was utilized to its full potential that week, and a changing cast shared the leading role. My Christmas memories smell like steak fajitas, Christmas morning coffee cake, and whiskey eggnog. By leaving the hustle behind, I stopped thinking about the next moment and actually lived in the present one.

Be Spontaneous

Christmas felt a bit more magical this year because we had snow. But that snow turned to ice, altering our plans to travel into the city for the evening. We traded in our festive Christmas Eve attire for snow boots and winter jackets and made our way outside. We sledded in the driveway and then took our party of 16 down the hill to the neighborhood Thai food restaurant. The kids played Uno while waiting for dinner to arrive. The food was warm and delicious, and every last bite was finished. As we cracked open our fortune cookies and read them aloud, we realized we had closed down the restaurant. The evening was slow and perfect. We had nowhere to be but with each other. 

I am so thankful for the accidental lesson I learned this past holiday season. What happened by accident, I will now purposely put into practice. No more hustling.