Disco is My New Western Medicine of Choice

For the longest time, I have felt as though I operate on a three day brain cycle. I have a rush of creativity, of productivity, and excitedly set goals, both short and long term. I do a morning workout, eat oatmeal, have designated work time, and read something interesting. I feel a general willingness to welcome ideas and challenges into my brain. The next three days, however, find me adrift in a fog of whatever ambitions I identified before. I feel tired, disinterested, and quickly forget that I had goals and projects to begin with. 

Of course, I should be careful not to generalize about my psychological rhythms without contextualizing them aggressively. First of all, this is not a rigid three day pattern- more than anything, I think it’s just me trying to overspecify a pretty universal pattern of burnout in order to justify it to myself. The dream, obviously, is to find a day to day system that prevents burnout. And yet every time I pursue such a system, it falls neatly into the peaks and valleys of motivation and lethargy that I wanted to avoid in the first place. 

The lucky thing is that I have slowly begun to trust the process of burnout. Whenever it does sneak up on me, I accept it with the understanding that something always kicks me out of the funk and back into the world. This week, the little something that jump-started my brain was none other than this disco playlist.

As far as waves of relief go, few can compare to the feeling of dancing after not dancing for too long. I’m glad to report that my body was, at least temporarily, relieved of its sad couch muscles and instead enjoyed a warm and aerated moment of movement that helped set the rest of the world back in a favorable light.

As with everything, my energy levels will continue to ebb and flow, but I appreciate being able to notice new things that I can return to for guaranteed endorphins. And if listening to Best of My Love on repeat all afternoon is the antidote to a few days of lethargy, well, I'm on board. The love train. I'm on board the love train.

- Helen

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