Push - Flow - Rest
A look inside muralist Emily Herr's process of planning the week
A few Sundays ago I went for a walk with my pal Emily Herr. After we stopped at the farmers market and before we rounded the bend to her house, she shared her process for planning the week. Her mixture of structure and ease instantly clicked with me and I’ve been using it since. I’m so happy she agreed to dive deeper for all of us in a newsletter post. Enjoy! Thanks, Emily!
On Sundays, I've created a ritual for myself. Everyone in my house goes to church, which is a glorious emptying of the place. I also leave - I walk around the neighborhood, sometimes for hours. The house gets a little time to breathe. I still get back before them, and I have time to establish a small setting for myself: a drink, maybe breakfast, a bagel, fruit. I like to stay outside after walking, sitting out on the porch, staying just outside the bubble of Home for a bit longer. From this vantage point I prepare my week!
An exclamation point is deserved, it's an exciting moment! I've accumulated to-do lists and appointments and plans in my calendar, but this is the moment where I let myself anticipate the actual experience ahead of me. First I do some practical puzzling and sorting through timing and creation of calendar blocks and applying realistic expectations to the whole scheme. Mon through Sat get filled up with work blocks, meetings, intentions, events.
Once I've got the skeleton of the week laid out, all the bones in place and cavities exposed, I label each day with one of three categories: PUSH, FLOW, and REST. This is the best part. It's simple and quick, but the effect is so soothing and encouraging that I'm gleeful about sharing the idea with you.
As a self-employed person, I'm also a self-motivated person, self-bossed and self-critical, I'm self-lenient and self-comforting. If you're in a similar boat, you know that it can be hard to both create and abide by your own rules. The ghostly whisper that "I could always be doing more" or "I need to give myself a break" sits behind each ear.
On a PUSH day, I could always be doing more. Let's shoot for the stars, let's really crack down. I like doing hard things!
On a REST day, of course let's step back. Let's remember that saying no is a skill, that tummy time is critical for development.
FLOW days are the beautiful in-between. Keep moving, but take your time. You'll get done whatever gets done. Stay present, don't feel pressured to put plans before opportunities. Plan a few things, but mostly leave space to do the work that presents itself - something always always does. This is the answer to rigidity and strain - I found myself straining to work but also straining to rest. If I wasn't pushing I assumed I should come to a complete stop, and I'd curb myself from any activity. This would leave me depressed and sluggish, and it would be that much harder to gear up into active mode again later. This is also where I allow non-priority tasks to bubble to the surface. On a FLOW day, yes there is time to get caught up in spontaneously organizing all your old sketchbooks. No, it will not spin you out into sitting on the floor and playing on your phone for hours. Take your time, but keep moving.
Mon: Paint on site, river evening. PUSH
Tues: Paint on site, music evening. PUSH
Wed: Design work at home, two appointments. PUSH
Thurs: Design work at home, two appointments. PUSH
Fri: Bookkeeping, coffeeshop/library/home. Climb? FLOW
Sat: House clean, climb? nothing else. FLOW
Which means for this week: Sun: REST
Now I sit and look at my coming days. The skeleton and the categories sit together and between them I can start to anticipate what the week will actually feel like. I have a beautiful little notebook made by a friend that shows one week at a time. This is not my calendar, where precision lives.
Here I identify whether I'll be mostly at home or out and about. I check the weather and consider rearranging a few things to suit the rain or the heat. I note which days I should expect to eat at home (and pick a grocery or meal-prep day) and on which days I should lean into eating out and scavenging. I cast a prediction about what days I'll have energy to tuck in a climbing date at the gym. I put an X on days where I know I can't handle anything else on my plate.
From this vantage point I can tell whether I need one REST day or two, or what events will suffer if I don't PUSH as planned. It turns out, if I limit my PUSH days and intersperse them with FLOW, I really only need one REST. I can mentally steel myself for three or four PUSH days in a row, or decide that I need to change plans if I want to show up fully for events at the end of the week. It gives me the opportunity to embrace a challenging week, rather than realize I'm in the middle of it and grit through to the end.
Without these categories, I would frequently find myself relying on a plan where I push hard at work for days on end because I would just stack up tasks without having a way to reflect on or anticipate my energy levels. Inevitably this would lead me to behave reflexively and change plans as I went, resting and working haphazardly, and all my nice plans would go out the window.
I'm a painter, and I like to think of this effort as a study of my week. I have a plan, I have the rough shape, the palette, the vibe, the composition. This miniature of the "real" thing is a first pass, a first step that makes the next step easier. I can reference this as I move through creating the final piece, but it's not a perfect reproduction - further interpretation and finishing touches are expected, possibly even grand shifts.
This mindset has everything to do with approaching my life and work and art as one continuum. My art benefits from practical structure; methodical techniques set me up for expressive success. Likewise I see my daily management system as a creative endeavor, a place to experiment and reflect and imagine. I hope this idea sparks an idea for you as well :)
If you'd like a little notebook of your own, Ellie is still selling these! Unsponsored fave ;) She has a substack as well!
love to see how you're USING that planner, Em! I really resonated with the push/rest/flow categories you balance your week. My days usually look something like that as well, but they just turn out one way or another, and going into a day with intention would be helpful. I thought my FLOW days were half-baked PUSH days, but reading this made me realize they are important in different ways.
Do you always have the kind of day you planned for? What do you do if you don't have the energy you planned for?