It had been a long day.
I had several meetings in various parts of the city. Getting to the Upper East Side from my section of Brooklyn can easily take an hour and a half. It wasn’t a terrible commute that morning, but I saw a few snowflakes on my way in. One meeting uptown ran late, which made me hustle to my midtown appointment at noon. By then, a thin sheet of snow had blanketed the city streets, and I had left my boots at home.
When I was done for the day and ready to come home, the train was not coming. Signals had rendered the B train frozen, and I stood along with several hundred other tired commuters for 45 minutes until we squeezed our way into the metal cars to head very slowly back to Brooklyn. Then, I had to wait for the bus to take me to my house. The bus had no intention of arriving on time, either.
Waiting at home for me was grocery shopping, planning a family get-together, taking my son to music practice, my dog to the vet, laundry, and a couple of deadlines.
While waiting for the bus, I saw an older woman walking with three large bags, slushing her way through the snow. She looked at the bus schedule and then shouted out to no one in particular, “Does the B2 stop here?” I answered, “No, it doesn’t. It stops across the street,” and I pointed to the opposite corner. She then told me where she had to go, and how she didn’t know how to get there and in that short time, I realized she wasn’t exactly coherent. But I tried to help her get where she was going. Then she proceeded to pace around and talk to herself as I remembered a faster way for her to reach her destination and walked over to tell her.
And that’s when she screamed, “Honey, you’re trying too hard. Just stop.”
Startled, I didn’t respond. She shuffled away. My bus finally came, and eventually I got home. As New Yorkers, we encounter all sorts of people every day and, unfortunately, many of them are not exactly lucid, some are terribly obnoxious, just plain mean, or otherwise intoxicated. It’s nothing new. But this lady’s words stayed with me … because they hit home.
I had been trying to do everything all at the same time, not let anything slip through the cracks, and control it all. Only, I couldn’t. No one can. None of us can do it by ourselves, but I was one not accustomed to asking for help. And each “yes” I agreed to only stirred my anxiety. This lady was like the angels in the movies that only the lead character can see, although I’m fairly sure she was real. We all get signs, whether they are directly from friends and family, or an animal, or song, or even a word we keep encountering over and over again. When we see or hear something that makes us stop in our tracks, that’s a good indication that it’s something we need to give our attention to.
I’d like to say that since that day, I completely put an end to overextending myself, accepting every invitation, and volunteering to help out whoever needs help. I have become better at saying “no.” Every now and then I hear that woman whisper, “You’re trying too hard,” particularly when I find myself too busy and stressed. I silently agree and then practice saying “no.” We all should try our best to help our loved ones, and even those we don’t know but can help, but not at our own expense. Only when we take care of ourselves can we truly impact others, and to do that, we must put ourselves on our own priority list.
Danielle Sullivan, a mom of three, is a writer and editor living in New York City. Sullivan also writes about pets and parenting for Disney’s Babbl
