You Don’t Need Life to Get Easier. You Need to Expand Your Capacity. - by Jessica Janzen
There is something about fall that feels like someone suddenly turns the speed of life up three notches.
Back to school. New routines. Work ramps up. Sports schedules. Practices. Games. Team apps. School messages. Emails. Permission slips. Lunches. Appointments. And those insane Spirit days that somehow require a very specific outfit you find out about at 9:47 p.m. the night before.
And then there are all the things that were already there.
Our relationships. Our careers. Our homes. Our health. Our friendships. Our families. The people we love and want to show up for.
It can feel like there are a hundred tabs open in our brains at any given moment - and at least three of them are playing music, but we can't figure out which ones.
I know this season well.
And while I am a huge believer in taking care of our physical bodies - moving, working out, eating food that fuels us, getting outside, sleeping and doing the things that help us feel strong - I think there is another piece of our wellness that deserves just as much attention:
We have to learn how to manage our minds.
Your thoughts are shaping your experience
Research suggests we have more than 6,200 thoughts every single day.
Think about that.
Thousands of thoughts moving through our minds about what we need to do, what we forgot to do, what could go wrong, what someone thinks about us, whether we're doing enough, whether our kids are okay, whether we're succeeding, whether we're falling behind.
And we don't get to control every thought that shows up.
But we do get to decide which thoughts we hook onto.
There is a massive difference between having the thought:
This is a lot.
And hooking onto the thought:
I can't handle this.
One acknowledges reality.
The other begins writing a story about our capacity.
When my mind tells me, I'm so behind. Everyone else has this figured out. I should be doing more. I'm dropping the ball. I can't keep up, those thoughts don't stay contained in my head.
They change how I show up.
They affect my patience with my kids. My ability to be present with my husband. How I walk into a meeting. How I respond to an interruption. How I treat myself when something doesn't go according to plan.
The thoughts we repeatedly hook onto eventually become the lens through which we experience our lives.
That means managing our minds isn't about pretending everything is wonderful.
It isn't toxic positivity.
It isn't ignoring that some seasons are genuinely hard.
It is learning to notice the thought before automatically believing the thought.
Sometimes I need to stop myself and ask:
Is this thought actually true?
Is it useful?
Is it helping me become the person I want to be in this moment?
And maybe most importantly:
What thought would serve me better right now? Because powerful thoughts, lead to powerful actions.
Maybe instead of I can't handle this, it becomes:
This is a lot, AND I can take the next best step.
Instead of Everything is falling apart:
Today didn't go according to plan. Tomorrow is a new day.
Instead of I have to do everything:
I can ask for help.
Instead of I need life to calm down:
I can expand my capacity to meet the life I'm living. Because many of the things I am facing are actually the things I use to pray about.
Stop waiting for it to get easier
I think this is one of the biggest lessons I have learned.
We spend so much time waiting for life to settle down.
After this week.
After this project.
After hockey season.
After the kids finish school.
After this trip.
After this hard thing.
Then I'll breathe.
Then I'll take care of myself.
Then I'll be present.
But life doesn't really work like that.
One season ends and another begins.
So perhaps the goal isn't to create a life without chaos.
Maybe the goal is to build our capacity to live well inside a full life.
Capacity doesn't mean doing more and more until we collapse.
It means strengthening our ability to navigate what comes.
That happens physically when we move our bodies and build strength.
It happens relationally when we invest in friendships, family and community.
And it happens mentally when we learn to notice our thoughts, challenge the ones that aren't serving us and intentionally direct our attention toward what is.
Admit when it's hard
Expanding our capacity does not mean pretending we have endless capacity.
Some days are hard.
Some seasons stretch us.
Some mornings the lunches aren't made, somebody can't find their shoes, the calendar changed overnight, you're late for the meeting and you discover at drop-off that apparently today was Dress Like Your Favourite Book Character Day.
There are days when the wheels come off.
Let them be messy.
One of the most powerful things we can do for our mental wellness is simply admit:
This is hard right now.
Not I'm failing.
Not I should be handling this better.
Just:
This is hard.
There is freedom in telling the truth about where we are.
Because once we admit something is hard, we can stop wasting energy pretending it isn't.
And then we can decide what we need.
Ask for help sooner
We were never meant to do all of this alone.
And yet, somewhere along the way, many of us decided that being capable meant being able to carry everything ourselves.
It doesn't.
Sometimes expanding our capacity means becoming stronger.
And sometimes it means realizing the load was never meant to be carried by one person.
Text the friend.
Ask your partner to take something off the list.
Accept the carpool.
Tell your team you're at capacity.
Ask your community to step in.
Tell someone, I'm having a hard day.
We talk a lot about being there for other people. But community only works when we're also willing to let other people be there for us.
Asking for help isn't evidence that you don't have enough capacity. Sometimes it's exactly how you create it.
Set yourself up for success - and expect interruptions anyway
I love a plan.
I believe in setting ourselves up well.
Put the workouts in the calendar. Prep what you can. Create the routines. Protect time for the people you love. Build the systems. Go to bed earlier. Make the list. Do the things that make tomorrow a little easier.
But then remember:
You can do everything “right” and life will still interrupt you.
Someone will get sick.
The meeting will run long.
The practice time will change.
The school will send another notification.
You will forget something.
Life will life.
Our wellness cannot depend on everything going according to plan.
The plan matters.
But so does our ability to adapt when the plan falls apart.
That is resiliency.
Maybe this is the good stuff
And here's the thought I keep coming back to in the middle of the craziness:
There is a very good chance that five or ten years from now, many of us will wish we could come back to some of these days.
Not necessarily the 37 notifications from the team app.
We can leave those in 2026.
But the rest of it?
The shoes piled by the door.
The backpacks on the floor.
The drive to practice.
The kids talking over each other in the car.
The rushed dinners.
The friends who stop by.
The house that feels too loud.
The people who need us.
The life happening right in front of us.
One day, some of the things that feel like interruptions today may be the things we would give almost anything to experience one more time.
That doesn't mean we have to love every second.
It means we can learn to hold two truths at once:
This is hard.
And this is good.
This season can be overwhelming AND meaningful.
My life can be chaotic AND beautiful.
I can need help AND be incredibly capable.
I can have a hard day AND still have a good life.
Manage the mind carrying the life
So as we head into a full fall, take care of your body.
Move.
Sleep.
Eat well.
Spend time outside.
Connect with your friends.
Build community.
But don't forget to take care of the mind carrying all of it.
Pay attention to what you're paying attention to.
Notice the thoughts you're hooking onto.
Give yourself permission to have messy days.
Ask for help before you're drowning.
Set yourself up for success, knowing the plan will sometimes change.
And stop waiting for your life to get easier before you decide to enjoy it.
Build the capacity to hold more of the life you already have—not so you can cram more into it, but so you can actually be present enough to experience it.
Because this might be the crazy season.
This might be the hard season.
This might be the season where you don't quite feel like you have it all together.
But it might also be the season you'll someday wish you could have back.
So why not make the most of what we've been given right now?
With grace & gratitude,
Jess
Jessica Janzen
Speaker, Executive Coach, Philanthropist
Joy as a strategic advantage.
Best Selling Author, Founder of Love For Lewiston
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