“I usually know almost exactly how I feel.
The problem is,
I just can’t tell anyone.” ⁠

—Meg Cabot

How do you respond to the question, “How are you?”

• Do you have a real sense of how you are feeling and what you are thinking?

• Does the context of the situation influence your response?

• Does the person who asks the question have an effect on the way you respond?

• Are you always authentic when answering?

• Do you withhold or recast your answer?

• Do you think others are prepared for you to be totally honest? Or really care?

Most folks with whom I interact begin their conversations with this question. And most individuals I interact with really do care about my response. So, I try to be as honest and authentic as possible.

Sometimes people check in with me in response to my most recent blog post.

So, when asked, “How are you?” This week I responded with, “I am embracing the interruptions. Or at least I am trying to embrace the stress of it taking twenty minutes to return to what I was trying to accomplish before the interruption.”

I have written that this summer has been the summer of ‘Unplanned Interruptions’ — some good, some not so good, and some truly challenging. I have navigated them all with as much humor, grace, and good spirit that I could muster. And with the help of many friends.

I am returning to a more predictable schedule, but I am still chronically interrupted throughout the day. That is to be expected with phone calls, text messages, and emails. As well as the pack of dogs and litter of puppies which generate their own sets of interruptions.

I have never been more aware of interruptions than I have been this summer.

Nor, have I been more aware of the time it takes to reconnect with a project once interrupted. I must find the quiet again, focus, and do the task at my peak time of the day. I tend to rise early and tackle the day before anyone else wants to talk and before I start to slow down as the sun moves from the morning horizon to that of the evening. The dogs and I keep the same schedule.

I would be a stressed-out mess if I had not learned and mastered early in my career a cadence for planning at the end and beginning of each day. A system that helps me understand my priorities and thus how best to use my time. It is my life-long system of planning. Now, however, I am learning all over again that plans flex and change with interruptions — some of which are very good!

I recognize that my life has many divergent parts, deadlines, commitments, and responsibilities – all of them moving and connected to different people. Though I would like the daily plan to go as originally organized, I realize I am not in control of most things.

Here again, I am learning and relearning this lesson. It is good to practice agility. That is not to say that I don’t experience stress. But I do recognize it, open my arms wide, and try to pull it in close.

I could slow down the interruptions if I shed some responsibilities (and puppies) but my life might become very dull. Though I was not meant for a cloistered lifestyle I do appreciate the order and quiet that come with simplification.

This fall, what do you reply when asked, “How are you?”

Leslie

“Kanye’s the best listener I’ve ever worked with.
If I interrupt Kanye, every single time,
he’ll wait for me to finish before speaking.
It’s a running joke – sometimes I interrupt him just to see.
And he always goes, ‘No, no, finish.
I want to hear what you have to say.'”

— Scooter Braun