The Difference Between a Restart and a Return
Nobody warns you that after months of finally figuring out what works for you, building consistency, and inching your way to good progress, may come an eventual and unannounced single month that tries to take it apart.
Everything you put in place; meticulously creating a plan, setting boundaries, doing the work. You found clarity on what you wanted and how you were going to accomplish it; your rhythms, the good habits that stuck, systems that worked. And all done while being patient, frustrated, perplexed at times, but all intentionally, mostly without burning yourself out. And then, everything that could go wrong did. One thing after another, until the rhythm you’d built felt very far away.
If that was your April or maybe just a recognizable month, this is for you.
Maybe yours looked like being dealt blow after blow each week, while overworked, to later get sick and an ending the month with a hefty unplanned fine …the cherry on top of a poop pie.
That likely wasn’t your month, but it was mine. I’m not here to tell you it’s fine or pretend to be some guru and repackage poop into a shiny lesson. If it sounded even loosely familiar, stay with me as I tell you something.
First, don’t contemplate the meaning of being dragged down for no good reason. Whether you believe everything happens for a reason or not, dissecting and replaying will only add to your already stressed-out, overdrive month.
But I am here to acknowledge (as should you) that you’ve made it through a pretty hard month. And yes, it may feel like ground was lost and you’ve been dealt quite a setback. But you’re not, and you haven’t. It’s just evidence of something real you built and the capacity you didn’t know you had. All the while, whether you noticed it or not, your foundation held even when you couldn’t see it.
Right now, you don’t need to restart. What you likely need is a return.
A way to get back on track after a bad month.
Why a Return Works When a Restart Doesn't
The temptation to scrap it all, run, and devise a new path out of a perceived necessity because of what you went through.
This version of resilience gets talked about constantly:
The bounce back.
The pivot.
The ‘new month new energy’ reset.
And there’s nothing wrong with it, and sometimes that’s exactly what you need.
But sometimes treating a hard month as a reset means erasing everything you went through and all the progress you’ve achieved. And what came before it was real. Most especially if there was value in what came before it. Erasing all that foundation built would be a tragedy.
Don’t do it.
Now you may be asking yourself, “But how do you know for sure if I should restart or return?”
A restart says, “That didn’t count; let’s begin again.”
A return says,” That counted. All of it. Even the hard part. Especially the hard part.” And now I’m coming back to what I know is true about how I want to work and live and build.
We may forget that surviving these tests does not derail you from your path; it is the path.
A person who is tested and makes it through a rough month like this without abandoning their values, spiraling into pushing themselves harder, or outright quitting altogether. That person is so much further along than they were before it all happened.
Even if nothing on the outside looks different yet.
What a Real Return Actually Looks Like
So, allow yourself some recovery time. It may seem like you’re ages away from where you were, but we just can’t see how much closer we are to our destination than we believe. Life always seems to have a funny way of pushing us into detours that lead us to unexpected answers, better places, and, somehow, exactly where we need to be.
Take a breather. When you’re closer to your baseline and sane self, mosey your way through recovery (btw…please don’t rush a recovery) to your wiser and brighter return . Those who move steady at a pace all their own find the sweetest, most unexpected fruit, sometimes through the journey more than the trophy at the end.
