Spring Static
What I’m Borrowing From My Television Career Right Now
By Sue Pendleton, Founder
Lately I’ve been feeling what I can only describe as Spring Static.
It’s not exactly stress.
Not exactly excitement.
Not exactly overwhelm.
It’s more like a buzzy, unsettled feeling in my head. Too many mental tabs open at once.
Part of it, I think, is the season itself. The weather keeps swinging from hot to cold and back again. Flowers and shrubs are blooming. The light has changed. More neighbors are outside. There’s more movement, more conversation, more beauty. It’s lovely. And at the same time, all of that can feel stimulating in its own way.
Then layer on the harder things: the heaviness of the news, world events that feel scary and so big they’re hard to even wrap your head around, plus the everyday responsibilities that still need attention no matter what kind of week it is.
It can all create a strange kind of mental static.
The ideal is flow. But some weeks don’t work that way.
If you know my work, you know I care deeply about designing life and work in ways that support creative minds. I believe in working with our natural rhythms whenever possible, not against them. More flow. More spaciousness. Fewer systems that make us feel boxed in.
But here’s the reality: some weeks simply don’t offer that kind of flexibility.
Sometimes there is just too much to do.
Sometimes the week is too full.
Sometimes the pressure is real.
And in those moments, “go with the flow” is not always enough. Sometimes I need more structure than I want.
What television taught me about deadlines
This week got me thinking back to my career in television. TV is all about deadlines. Not soft deadlines. Not “sometime tomorrow” deadlines. Real deadlines. The kind where someone is literally counting down: going live in 5, 4, 3…
There is no wiggle room.
As my career grew, I was often handling more projects, more moving parts, more coordination, and more pressure, all while still needing to think creatively and make good decisions.
At times, it felt a little like juggling chainsaws.
And when things got especially intense, I knew I sometimes needed to hunker down for a day or two and work in a much more structured way. Not because that was my favorite mode, but because it was the clearest way through. It helped me focus, protect what mattered most, and make sure important things actually got done.
That’s what came back to me this week.
When your mind feels staticky, handrails help
So instead of hoping I would magically settle down, I decided to give myself more support than usual.
I plotted out my day hour by hour. I grouped similar tasks into blocks of time. I set alarms to help me shift from one area of focus to the next. And, importantly, I gave even the distracting things a place on the schedule. That part helped more than I expected.
When my mind jumped to something else I needed to do (an errand, an email, something around the house, something I didn’t want to forget), I didn’t have to keep wrestling with it mentally. I could remind myself, “that has a place, but later”.
That simple shift made it much easier to stay with what was in front of me. These are what I’ve been thinking of as handrails.
Not a cage.
Not a forever system.
Just something to lean on while the static is loud.
A little sweetness helps, too
The old television version of me probably would have made a rigid schedule and just pushed through it. The current version of me knows I need a little more sweetness than that. So I added a few supports that feel much more in tune with my creative brain.
At the end of each block, I built in five or ten minutes for what I’ve started calling a palette cleanser. Sometimes that meant unloading the dishwasher, moving the laundry to the dryer, making the bed, doing a few squats, or sitting outside in the sun for a minute. They’re tiny things. But they help.
Those little resets make transitions easier. Instead of dragging the mental residue of one task into the next, I get a small chance to clear the palate and begin again.
And honestly, that has mattered more than I expected.
Writing down what I finish
I also started keeping a running list of accomplishments as I moved through the day. That may sound like overkill, but it’s been surprisingly motivating. There’s something deeply satisfying about seeing, in plain sight, that I am getting things done. On a staticky day, that visible proof helps calm the feeling that I’m scattered and not making progress.
It gives my heart something to respond to. And on a week when my mind feels pulled in so many directions, that little bit of encouragement goes a long way.
Sometimes support matters more than the ideal
I still believe it’s best to design our lives and work in ways that honor how creative minds naturally function.
But when life doesn’t allow for much flexibility, support matters more than the ideal. Sometimes supporting a creative mind does not mean creating the most spacious, intuitive, flow-based day possible. Sometimes it means recognizing that the week is full, the pressure is real, and you need more containment than usual. Not forever. Not as your whole identity. Just for now.
Sometimes the kindest thing we can do is borrow a little structure and then soften it in the places where we know we’ll need help.
A few handrails.
A few palette cleansers.
A little visible proof that we’re moving forward.
Sometimes that’s enough to help us get through the static.
