Here's a story about spoons.

Imagine a first time cook, following a recipe to cook a dish. They use one spoon to measure out the flour and dump it, dirty, into the sink. They use another spoon to measure the butter and again, dump it into the sink. Another spoon to measure the salt, and likewise, into the sink. And so it continues, until all the ingredients are in the pan. The recipe then says put it on the heat and stir. They put it on the heat and look in the drawer for a spoon. But they are all gone, used and dirty in the sink. Quickly they rush around washing some spoons up, turn to the dish, and,

it's a disaster!

The food has burnt onto the pan and the dish is ruined.

What a novice cook like this needs, is someone more experienced, to teach them how to better manage their spoons. Use the same one for flour, salt and sugar, maybe. Use the one used for the butter for stiring too. Etc. I'm sure you know how it could have been done better.

Spoon theory goes that each day we have a limited amount of energy. We use that energy during the day to do the things we need to do. We use a spoonful of energy to do the washing up, a spoonful for shopping, a spoonful for gardening etc etc. If we have something difficult to do, we plan maybe an easy day, so we have the energy/enough spoons for it.

When something goes wrong, like a missed appointment, we use an extra spoonful of energy to cope with it. When lunch is late, we use a mental 'spoon' to cope with it. Someone coping with chronic pain is using energy and thus an extra spoon, constantly to cope with the pain. When we are worrying about something we need to do tomorrow, we are also using up an extra mental 'spoon'.

When you have a bad day, you can reach the point where you have just "run out of spoons" Just like the novice cook, it all becomes a disaster.

But all is not lost, just like the novice cook, learning how to better manage spoons is totally possible. Just like any other skill, where seeking out an expert to teach you would be completely normal, experts who teach skills to better manage life spoons are available.

The problem is, for some weird reason, society has decided that it is shameful to need to learn this skill. Like many others I want to change that.

In case you haven't twigged, i believe that therapists/counsellors/psychologists/whatever they are termed in your society, would be the experts in teaching spoon management skills, because they teach us skills that enable us to get more out of life. Just as there's no shame in learning any other new skills, why should there be shame in seeking advice on how to learn the skills to better manage your life spoons?

When was the last time you "ran out of spoons"? What happened?

Do you agree or disagree that therapists are experts in life skills that can benefit everyone? 

Wishing you a day of plenty of spoons. 💛