The Surprising Relief of Being Forced to Stop
By Suzie Thoraval
What an outage taught me about permission, structure and keeping promises to myself
“It’s precisely those who are busiest who most need to give themselves a break.”
The recent Telstra outage gave me something I didn't expect: relief. My laptop sat closed on the desk for a few hours. I couldn't check email, log into client documents, or answer a single message. I had a stack of clearing to get through in my office, I was overdue for a session at the gym, and I had been meaning to sit down with my journal to start the day with a clearer head. I did all three, easily, while the outage lasted, and I felt genuinely light afterwards.
I don't want to make light of the chaos that the same outage caused for millions of Australians: delayed trains, failed payments, triple-zero calls that didn't get through. It feels strange to describe relief in the middle of that, but both things are true, and I'd rather admit it than pretend otherwise.
Being forced to stop
I have written before about the value of deliberate boundary setting. That is easier when work life is calm and steady. But when there are multiple unexpected events that all come up at once and life is just getting busier and busier, it becomes harder to take that morning unless something outside my control forces me to stop. Boundaries work best when you deliberately set the limits and stick to them.
I knew what I want my boundaries to be, but the reality of my daily quest to please everyone, stakeholders, clients, those I work with, those boundaries are hard to enforce.
Giving my boundaries respect
I only kept my promise to myself that morning because forces outside my control took the decision out of my hands. That showed me something about where my own resolve actually needs help: structure.
Gretchen Rubin's work on habits found that many people reliably keep promises made to others but struggle to keep the same promise to themselves unless someone else is involved. She calls this 'outward accountability'. For those who need this, attaching a real cost works: when I tell someone else about a boundary, breaking it means letting them down too, so I hold it more easily. Cal Newport argues that you should decide the rule in a calm, deliberate moment well before you need it, so there's nothing left to negotiate with yourself later.
Both are ways of building adaptive stability - the mindset, flexibility, and resilience that produce equilibrium, rather than waiting to have outer forces impose it on you.
What the Telstra outage taught me is that I need to think that my own boundary deserves the same respect I already give everyone else's.
My resolve
For me, as I strive to maintain adaptive stability, I need three things to help me with my boundaries.
My mindset: I have to stop giving other people's boundaries more importance than my own.
My flexibility: I have to find the structure that actually works for me, since one approach won't fit everyone.
My resilience: I have to respect and maintain the boundary even after a hard week, rather than letting one slip in boundaries mean it is not worth trying to maintain.
This will support equilibrium even in the face of uncertain events.
Three Things Worth Trying
Choose one morning this week and physically remove your device from the room before you start, rather than trusting yourself to leave it alone.
Attach a cost to a boundary you want to keep. Tell someone else about it, or book something you would need to cancel to break it.
Decide one work rule to stick to in a calm moment today, before you are tired or under pressure, so you are not negotiating with yourself later.
What actually helps you to stick to an important boundary once you have set it?
