The Summer I Stopped Trying to Do Everything

I don’t think I fully realised how exhausted I had become until I experienced what it felt like not to be rushing.

Not rushing physically, necessarily. I’ve never been someone who thrives on chaos or leaves things until the last minute. If anything, I’ve always been organised, prepared, thoughtful about creating calm for everyone around me.

But there is another kind of rushing that can quietly take hold of your life without you noticing it at first.

The mental kind.

The emotional kind.

The constant low-level feeling that life is something you need to stay on top of all the time.

For years, I think I carried that feeling into every season, but especially into summer.

Without ever consciously deciding to, I had turned summer into something that needed to be managed well. Something I needed to get right. A season that somehow carried equal parts hope, pressure, responsibility, and expectation.

I told myself I simply wanted to make the most of it.

But looking back now, I think what I really meant was that I was afraid of wasting it.

Afraid of not appreciating it enough.
Afraid of not creating enough memories.
Afraid of letting time pass too quickly without making it meaningful.

And underneath all of that, there was probably also the quieter pressure so many women carry without ever fully speaking about it aloud: the feeling that the emotional atmosphere of family life rests largely in our hands.

Not entirely, of course. But enough that we feel responsible for it.

The planning.
The rhythm of the days.
The food.
The organisation.
The remembering.
The emotional temperature of the home itself.

Even joy can begin to feel like something you are quietly tasked with creating for everybody else.

I don’t say that with resentment. I think for a long time I simply accepted it as part of motherhood, part of caring deeply for the people around me. But somewhere over the years, without meaning to, I think I began carrying every season as another invisible project to hold together well.

And summer, in particular, became strangely loaded.

Not just because of family life, but because of the culture surrounding it too.

Everywhere you look, summer is presented as something extraordinary. A season that should be unforgettable. Beautiful. Transformational. Full of magical memories and sunshine and ease and spontaneity.

At the same time, there is also this subtle pressure to optimise it.

Read more.
Travel more.
Do more.
Make memories.
Reset your habits.
Have the best summer ever.

Even rest has somehow become productive.

And for a long time, I don’t think I questioned any of it. I thought this was simply what people did. What good mothers did. What emotionally present women did. What grateful people did.

You filled the calendar.
You planned the activities.
You organised the trips.
You made the memories.
You made sure everybody enjoyed themselves.

And if you did it well enough, perhaps you too would finally relax somewhere inside it all.

But the truth is, by the time August often arrived, I wasn’t relaxed at all.

I was tired.

Not because summer hadn’t been lovely. Not because there weren’t beautiful moments. But because I had spent so much energy trying to hold the season properly that I rarely fully settled into it myself.

I was always slightly ahead of the moment I was actually living.

Thinking about the next plan.
The next meal.
The next arrangement.
The next thing we should probably do before summer slipped away.

And I think somewhere along the line, I confused managing life with experiencing it.

The thing that shifted this for me wasn’t dramatic.

There was no big breakdown or revelation. No moment where everything suddenly changed overnight.

It happened much more quietly than that.

Partly through getting older, I think.

Partly through burnout.

Partly through stepping away from full-time work and slowly beginning to untangle who I was underneath years of constant responsibility and overstimulation.

And partly, strangely enough, through sitting on a deck in France earlier this summer with nowhere urgent to be.

What struck me most there was not the scenery or even the holiday itself, beautiful as it all was.

It was the absence of urgency.

Nobody seemed obsessed with maximising the day.

Nobody appeared to be frantically trying to create perfect experiences every waking minute.

There was space around everything.

Long lunches that drifted slowly into late afternoons.
Teenagers appearing eventually, hungry and sun-warmed and relaxed.
People sitting and talking without constantly checking the time.
Quiet mornings before campsites properly woke up.
Walks taken for no particular reason beyond the simple pleasure of walking.

And slowly, almost without realising it, I felt something in myself begin to soften.

Not because France was magical or because life suddenly became perfect there, but because I finally had enough distance from my normal routines to notice how tightly wound I had quietly become.

I noticed how uncomfortable stillness initially felt.

How instinctively I searched for the next thing to organise, improve, arrange, or anticipate.

And then gradually, after a few days, something else happened.

I stopped trying so hard.

And what surprised me most was that the moments I loved best were never the big planned ones anyway.

They were the ordinary moments I would probably never photograph.

Reading outside while everybody else slowly drifted through the day around me.

Fresh bread from a nearby bakery still warm in the paper bag.

Late evening conversations with my teenagers that happened only because nobody needed to rush off anywhere else.

Coffee in the early morning coolness before the heat arrived.

The feeling of time stretching slightly instead of constantly tightening.

Nothing extraordinary.

And yet somehow, everything about those moments felt deeply alive.

I think that was the real turning point for me.

Not learning how to slow down perfectly.
Not suddenly rejecting ambition or productivity or plans altogether.

Just realising that I no longer wanted my life to feel like something I was constantly managing from slightly outside myself.

I wanted to be inside it again.

Fully present for it.

Not curating every moment.
Not trying to optimise every season.
Not carrying every invisible emotional thread quite so tightly all the time.

Just living.

And perhaps what I’m learning now is that ordinary life becomes far more beautiful when you stop trying to force it into becoming extraordinary all the time.

The slower evenings.
The open windows.
The tiredness after swimming.
The silence after everyone has gone to bed.
The walk after dinner.
The sound of people moving quietly around the house on a summer morning.

These things matter.

Not because they look impressive from the outside, but because they are the texture of an actual life being lived.

I think for a long time I believed happiness would arrive through getting everything right.

Managing things well enough.
Creating enough memories.
Making life feel meaningful enough for everybody around me.

But these days, what I want feels much quieter than that.

I want enough space in my days to notice my own life while it’s happening.

I want my nervous system to feel calm more often than overwhelmed.

I want presence more than perfection.

And I no longer want to spend entire seasons trying to prove — to myself or anybody else — that I am making the most of them.

Maybe enough really can be enough.

Maybe summer doesn’t need to be optimised to matter.

Maybe the most meaningful moments are the ones that arrive quietly while nobody is trying too hard to create them.

And maybe the deepest relief of all is realising that you are allowed to stop carrying everything quite so tightly.

You are allowed to rest inside your own life for a while.

Chat soon,

Ciara

P.S. If you enjoyed this post, you might also love these gentle summer reads from the blog:

Maybe This Summer Isn’t Meant to Be Magical — a reflective piece about letting go of pressure and unrealistic expectations, and creating a slower, more meaningful summer rooted in real life rather than perfection.

10 Simple Ways to Enjoy a Summer Morning at Home — cosy, realistic ideas for slower summer mornings, gentle routines, fresh air, quiet moments, and beginning the day feeling calm and grounded.

Why Slowing Down Feels So Difficult — a deeper look at why so many of us struggle to truly slow down, even when we know we need it, and how to begin creating a gentler pace in everyday life.

10 Things I’ve Let Go of This Summer (So I Can Actually Enjoy It)

12 Things I’ve Stopped Doing to Live a Simpler, More Intentional Life — both gentle reflections on slowing down and creating a life that feels calmer and more aligned.

And if you’d like to follow along more day-to-day, I share little glimpses of our life, seasonal moments, and gentle reminders over on Instagram at @ourlittlehouseinthecountry 

Summer Printables You May Enjoy:

• 25 Simple Things to Do Before Summer Ends
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• How to Create a Slow August Rhythm
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• 30 Simple Ways to Savour Late Summer
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