Stressed out? Feeling powerless in the face of situations beyond your control? Perhaps beating yourself up for not achieving as much as you had either hoped or expected what with all this newfound “free” time you’re finding yourself with? (Nevermind that most of us didn’t really choose to have this “free” time.)
The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse is here to let you know that that’s fine. Whatever you’re doing, is enough. It might not always feel like it, but this overarching message is a welcome reprieve from the constant overbearing pressure to optimize your time and improve yourself. You. Are. Enough.
The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse is kind of an odd book, as far as categories go: I’m tempted to say it’s self-help, in the same way that This Difficult Thing of Being Human is, or The Body is Not an Apology (available via Hoopla Digital as an e-audiobook), which I’ve written about before.
This New York Times article is also a good reminder if you find yourself being hard on yourself for not doing as much as you think others are doing during this time, or not being quite as productive as you had hoped to be: Stop Trying to Be Productive. You can access the New York Times for free using your library card by following the instructions on this page on the VPL website. The free code is only for 72 hours, but you are free to repeat the process as many times as you’d like.
Need more feel-good books to make you bawl like a baby because what do you mean I’m not intrinsically flawed to the point of failure and require a lifetime’s worth of working on myself before I am worth anything to anyone? Look no further! (Well, just beyond the cut.)
After a long day of staring at my screen and working, I usually like to wind down by staring at my screen for a bit longer and watch something mindless, or something I’ve already seen before. And based on the viral craze around anything new that’s posted to Netflix, I’m not alone in my binge-watching bringing me comfort. But what do you do once your comfort show is done? Start over again? Wait a year or two for another season? With everything that’s going on right now, I’m definitely in need of some instant gratification and something to entertain me right away.