Life has a funny way of making sure that there’s always something to overcome, no matter who you are and what you do. This past year we all kind of had the same big problem but even there some fared better than others. Nevertheless, there were new problems created, ones we thought we would never have to think about. But when that does happen … when our minds are chaotic and we don’t know what to focus on, it can be extremely helpful to take a step back and think logically.
The insane timeline of 3 months
Why we decided to have our wedding 3 months from our engagement … I’ll leave that for another story. But not that we had decided, it had to be done. Keep in mind, this was in the middle of the pandemic (July 2020). State mandates for masks and gatherings changed quickly, travel was volatile, and on top of that, I being an immigrant who had only come for college, had no resources or knowledge of how to plan for a traditional Pakistani wedding in the US.
It would have been so easy to get lost in the chaos. So many constraints and such little time. We find ourselves in this situation all the time. We have to get something done, but we feel like the world is against us and we just don’t know how to even start. How do we actually remain calm? What do we even do when we’ve calmed down with everything else being in disarray?
Step-by-Step thinking
1. Figure out what you do know and what you don’t
I think what helps the most in getting calm is thinking about what you do and don’t know. Our minds keep jumping from one thing to the next but actively listing them one helps. We’re basically figuring out how to divide with the intent to then conquer.
- a venue
- a caterer that could accommodate dietary restrictions
- a photographer
- guest list
My major constraints were
- COVID-19. This was maybe the biggest source of my anxiety. It would dictate what venue I could have, how many people could come, and the incredible volatility of changing event policies from the government
- Safety was more important than ever. My biggest concern was making sure no one got covid and that my family, who would be trying to come all the way from Pakistan, would not get fall ill or get stuck here
- Time limited what I could get done and how much I could research
- Cost. I just graduated from college and barely had savings.
- Sustainability. I hate waste and knew decorations could end up being thrown out.
Now to figure out what I didn’t know.
- What venues would be available, have enough space for distancing, and outdoor space?
- How was covid going to be 3 months from then?
- What if my family isn’t able to make it?
- How much is all this going to cost me?
A lot of these things were things that I couldn’t possibly know until later while some were things that maybe I could research. It’s necessary to make the distinction between what you can’t control and what you can figure out.
2. Perfection isn’t only vertical, it’s also horizontal
Being a perfectionist myself, whenever I do something, I feel that it needs to be perfect. Especially my own wedding! This raises the expectations for ourselves and anything short of it just ends up feeling empty. But what’s wrong with this? We think that there is only one definition of perfect but the truth is, it really depends on the person. When it comes to our own happiness, why take someone else’s definition of perfect. It’s not really logical.
Thinking about this, I had a choice. Either think of what a perfect Pakistani wedding would look like in a magazine, or think about what it would look like for me in the situation I was in. What did I value the most and could I picture what I want without thinking about the glossy magazine and picture-perfect Instagram photos of others’ weddings?
3. Think within the realm of your constraints
When you’ve already figured out the constraints, and you have identified what your values and goals are, your list of possibilities just got smaller. Sure all this meant that I couldn’t plan a big grand wedding, but it also meant I could focus completely on the smaller list of tasks at hand. Constraints are useful in helping you get to the possible solution much faster because they restrict how many solutions there are. For example, I could use potted plants as decorations and have guests take them home with them taking care of aspects of cost, sustainability, and decorations. Basically, I started to think more about what the constraints had left me with.
4. Systematically work your way forward
What’s left after creating the list of tasks is actually doing it. But now at this step, we have to consider the timeline again. I was doing this on my own and that meant a lot of research. I was working full time and about to start part-time grad school so my downtime was fairly limited. Which meant I had to parallelize as many tasks as possible. In such situations, I find it really helpful to create a graph similar to how college courses work. Some courses can be taken in parallel, while others have pre-requisites. Similarly, maybe I could research the venue and visit venues, but I would have to then also plan to visit caterers around that area instead of considering them two different tasks.
5. When things go wrong like they always do
Even with all that planning, nothing will ever go all the way you envision. I mean, look at Covid. No one was prepared for something like this and it easily broke the logistics of the global economy and upended billions of lives. You can have backup plans but those will never cover everything. So, just like we can apply this process of steps (above) to the larger problem, we can apply it to the smaller problems that arise.
The morning of my wedding was the first time I had a panic attack as far as I can remember. My rental car wouldn’t start. I started thinking about being late to my own wedding, the cost of the extra days of the rental, how I would return the rental. You get the idea. What helped then was to start listing off what I could do at the moment and what I couldn’t and what was the most important thing for me. Whether or not I came up with the most efficient solution is irrelevant since what mattered is what was something I was okay with.
Everyone has chaos in their lives. Without it, life probably would be pretty dull. Some have predicaments where it’s extremely hard to get into the mindset of even beginning to plan because the world is literally crashing around them. The point of this guide isn’t to provide a one-size solution to everyone but to make you think about how to approach your own problems logically.