Let's talk about what we let go of - and what we hang onto - in work, life, and connection!
The host opens with friendly hellos, mentions background noises, and tells stories about crows, an owl, and discovering live animal cams. This informal intro sets a warm tone and shows the host’s curiosity about nature.
The speaker expresses appreciation for the community, mentions enjoying others’ contributions, and introduces the week’s theme: 'carrying less and moving further.' This orients viewers to the episode’s focus.
Using personal examples, the host discusses how the pandemic shifted work, travel, shopping, and social habits, and highlights choices about what to stop carrying—like rigid schedules or superficial friendships—and what to keep, like flexibility and closer family connections. These reflections encourage viewers to consider what they’ve let go of or reclaimed.
The host invites viewers to think about what they want to carry forward or leave behind, offers well wishes, and closes the segment. It's a brief call to action and a warm farewell.
Hi, Cadre Sphere! Hello, hello, hello. Happy Wednesday. The sun is shining bright here and two things are currently happening. My stomach is growling, so if you hear it, which I don't think you will, I apologize. I haven't had time to have my lunch yet. And my neighbor just decided to start mowing his lawn. So if you hear that, I also apologize. it just all kind of started happening at one time and I threw out a come on of course now's the time you start mowing your lawn but that's okay it's good that means the sun is shining and things are growing and spring is happening so it's actually something that I need to get out and do.
I was talking to my husband this morning he's up at our lake home And he said he was awoke to a couple of crows this morning, making a lot of ruckus. And so he went out to kind of see what was happening and they were picking on a little barred owl who was in the tree and. Hi, Mel Myers and. He said they kind of tried to shoo them away so the owl could have a little piece, but the owl kind of turned his head all the way around, looked at my husband, and then took off out of the tree. So he was taking care of himself.
I've never seen an owl up there, so I was incredibly jealous that he got to see the owl. And I've wanted to, I've actually been, it's really interesting there is, I know I've talked about the DNR eagle cam here that we have in Minnesota. And the other day somebody had showed me a New Zealand albatross, hi, hi, hi, cam, live cam too. That was, that's really cool. But while I was looking at that, a little thing on YouTube popped up for these tawny owls, T-A-W-N-Y, and they have a live camera in for these tawny owls.
And I have just been in awe of the tawny owls. They're actually in Denmark. So some of our daytime, my daytime here, it is their nighttime. And so you get to see the activity of the mom bringing the food back and really fun. I just love this time of year where things are growing and springing and things are turning green for us. And especially here in Minnesota, we've had kind of an up and down spring of one day it's 65 and the next day it's 30. So really excited to see the sunshine and excited to see some warm days ahead.
So Christy Larson, sorry, I should have started with that. Hi, welcome. I'm happy that you're here. I am always incredibly happy to join the Cadre Sphere. I think every contributor says that because it is such a great community, great people, great things happening. love supporting, love being part of it, love being supported as well for my own self and love. I always I always try to pop into JC's morning to see what his song of the day is, because he's always got some good song that he's playing.
And so and then it usually sticks in my head for the day. And so It's always it's it's a it's such a a unique and in inviting space. So we are talking this week about carrying less and moving further and that got me actually thinking about the pandemic and the things that changed during the pandemic and how much things we didn't know we were carrying and could finally let go of. Especially, you know, experiences, people, values, trends. There was a lot of things that changed. Work changed how we work, where we work, when we work.
The flexibility of work changed dramatically. People were vacationing less. Camper sales went up 600,000. Wholesale shipments were shipped in 2021. It's so camper sales went up because people wanted to get out of the house but weren't able to maybe stay in a hotel or weren't comfortable in an Airbnb in somebody else's house. The online shopping became bigger, right? People were staying home and cooking, maybe taking online cooking classes, cooking more food at home. Maybe they took started a new hobby or a new habit that they formed during the pandemic.
I know working from home that created a lot more flexibility for folks to, you know, really take care of their health. So lots of things changed. And one thing I was thinking about in this kind of came up, I think shortly after things went back to quote unquote, what they call normal. And Somebody was talking about what are the things that you stripped that you never put back on, the things that you took off or you let go of or you got rid of that you never put back on or you never took back after things went back to, like I said, quote unquote normal.
And it got me really thinking about some of the things that maybe changed for me that became more important or less important in my life. And likely some of these things probably changed some things, not these things, but some things probably changed for you as well. Just in terms of what are the things maybe you were like, I'm not picking that back up. Like I let that go. I'm not taking that again. I'm not going to carry that anymore because I don't need to. And I know for me it was. Kind of the idea of loving the idea of flexibility in my work, loving the idea that I can work from home and be productive and still have a sense of community with work.
And that was one thing when when the school I was working at shut down, I knew that that's what I needed and I needed a place that was going to be flexible enough for me to be, you know, whether it was in the office and at home or whether it was fully at home or fully, you know, remote or hybrid was totally fine, but I knew I didn't want to be back in the office full time. I felt like the flexibility of that was really important for me. I also had friendships that I was like, I didn't miss you. That sounds horrible, but I didn't miss you enough that I felt like we needed to forge that same relationship that we had before.
Or you realized or realized that maybe it wasn't as healthy as you thought it was, that relationship that you had. When we weren't able to see each other in person, it became a little bit more of you had to make an intentional ask or an intentional outreach to folks that you really wanted to continue to have in your network. And maybe you didn't do that right. And maybe it was OK and you felt OK about it. You felt better maybe about it. You know, the other thing too is I I love the fact that I can wear sweatpants.
I'm not gonna lie. The leisure wear was a thing that happened during the the COVID pandemic that allowed us to not have to put on those tight jeans every single day or. You know, the stiff suit or dress that you had to wear to work. Maybe that's not a thing anymore for you. Those are the things that I think, you know, I can really think of that. I didn't want to put back on and and that I think is OK, right? That's that's one. If there's anything good that came from the pandemic, it might be the things that we let go of, the things that we carried less.
And now that we're moving on, we don't want to have to carry them anymore. So, you know, the things that I think about that were really important for me was I felt, I felt that there were, so I have a sibling who is out of state, out of Minnesota. And one thing we were able to do, and we should have done it a long time ago because Zoom wasn't new in 2020. But we connected more via face. You know, we did less phone calls, less texts, and we connected more via Zoom. And that was really fun. You know, we get to see the kids and we got to have, you know, the shared experiences that way.
And that made the connection a little bit stronger. I think the other thing I think that, you know, I learned was where I wanted to spend my time and when and how I wanted to spend my time, what was most important to me in my experiences in my relationships and I am really grateful for that. I'm really grateful for the opportunity to have kind of that window shade opened so that I can see out and I can decide what I want to look at, right? What do I want to carry with me? What do I want to let go of?
And so that's what got me thinking about the carry less move forward and I'm sure there's plenty of things that you can kind of look back at and say oh yeah I let that go or I picked that back up because that was important to me and so I encourage you to think about that because it is something that maybe you um maybe you haven't and it got me thinking about it so anyway that's it CADRE sphere um take care be well and carry less have a great rest of your Wednesday I appreciate y'all coming We'll see you later.
