My producer brain is firing on all cylinders at all times, and almost every time I had an idea about the show, I was shooting Mary a text. It could be morning, midday, or evening. Idea comes in, text to Mary goes out. Finally, Mary hit me up and was like, "I don't have the bandwidth for this. There needs to be some control with the messaging." In that moment, I stopped and did something I had yet to do. I thought about Mary on the receiving end of these messages.
Text has a certain level of immediacy, and to them, nothing I was sharing had urgency. Also, there was no reason to share in the moment, because nothing needed to be done. I replied to Mary with sincere apologies, and we decided that for ideas, suggestions, and to-do things, we would use email. For immediate needs, we would text. This arrangement created a respectful way to honor Mary's bandwidth and also to install some controls on my communication. I am forever grateful to Mary for this callout.
Those shows are over, and Mary and I are no longer working together on the project because it's done. But the lesson of controlled communication remains. I am now more aware of the need to respect others' bandwidth. I am also saying, "No one cares about your stuff as much as you," and I need to follow that quote as well. People have lives. People have jobs. People have projects of their own. They cannot be bombarded with your stuff all the time.
Boundaries and bandwidth matter, and learning to respect both is important.