3 December 2013

Some days are busier than others.  Some lives are busier than others.  Some hearts are busier than others.

When you think about your life, are you busy?  Is your world filled with "I need to get that done."  "There isn't enough time in my day to do that." "I don't know if I can fit you in, I am so busy."

I appreciate that there are days when things get a little frantic, deadlines loom and things just have to get done.  BUT, do you save time for those you love?  Do you leave space in your life for yourself?

Around the holidays things get busy for all of us.  There is shopping to be done, houses to be cleaned, presents to be bought, parties and get-togethers to attend, and life gets bogged down in busyness.

It is all too easy to say yes to everything, not wanting to let anyone down.  However there is someone you are letting down at this point.  YOU!

You need to have time to relax and do nothing.  Time to run a hot bath and just wallow.  Time to curl up and read a few chapters of a book.  Time to catch up on that TV series you have been watching.  Time to breathe.

You also need to put as much time into your relationships as you do into your work.  Deadlines at work can create such a fuss in our heads, we work late to try and get them completed, we bring work home with us, we think about it on our time off.  But does this actually help us? 

Instead, could you take some of that time you spend worrying about getting work done and make a list.  Chose 3 things that need to be done and do them, before you leave work, then just leave work.  Don't bring any home.  Just for one night.  Work won't spontaneously combust.  The world won't end.  But you will feel a little better.  And your relationships will be better too.

Put some of that energy toward calling someone on the phone.  Put a smile on someone else's face.  Tell your mum you love her. 

If you do this just once a week for a month, maybe you could try it for an extra night.  Could there really be two evenings a week where you don't think about work?

This would soon develop a great pattern of getting things done and not bringing it home to worry over.  Because if you are anything like me the work comes home in a big bag, and it sits there, in that big bag, while I worry about how much I have to get done, and how I have no time to do it.  I don't actually do it, but I don't do anything else either...because I have no time to do anything else because of all the work I have to do.  I try to stay a little extra in work, get done whatever actually needs to get done, then make a list of three things I need to do first in the morning.  This habit means that I don't waste time first thing worrying about what needs to be done first, and that I don't bring work home with me.

Itts a win win situation.