Posts Tagged ‘time’
Gold star motivation
I think I have been complaining a lot lately. Probably not so much on here because I never seem to make time to write any more but most certainly on facebook and in general to Ben and the people around me. The thing that has been bugging me the most lately is my lack, or apparent lack, of time to do the things I want to do.
I figured out three days ago that I will not have my credit cards paid off until June 1st this year. Sure it is better than I had expected but it still seems a long way away. And that is only as long as no unexpected bills show up and as long as I don’t go crazy buying new clothes or something similar. I am really on a strict budget. I have secured a lot of work in the coming weeks working for Cirque de Soleil but that seems to have added to my time limit frustration.
I have a fairly detailed timetable set out which, if followed, should cover me for most things. It is the following it that is becoming difficult. I have now adopted a very childish way of getting me to stick to my timetable more strictly (I figure I act like a child sometimes so this may just work). Every time I stick to my timetable and get all my work done I get a little star sticker to put on my calendar. At the end of each week if I have seven stars I can have a gift. The gift can be anything I want like an afternoon of watching “Sex and the City”, chocolate cake and ice-cream, a picnic in the park. I just have to decide at the start of each which what I want the gift to be. I got a silver star today and the gift I choose was to go on a bike ride and picnic with Ben next week, especially now that it is autumn.
I really hope I stick to this.
In light of the recent cavalcade of Very Important Things that Need To Be Done Now; this post by Dawn Michelle stuck a chord with me. It’s something I have worked towards myself, but never formalised. Read the (short) article for more details, but briefly:
- Do no more than 3 important things every day.
- Ask for help.
- Taking a nap is better than doing the project tired.
- Limiting your tasks creates space for play.
- Practise Yoga or Meditation
Emma and I have both noticed the Grumpalunkus has come to visit us more often than usual lately. It’s time to get back on the minimal and happy path again!
Image by lotus8(Flickr).
I’ve got 15 minutes spare while I wait for Emma to turn up for dinner. Now I can relax a little and watch the world go by for a bit. It’s really quite relaxing watching other people go about their business while I don’t, on purpose.
Really brings it back to me about what I do and don’t have control over. What I can make time for.
Me.
Yay! Batteries recharging at Supa-Rate(tm). This is the life.
Same life actually, different channel.
How do you divide your day?
Do you look at the hours you have from the time you wake up to the time you go to sleep at night?
Do you divide it into work, rest and play?
Do you divide your day between morning, afternoon and evening?
I have at one time or another in my life tried to divide my day in all of these ways and more, but lately I have stumbled upon a better way to divide the day.
Instead of looking at each days events as an insurmountable to do list, I have recently started employing a new way of dividing the day into time for me and time for others. The fact is lately I have spent less and less time on what makes me happy.
At the start of the year I wrote a list of intentions for the year. Things I wanted to achieve by the time 2010 was over. Some of the things on that list included saving more money, making time to practise my singing, learning another language, being organised, learning to cook more and spending more time with Ben. I have found however, that I have been dedicating less and less time to these things for me and have been focusing more of my time on things for other people. The division of time was all wrong.
I was, until a week ago, working a job which was making my sick, tired and generally not a very nice person to be around. I was miserable and it was starting to show in every aspect of my life. I finally stopped and thought about why I was doing this job. I had started the job because I was pregnant and at the time it was the only job I could get that would be suitable as my belly expanded. Circumstances changed. I was no longer able to convince myself that I was happy in this job because the one driving force for me to stay was now gone. I was not doing something that I wanted to do.
That one change sparked off a chain reaction for me of wanting to spend less time on doing things because other people expected them of me and start looking at those things that are important in my life:
- I love helping others and I love teaching, so I applied for a job (and got it) as a teacher
- I want to lose the weight I put on, so Ben and I have started encouraging each other to exercise more often
- I want to spend more time with Ben, so I have started trying to find time for us to be together in a fun way
I guess the important thing is that there is time for both parts of me. Time for myself and time for others. The balance was wrong before and I am now starting to get it back in the right order.
Image by FreeWine (flickr)
I have realised that I can’t possibly continue to do things the way I have been. I have an exponentially expanding list of things that need to be addressed and a finite amount of time to do them.
24 hours per day. ~30 days per month. 9 months in total.
And I’ve already lost about a month because we didn’t know the countdown had started!
So I have started to use my phone’s countdown timer to help me divide my time to tasks I want to complete. It helps me prioritise the tasks I am going to do as well – I have to decide how much, in total, I am willing to give over to a particular task.
So:
- Reading a new book – 1 hour
- Investigating travel insurance claim – 1 hour
- Getting some extra work done while taking the day off – 30 minutes
- Blog post – 35 minutes
- Get dinner ready – what ever is left over before Emma comes home.
Obviously I will be revising the system as I go, but today it has worked well.
I also realise there are people out there that already do this all the time. I was not one of them.
