I have had this post in draft for a few weeks now. I wanted to write about this topic as time has always played an important role in my life.

When I woke up this morning, the ideas were already swirling in my head, and I knew it was time. I had a relaxed morning this bank holiday Sunday, took my time getting out of bed, had a nice breakfast, a bowl of plain cornflakes smothered in raspberries, blueberries, and milk, took my vitamins (have not been good with this lately) and enjoyed my morning coffee (usually my only cup of coffee for the day). Eggs are slowly boiling on the stove for my lunch – devilled eggs with a nice Spring salad – and, as I am typing this post, I am comfortably seated on my sofa.

For the longest of times, I have been telling myself that I don’t have time to do the things I want to do. There is this constant internal monologue happening which tells me that even though I want to do so many things, I just don’t have the time. It’s probably because I want to do everything at the same time, afraid that if I do one thing at a time, I will end up not doing the rest of the things I want to. My fear is that I will lose interest, forget about what I wanted to do or not feel inspired anymore so I end up with this long list of things to do which keeps getting longer and I find myself sitting idle on my sofa. It’s a perfectly acceptable sofa but wouldn’t want to be sitting on it idle too much… On many occasions, before I start doing something, the internal monologue is so unkind to myself that I give up on what I wanted to do even before I start doing something.

Albert Einstein said: “The only reason for time is so that everything doesn’t happen at once”. I heard this in an episode of “The Big Bang Theory“, one of my all-time favourite shows. It’s right up there with “Seinfeld” 🙂 This resonates with me and I couldn’t get this idea out of my head… it makes sense now 🙂

There is an exercise I learned about in therapy which I use when I realise that I am getting anxious or overwhelmed by my self-imposed to do list or the thought of not having enough time. I take some time to anchor myself in the present by doing a little bit of mindfulness focusing on my breathing, relaxing the shoulders, placing my palms on a surface (depending on where I am it could be a desk or the top of my thighs) or my bare feet on the ground and take a few moments to breath and observe what it feels like where my hands / feet touch the surface. I find this a very helpful exercise I can do anywhere with my eyes opened or closed. This is something my wellness coach also recommends, and we practice during our sessions. Then, I focus on completing one activity at a time without thinking about the other items on my to do list. I sometimes get mentally entangled in figuring out which activity is a priority or what should the sequence of completion be so that I can get much more done at the end of the day and go down the rabbit hole! In this case, I just pick an activity which I know it would be quick to complete, an easy win.

Another strategy I learnt in therapy is timing myself. Again, when I feel overwhelmed, but I want / need to do something and I just can’t get going, I set a timer for 15 minutes, tell myself that I will do that activity for 15 minutes and then I can take a break and / or continue for another 15 minutes. By the time the timer goes off, I am usually so focused on what I am doing that I don’t stop until I complete the task/ activity as the difficulty mostly lies in getting started.

My wellness coach challenged me on my assessment that I never have the time to do everything I want to, and, in her opinion, it is a matter of simple time management as I kept saying to her that it feels like there aren’t enough hours in the day for me to do the things I wanted to do after work. She immediately did a rough calculation of how much time I would have available to myself before and after work. I must admit that I have never thought about approaching the matter from that point of view. I know, right?! It is just a simple calculation that never occurred to me! Sometimes it is easier for people from the outside to put things in a different perspective which we can then filter through our own lenses. I am now actively working on developing a morning routine that allows me to focus more on myself in the morning and do things that bring me joy instead of jumping straight to my laptop and start work the days I work from home. I also feel I am getting more done after work, too. This also helps with work as I start work feeling that I have already accomplished some of the items I had chosen for that day, and this allows me to focus on completing work assignments instead of thinking what other things to I need to do.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that before I started applying these strategies I was not performing at work, far from it! I am saying that I continue to perform, and I do my absolute best but I am doing this in a more relaxed manner by taking away the pressure that I put on myself and feeling happier with accomplishing more in my day to day life outside of work.

I don’t know about you, but this is why Einstein’s quote above resonates with me so much. Every time my mind starts racing and I start thinking about all those numerous things I would like to do, all at the same time, this reminds me that everything doesn’t have to happen at the same time.

I am not going to labour this topic further. Hopefully, the message I wanted to convey has come across.

I am off now to set the timer to do those silly dishes sitting in the sink… 🙂

Let me know what you think. I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments section.

Miss B