Carving out time

having no time means i'm a headless chicken

I hate when you ask someone how they are and they respond with “busy”. Which is why it grates me that I’ve sorta become one of those people. It’s not on purpose, I swear. I don’t mean it to minimize how busy other people might be, or to somehow glorify the idea that I’m so busy. It’s more an issue of time, and my severe lack of it. Time is such a precious resource, and I’m increasingly aware of how little of it I have each day. Between work, playing taxi service for the husband and kid, and then trying to still get done all the day to day life stuff (dishes, cooking dinner, etc) that needs doing, I feel like I really don’t have any time.

That said, I’ve continued with my daily yoga, going into my third month of it now. I really love the videos from Yoga with Adriene on YouTube, and she often talks about how hard it can be to just get on the mat, turn on the video, carving out time for yourself in the day. And yet, once I’m there, I love it, and I relax and focus and remember that I can always pick up my to-do list again when the video is over. So, in that same spirit, I’m trying to carve some time out of my day for something I’ve been struggling to find time for lately – blogging. I really wanted to connect with people more this year – it’s even one of my main goals for the year – but I feel like I’ve been dropping the ball when it came to blogging, so this is me, carving out the time in the day to write some words about what’s been going on, and making a commitment to continue to do so more often.

A big part of why I’ve been so busy is because my day job stuff is taking a lot more of my time. But that’s a good thing. Relationships that I’ve been trying to build for a long time are finally coming together, meaning there are more opportunities for cool stuff. Of course, organizing all the things and keeping all the various relationships going, replying to all the people and also trying to offer reporting and unique insight for those people can be… busy. Add to that being in charge of editing/daily schedule some days, as well as also trying to write content, and my day can become chaotic.

Thankfully, Harley is doing really well at school. She’s there for the whole morning and really happy. Most days, she plays all day, eats all her food, and comes home completely exhausted, which means she also naps for much of the early afternoon, giving me a couple more hours to get everything done. Then there are the days when she sleeps at school, when my whole afternoon is thrown into disarray because I have a perky, curious, busy toddler trying to play around me while I attempt to get anything done. It’s those afternoons that remind me just how necessary it is for her to be in nursery school, and how grateful I am that they keep her safe, fed, clean and oh so busy.

I am really so happy with her school. They are so good to her, and so kind to the parents as well. It is such a loving, warm environment and I never worry for a moment about her while she’s there. Gone are the days filled with tears and screaming – she is just happy and playful and fun at school.

When Harley wakes up in the afternoon, I really do try to remember my promise to myself that I would play with her after school. Time is going by so fast. I can’t even believe that she’s already 15 months. So I try to enjoy the moments with her, be present with her. I push her on the swing, or play with her with her toys. Not for hours and hours, because I could only dream of having that much time, but at least I try to savor the time we do spend together. It’s already going by so quickly – she has more teeth, and can definitely say mama/mommy and bye bye. She loves her food and laughs so hard at silly games. She adores her swing. She is already so big, so grown up compared to where she was just a few months ago, and I know more milestones will continue to speed past.

So that’s why I’ve been quiet, why I haven’t blogged as much as usual, as much as I like to. But I really will strive to carve out time each day to write down words, to get my feelings and experiences out there. I feel better when I blog regularly. It’s cathartic for me, but also makes me feel like I’m connecting to people more, like I’m sharing my world and opening myself up to your worlds. So tell me, how do you make time for all the things? I am looking forward to some fun multitasking – like when Harley and I can do yoga together, or make dinner together, as our time to chat and just be in each other’s space. What do you do to somehow balance finding time for your work, your partner, your kid and yourself? Or is the idea of balance really just a myth?

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