Are you trying to cram 2 days worth of projects into a 24-hour day? And, then feeling a sense of failure because you’re unable to do it? The use of budgets for money are a common practice, but have you ever considered applying it to your time? Moms usually make a “to do” list and then spend their day frantically trying to cram it all in. Being guilty of this, it occurred to me that no one could do everything on my list. And certainly not with a child that gets sick and needs your attention at your side all day!
Start with how much time you have in a day and divide it amongst what must get done. This is the necessity list not the extra list. Don’t forget to allow for margin. This means you have planned for extra time like traffic, getting gas and well stopping to get yourself a coffee. Yes, you deserve it! Running around chasing your to do list will leave you exhausted, defeated, and frustrated.
Are you trying to do more than what’s possible in a 24-hour day? Have you ever considered that you have over-budgeted yourself? And, that no one could do everything on your to do list?
Your post totally hit the nail on the head for me! I'm extremely guilty of this: I have a spiral notebook that I write my daily to do list in, and with 4 jobs (3 from home, 1 outside the home on weekends), homeschooling my 3 kids, writing projects, running errands, getting the kids to/from their activities, cleaning and working out each morning at 6:30am--it's insane! I feel horrible if I don't stay on top of everything I've got going on, but after reading your post just now I realized--it's impossible to get it "all done" every single day.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the reminder! I thought it was just me being in desperate need of a time-management intervention! ;)
I feel like this was written just for me! I am the queen of over-budgeting & then I feel like a failure because I didn't cram it all in! Thanks for reminder! So nice to know someone out there gets it! You're awesome!
ReplyDeleteRight on! I have a to-do list I fill out each day, and at the top of it lists my "MITs" for that day. There are only 3 blanks here, and this stands for my "most important tasks" for that day. It really helps that at the end of the day, even if I had 10-15 things written down, that if I accomplished by 3 "MITs", all was well and I slept at night with a feeling of accomplishment.
ReplyDeleteI always seem to have a partially finished to-do list at the end of the day, I try to see the victory in the items accomplished and not dwell on those items I was not able to check off the list. I have gotten much better about taking a few minutes despite being surrounded by things that should be done to allow myself to do something I want to do! ...besides...no one else seems to see the urgency to get the list accomplished.... :)
ReplyDeleteI love the "MITs" idea, thank you Maria! And FitMom, great way to think about it! Crystal & Denise, yes it' s impossible to get it all done. I think there's relief in knowing that. Give yourself a break and tackle the top 3.
ReplyDeleteI'm learning from your comments, thank you.
Happy Mom = Happy Family,
Kim