busy – Burpees to Bubbly

Over the weekend, I created a very busy day for myself on Saturday. I didn’t need to, but I have a tendency to over-book, over-commit and over schedule myself (WHY?!). Granted, if everything worked out time-wise how it should (or how it does in my mind), it would be a different story, but we all know that is generally not the case. Something is delayed, something takes longer than we anticipate and something doesn’t go as smoothly as we planned, which in turn means it takes longer to complete.

Here’s the way I thought my day was going to go:

get up, eat breakfast, make workout & get new playlist
Leave the house at 9:30 to bike to the Y
Teach 10-11 then do a quickie workout on my own
Leave the gym at 11:15
Shower quickly and head to a hair appointment at 12:30
12:30-1:15 – hair cut
After hair, go to the grocery store to pick up other things we needed for the night
While this was all going on, Roberto would be getting ground pork in the North End
3:15-3:30 leave for Jessi and Chuck’s

I mean, just looking at that written out now makes it so clear that I was setting myself up for a stressful day by jamming my schedule so full of different things. If ONE thing got delayed or took longer, it would literally throw off the rest of the day, so when multiple things don’t go as planned (as was the case for me on Saturday), I was left feeling anxious and like I was running out of time to get things done. It was not a relaxing day, even though it was filled with lots of my favorite things.

As we drove to Jessi and Chuck’s house (which was the thing I was most excited about!), 30 minutes late, mind you, RM asked what was wrong. We were stuck in traffic and I hate being late and when I told him these things and how anxious they were making me feel, he quite bluntly said, “Monique, you do realize that you created a busy day when you didn’t have to, right?”. Touché, RM, touché.

And, while I didn’t necessarily like being called out on this ( 😉 ), the guy did have a point. I could’ve spared myself a whole lot of stress, rushing around, and anxiety if I had just not filled my schedule so much. Committed to one less thing. Given myself time to enjoy fewer things rather than rush through them. RESTED and relaxed, maybe!

While I’ve gotten better at this since meeting RM (he, unlike me, much prefers not having plans and just going with the flow in terms of what he’s feeling on any particular day, especially the weekends), I still have the occasional self-imposed busy/stressful day like I did last weekend. Or even just the need to fill up “free” time with things I always wish I could do if I had more free time. However, I am really working on doing less of this, because at the end of the day it robs me of the enjoyment of each activity – and there’s no fun in that!

I’d love to hear from you – if you tend to be like me in terms of filling up your schedule, how do you force yourself to slow down? To not overbook or over commit? To “go with the flow” rather than have everything planned out?

And, if you’re not like me, but rather more like RM in that you prefer to not have plans scheduled out, what’s a tip you have for people to be like that?

For me, before I over-book myself thinking that I’m a super woman who can handle it all, I’m going to think about what I REALLY want to do and what can wait. For the thing (or things if they’re spread out) I really want to do – that will be my focus and if nothing else happens that day then it’s no big deal. Bonus- if I get other things done based on time, that’s just things I don’t have to do another day!

The other night, RM sent me a super interesting & really great read : The Disease of Being Busy. Please, take a few minutes and read this as I think it’ll cause you to think about your life and put into perspective what we are doing by making ourselves “so busy”.

While the concept of “being busy” is nothing new to me, over the past few years I have strived to refrain from the “I’m so busy” auto-response when people ask me how I am. However, even though I try to be more conscious of how I respond to the “how are you doing” question, I find myself still talking about how busy I am.

“I have so much going on this week”

“Listen to everything I have to do over the weekend”

“My weekend was ok, but it was just too busy”

“I wish I could, but I have X, Y, & Z already scheduled”

… sound familiar?

But the thing is, I AM busy, so when I respond with everything I’ve got going on I’m not doing it for pity or for the satisfaction of “being the busiest”, I’m just saying what I’ve got going on. Between work, teaching, blogging, 2 book clubs, being a wife/friend/daughter/sister/etc., I have a lot of balls that I juggle, which I’m sure many of you can relate to.

The question I ask myself these days, though, is am I TOO busy? Is my busy schedule chock full of jumping from one thing to the next taking away from each particular activity/task/event? Am I gliding through my to-do list, constantly thinking about what I can check off and what I still have to do, rather than focusing on being in the moment in each particular thing on my to-do list? Is it so bad to say NO to plans, activities, subbing, etc. if I really don’t feel like it? Is it better to just suck it up and get things done or should I give myself a break and take a weekend or a week where I say “nope. I’m not saying ‘yes’ to anything”?

For me, personally, I do enjoy being busy with a lot of things going on, but these days I’m feeling a little TOO busy, even for my liking. I’ve been dreading the weekends because they’ve been SO FULL of plans- some of which are my fault in terms of “over-booking”, others are unavoidable (and ultimately fun, but it’s still tiring having non-stop plans). I go into the week feeling like I need to “gear up” for a week full of teaching, social engagements, lots of meetings at work, trying to get back to consistent blogging, etc.

And you know what? It’s exhausting. Like really, really tiring. I feel like I’m “burning the candle from both ends”, as my mom likes to say. Which is why this past weekend was so wonderful. Friday night I came home and then grabbed an Uber to meet RM in the city for a little shopping and dinner. Saturday we planned on going skiing, but for a number of different reasons, ended up turning around halfway there and heading back. This was actually a wonderful thing because we were able to food shop on the way home and still got back early enough to get workouts in, showers taken and -gasp- relax before making dinner. Sunday we skiied early (and at a closer mountain to avoid so much travel), went to Sunday dinner at my MIL’s and then I meal-prepped, blogged and read/watched tv.

I joked on my Instagram story when posted this picture on Saturday:

But it was so true at that moment. I was drinking hot lemon water, reading a book, snuggling on the couch with RM & Francesca and at that moment, I realized I need more of that in my life. I need to take more time for ME to do absolutely nothing. To have time scheduled where I have nothing scheduled and I don’t have to think about everything I still need to do. Time to be present. To be in the moment. To not look at the clock. To not be busy.

So, if any of this resonates with any of you, I urge you to try and find time where you can just be. You can do or not do whatever you feel like and whatever makes you feel good, happy and relaxed. Because at the end of the day, relaxing IS so under-rated 😉

Questions for you: Are you too busy? Do you enjoy being busy or do you thrive more off of downtime? How do you prioritize relaxing and practicing self-care?