Tossing out my lists and rediscovering routine

I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do". - Leonardo da Vinci

Lately I have been thinking about action.  Taking action vs planning to take action.  In my world it is SO much more fun to plan to take action than to take action.  I sit down to make a list of cleaning tasks as if I have never cleaned my house and can't see that there is a ring around the toilet and a pile of laundry taking over my basement.  But still I will often sit down to write the list.  I love lists and believe they have value but, sometimes I am just avoiding taking action.

Years ago I was reading a Beverly Lewis book about a young Amish girl who ends up leaving her Amish roots but stays with much of the tradition by becoming Mennonite.  As she navigates the new world she learns many of her friends make lists to keep track of what they need to do so she decides to start making one.  This young girl who spent her life learning the routines of life that would tell her when to cook, clean, run errands and relax suddenly was relying on a list instead of her routines. At the end of the short story she found herself without her husband's anniversary gift because she had read her list wrong.  It ended up to be a lesson to her to trust the routines she grew up with and the way she knew to do things.  And it has stuck with me through the years.

When I was a homemaker I had a routine.  I didn't need to write a list to know when to clean the bathroom, dust, mop, make dinner, etc.  Things that happened every day or at least every week were just done.  I just did them.  When I did put them on my lists they were generally covered with the word "clean".

Then I went to work and I am realizing that what I really miss is that routine.  My house doesn't clean itself, although sometimes within my routine it began to feel that way.  I would come home from work and nobody had swept up that spilled breakfast cereal or picked up the dirty clothes on the floor.  I was overwhelmed with all that needed to be done.

So I started making lists.  When I feel overwhelmed by the number of things in my brain to do and juggle I start making lists.  Cleaning lists, parenting lists, school lists, work lists, life lists, lists, and lists.  

But lately I am wondering if maybe instead of making a list when I feel overwhelmed I might just do something.  Toss a load of laundry in, sweep the kitchen, play a game with my daughter, write a few more words, send out some writing queries, put in another hour at work, take a walk.

To be clear, you won't see my tossing out my notebooks and lists.  I love lists!  But maybe I could do with a few less lists and a little more action.

I am learning, I am willing, I am ready.  Now is the time to Do.  To take action!

Today was one of those days I felt a little overwhelmed and didn't want to take action.  And normally that leads me to sit down and make a list but instead I pushed past that desire and did what I already knew needed to be done.  And it has energized me to get up tomorrow and be really productive.

Slowly, as the weeks and months and years go by I am developing a new routine, a new schedule, a  new way of doing my life and interacting with people.  And suddenly one day my kitchen and bathrooms will seem to clean themselves once again as I slide comfortably into my new routine.  And I will add new routines as business, writing and working from home become the normal routines of my day.  And each of these has their own routine just waiting to be discovered.

This is my year of action.  I have to admit that the year of action has been much more challenging than the year of release.  I would like to go back to releasing things and not taking action.  But this is my year of action and I feel God calling it to me every time I start to back up and look like I am going to sit down.  So I keep moving forward and looking for the next action to take.  One step at a time I am doing what I know I need to do and believing that God will use it all for His glory.  ...and maybe make enough money to pay the bills while John is in school?

Back home for work

And she'll have fun, fun, fun til the bank takes her house awaaaaay.

Can I just tell you I am loving my new job?  I love working from home.  Actually, now that I have gotten a very broad overview training online, I am in the office this week while I wait for my computer to arrive and get set up.  Next Monday I will wake up, open the laptop and...probably panic.  But then I will find a starting point and move forward one step at a time and it will be great!  I am going to have a bit of a learning curve but I am enjoying it.  I feel energized by what I am learning not wiped out by it. Who knew you could have that experience?

I am also feeling a little guilty.  I suppose not unlike when a woman quits her job to be a homemaker, or the way my mom felt when she retired.  Am I doing enough?  My mom used to call me when she first retired and tell me she had watched Matlock for 2 hours and then ask me if it was OK.  I never thought about whether I was allowed to be a bum for an hour or two or a whole day, I just did it.  And in her retirement I released my mom to embrace that same attitude.  But now that I am home but working I am never sure if I have done enough.  Watching 2 hours of Matlock definitely does  not seem like something I have permission to do.

And I am nervous.  I am making less money at this job but with the idea that I will generate at least a little self employment income by the time John returns to school in the fall.  I am unsure I am allowed to sit down or stop working until I have made that happen.

So I sort of wander the house feeling a little twitchy and wondering if I have justified my existence for the day.

The woman teaching me this new job has been doing it for 6 years.  She knows what needs to be done, when it needs to be done and it all sort of just flows out of her by instinct.  So breaking it down and teaching it to me has been a bit of a chore.  I feel like she is going all over the place and I am not sure I am tracking.  I know in a few months I will start to develop that same sense of knowing what needs to be done, what can wait and how much time I need to spend each day and on what.  I will have developed my own system and be able to jump around and track things.  I know this because when I was a homemaker I had that down.  I had a system, I had a plan, I could go from one unrelated thing to the next and back without missing a beat.  I knew I could spend an afternoon watching Matlock and still get the house picked up and dinner started by 5pm.  Or I knew I could skip making dinner and we could go out.  And of course some days I just let it all go to the pit because I knew tomorrow was another day and I could pull it back together then.

This is the the vision I keep in my head as I go about each day feeling a little twitchy and wondering if I have yet justified my existence.  Eventually I will find that balance.  I will know how much I can do in a day, how much I need to do in a day and how to prioritize it all so it gets done AND I have time to do my nails.  (I miss Melanie time.)

Never a dull moment here!  We press on.

Am I busy?

I am feeling so good about working these days.  I know I just had a rebellious breakdown a little over a week ago but every breakdown seems to be a break through to more contentment and peace about working.  I still think about trying to start a business and I still think the work environment is a weird/unnatural social structure to navigate within but I am feeling better about working, trusting my husband to do some of the things I used to do and just relax in my new role.

This week I was thinking about the word "busy".  I hate this word.  I hate when people give the excuse of "busy" to not do something. I may have blogged about this before because my hate of this word has existed long enough that it may have warranted a post in the past.  However, in my new life I have new thoughts on the word so I am re-visiting the thought.

I must admit that I was seriously considering re-thinking my feelings toward the word busy after I started working.  I thought I was busy when I was at home but now working I was appreciating the word in a whole new light.  NOW I am busy.  Or am I?

Now that I am working I have to "do it all" and since that is impossible I really must be busy.  When I was at home I had all day long to do whatever I wanted and while my days did fill up quickly with parenting and homemaking I had plenty of time to help out with ministries at church, in Jake's class and with John's business, etc.  I kept busy but was I actually busy?

However, I have been releasing so many tasks and emotional distractions from my life now that I practically have nothing to do except work.  So am I really that busy right now?

It really is about a readjustment of priorities.  My family is my priority.  Now that I am working I have to be even more intentional about prioritizing them than when I was at home.  And some days that can look like doing nothing, just spending the evening at home watching tv but being present.  Right now in my "release" stage of life we are all getting used to my being home less and them doing more around the house.  But as this schedule becomes our new normal I am starting to see where I might have a little time for something else in my life.  Not today but definitely in my near future.

So am I really more busy now that I am working?  Well, yes and no.  I don't have nearly as much time in which to accomplish things but that is not to say I have no free time.  I am still have my evenings and weekends almost completely free.

I think people use the excuse of "busy" when what they really mean is "I am not willing to prioritize this into my life".    Busy to me is the word you use when you aren't organized or in control of your schedule and you are overwhelmed by life.  Yes or No is what you say when you understand your priorities, what your schedule looks like and how the requested time commitment will affect that schedule.

So right now I am intentionally in a phase of life where I am saying No.  I am spending my time learning how to fit work into my life while still prioritizing my family and re-defining all our roles in caring for our home and each other.  It is coming together, we are all falling into our new roles and learning to be aware of places we can help.  Some of us are learning this skill better than others (Jake?  Isabelle?  You out there?  Can you give us a hand?) but overall it is coming together nicely.

So as I sit at my desk thinking of the business I would rather be running, the ministry I want to lead or the school field trip I would like to go on I can see the light at the end of this transitional tunnel we are in and know that eventually I will be able to work the word Yes back into my vocabulary.

For now I will continue to say "No" rather than "I'm too busy" because everyone is busy, I am just controlling how I spend my time.

Finding my way toward the end of the tunnel

Yes.  I am still working.  Can you tell by my lack of posts?  My mind was so full of inspiration 6 months ago.  I was wise and deep and growing and learning.  Now my mind just gets through the surface thoughts and survives.  It is all I can do to keep up with the necessities of the day to day of life let alone attempt any new thoughts or tasks.

Which brings me to the main thought I have in my free time:  How to organize my life so I have more free time.

Basically I have come to the conclusion that I cannot leave my entire life on hold until the weekend because that just makes the weekend no fun and then I can't wait to get back to my nice neat organized desk at work where I know what to do and how to do it and at the end of the day I feel like I accomplished something because at home I never feel like I get on top of anything but just keep bailing.  This is not working for me.  I don't want a life where work seems more appealing that being at home.

I have determined to step away from all responsibilities and say NO to all proposed responsibilities that come into my life this year.  I literally had a pencil in my hand at Isabelle's school open house while standing over some sign up sheets and having an argument in my head about why I should or should not write my name down.  Oh how I desperately wanted to help with the monthly art masterpiece program or at least sign up to help the kids off the bus on the first day of school.  But NO! I put the pencil down and walked away.

I did not go to a long term planning meeting at church this weekend but I am sure the church and women's ministry specifically will continue on without me.  I hope.  Yes I believe.  I think I do.  I am pretty sure God will call someone else to step up.  Probably.  Either way, I am not planning anything this year!

I am stepping away from outside responsibilities in my life.

But I still need to clean my house, do the laundry, keep up our checkbook, buy groceries, make meals, snuggle with Isabelle, listen to Jake and spend time with my husband.  And while I can and am sharing some of those responsibilities, the truth is I love doing them and don't want to delegate them completely away.

So this week I picked up 3 books at the library on time management.  Like home organization, time management basically is a one trick pony wrapped in different packages.  Or more clearly, they all say the same thing.  You need to consider the various areas of your life and be present in each of them.  One at a time.  Don't just react to what comes your way but sit down, look at your responsibilities and decide when you will do each task.  Etc, etc.  I summarized them for John over dinner on date night.  He is also struggling with managing all the tasks before him.

But we march forward.

I have decided that I need to nightly update the checkbook so I am not stressed at the end of the week wondering if we still have money.  I am ordering groceries online each week, just the basics but enough so we always have something to eat.  We have discovered if there is food in the house we don't eat out even if I haven't planned a specific meal.  Interesting. We have talked to Jake about adding some activities in his life so he isn't spending all day hanging out at home which causes me mental stress.  And I continue to remind myself to prioritize exercise and good food choices which so significantly improves my health, energy levels and mental state.  And I ordered some new shoes online which if they fit may revolutionize my life.

I am still working on how to make the bathrooms and floors magically clean themselves. And I have no idea when I am going to buy fall clothes as the season changes or how I am going to Christmas shop.  But I am seeing tiny lights at the end of the tunnel and believe that before long my weekends will belong to me and I will be thrilled to spend them with family, friends or doing other social activities without any concerns about the tasks that await me at home.

Until then I give myself grace.

Solid Yellow Lines

In the book "Body by God" the author not only talks about fitness and nutrition but also stress and time management because he feels to have the body God created us to have we must address all aspects of the body and what affects it.

One concept he talks about is drawing "solid yellow lines", like on a road, around various aspects of our life.  Priorities.  So, for instance, he has his quiet time in the morning and no matter what he doesn't see patients, check email or play with his kids during that time.  That is his time with God.  But the same is true of the time he spends with patients, family or writing.

Now I Personally feel a little stifled by this idea and like the guy must be a little high strung type A personality.  That is serious structure.   But I do have a girlfriend who is really good at this type of thing and I have experienced this structure as I have viewed her life.  She is always aware of keeping a balance taking time with each child regularly, managing the home efficiently and carving out time for work and personal indulgences without feeling guilt because she knows her priorities are not being neglected.

It would be easy for me to dismiss my girlfriend as a nutty type A as well but I can't help wonder if there isn't something to this idea worth exploring in my own life now that I am working.

In some ways being at home creates its own challenges with keeping priorities.  You have so much unstructured time you think you can get it all done with no planning.  Yet you can be home with your kids all day and never really spend time with them, never get around to cleaning or making dinner or organizing, or...There is always something ready and waiting to pull you away from responsibilities and skew priorities.

For me, as I have observed this practice in my girlfriend over the years, what I see is an ability to enjoy each task in her life without saying any, "I should be...".  She knows she will be spending the evening doing certain activities with her daughter, for instance, so she is free to spend the afternoon working on her own projects without any guilt.  She knows when her house will be cleaned and what is for dinner so she can totally focus on the task before her.  Totally present in each moment of her life.

That is the aspect of drawing lines around tasks that I want to experience.

So that is what I am working on figuring out and organizing this week. Since I am not particularly type A in my approach to life I won't be creating a permanent structure but more of a loose concept in which we as a family are aware of the priorities and look to see they are happening each week in some way.  And with that confidence I can be fully involved in my life and relationships and not worry about what is falling through the cracks.

It is slowing coming together at our house.

Time Management

I have spent a fair amount of time sitting on the computer this week. It causes me to ask the question, could I have better used that time? What else could I have been doing?

• Begin making Christmas gifts rather than waiting until the last minute.
• Planning menus for grocery shopping so that I don't have to call my husband to pick up dinner.
• Playing dolls with Isabelle. Ok I wouldn't actually do this one.
• Help Isabelle memorize her bible verse for Sunday School.
• Organizing the pantry by food group. OR I could be grouping my cans by the recipes I want to make so they are all together when I want to cook.
• Alphabetize the videos and dvd's
• Put books in order based on the dewey decimal system
• Research the dewey decimal system so I knew where my books went
• Actually clean my house rather than waving the illusion of clean wand over it.
• Actually go for a run rather than just talking and reading about running.
• Vacuum the crushed tortilla chips out of my van before winter arrives.
• Paint over the wall art in the living room
• Find out what I am doing when Isabelle does wall and body art.

Hmm. Nope there doesn't seem to be anything better to do with my time.