It’s easy for me to keep adding more and more to my schedule. I usually think a class is too good to pass up or sure, I’ll help in the classroom for an hour. Sometimes I forget that I have time or energy limitations.
“When you add something new to your life, do you subtract something else? Or do you keeping adding and adding and adding until you feel constantly overwhelmed?”
Uh… guilty as charged! One of the Weekly Well Mindfulist features in August was written by writer and mindfulness-based stress reduction teacher Sandra Pawula, about how it so happens that new activities sneak into your day. You might think this opportunity is just too good to pass up or you tell yourself it won’t take much time.
Her article, Embrace Simplicity and Ease Through the Art of Subtraction, spoke to me, especially since I read it right after I wrote last week about our addiction to busyness.
“But instead of subtracting another activity in order to stay in balance,” Sandra says, “you just pile on new ones, which naturally leads to tension, overload, and overwhelm.”
It’s probably natural for a curious and enthusiastic person like me to want to do so much. There are so so many classes and books and experiences to learn from! Yet rushing from one thing to another and feeling like I can’t catch my breath… it’s not so much how I want my days to be. I have felt like I’m running too fast and don’t even have time to read my email. I’m doing two things at once constantly and I don’t like it.
I subtracted 1 big thing… teaching religious school. But I added 4 other things. The equation doesn’t exactly balance. Thinking about it for a few days, I do not think I’m keeping busy to avoid myself or something else. I agreed to serve on some school and community organization boards because I genuinely care about their purpose and I very much want to be part of my community. I want to meet people too. I hope that as long as I try to keep my goals in mind when deciding what to attend and how to contribute, I will keep my head and stay sane.
Leo Babauta writes in this Zen Habits post that “having ‘not enough time’ is just a feeling — we all have the same amount of time, but we often fill up the container of our days with too much stuff. The problem is having too much stuff to fit into a small container (24 hours). If we look at task management and time management as simply a container organization problem, it becomes simpler. How do we fit all of the stuff we have to do into our small container? By simplifying. And letting go.” I like that he says we should focus on the task that will have the most impact and do that. Also limiting ourselves to three main tasks per day… I have been doing that for a week now and it’s been successful.
Aha moment here: “Your frustration comes from an ideal that you should be able to do it all, that you should be able to do everything on your list.” Let this moment be ideal and let the rest go. Love that!
Leo also had an excellent post yesterday (honestly, they ALL are) called “How Not to Do It All.” In it, he writes:
“Be ruthless. You need to filter out the things trying to overwhelm your life. More things try to get into your attention bandwidth than you can possibly handle. So filter them out: say no to most requests, don’t make it your job to respond to everything, don’t just read everything possible, don’t have the firehose of social media always on, turn off your phone for awhile. Each day, take a step back and think about what you want to fit in it.”
It is so hard to say no! Do any of you struggle with this?
Sticking to three main tasks a day sounds helpful–if the rest of the world will cooperate.
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Yes, I used to be so overwhelmed that I was only sleeping 3-4 hours a day. Then I realized I had to let go of some activities that I belonged to. Then I found I was stacking up my ‘todo’ list with too many projects to be completed until someone taught me the 3 things on my list idea. Now, even if I have more than 3 things on my ‘todo’ list for the day, I feel satisfied if I completed 3 of them. What a change that has made for me!
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Totally. Letting projects languish on the “someday” list has got to be enough for now, as hard as it is. There’s just too much!
Hi Naomi,
I am working on a new challenge. I have decided that I am not going to talk anymore about how busy I am. I have decided to not give it a voice. It has been very interesting to notice how frequently I go to these words! My thinking is that, in NOT talking about it, I will not reinforce the feelings associated with it. Try it out if you like! See how it feels. I have not been doing it long enough to tell you if it works, but I can tell you that it is rather eye opening!
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Good! I agree that we manifest what we think about so let’s not think about the negative.
ummm…YES! I struggle with saying yes all too often. I love what you said about staying alignment with your purpose when it comes to what you have on your to-do list. Over this past year, I’ve really focused on being sure to only commit to things that were part of my purpose and for my reason for living. All too often I used to say yes in the hopes that someone would like me or want to be my friend. Not anymore….I only have things on my daily list that are true to me.
It’s so hard!! It’s like a day is a container and we can only fill it with so much. No sense wishing for a bigger bowl, right?
I used to keep on adding things, but now I’m getting better and better at substraction. Sometimes I get a bit too good at it – I’ve just realised that I’ve somehow managed to substraction blogging without meaning to… But I’ll get back into it.
Tat recently posted…Playtime for grownups: the many ways play can make your life super awesome
🙂 Well don’t deny all of us your wonderfulness!
I sometimes struggle with overcommitment…and I don’t have a hard time saying, “no.” I think, as you mentioned, there’s so much I’m curious about. It’s like being a toddler who doesn’t want to miss a minute – so I end up being stressed, overtired and really, just need a nap! I try to keep it simple and always remember the saying, “He who chases two rabbits, catches neither one.”
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Yes, I like that. If we think of ourself as a toddler… who are we that we need to do it all?
Good timing on this post, Naomi. Yesterday I somewhat spontaneously started a long-term project that will be awesome and is in-line with where I’m heading … but I’m struggling with finding an open time on my calendar for this new project, not to mention balancing my relationships with friends and family. I am on two low-key committees that can be subtractions, but one I’m committed to until February. This little discussion is pushing me toward stepping away from the other low-key committee and letting that project unfold as it will. Thanks for the links and topic for pondering.
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Sometimes I can recognize that I don’t have the time to take something on. Most of the time, though, it sounds so great that I just assume I can do it. I used to be ok with this strategy until I became a mom and realized that sleep is crucial to mental functioning. I was stunned to learn that I can’t fit in everything I want to. Good for you for looking for things you can let go of. 🙂
Goodness. I struggle with this too. I recently thought up a new fabulous project and dove in headfirst, not realizing that I was basically signing myself up for a major job for the next several months, without deleting anything else. So some of my other commitments have suffered. In the meantime, I’ve been tempted to join in this or that or the other thing in the community, wanting to volunteer hither and thither when I barely have the time/energy (not always an equal balance there) to complete the aforementioned fabulous project. Aargh!
I recently ran across a new planning tool online (yes, I’m kind of in love with planning tools, but the torrid affairs never last long). It’s called the Emergent Task Planner. While I haven’t yet had a hot date with this planner, I swooned when I saw one of its features: You’re only allowed to list three major tasks for the day. There’s room for more, of course, as all of us have days that go kablooie, but just before you list those extras, there’s a little reminder, something along the lines of “Seriously?”
One of these days, when I dig myself out of this hole of my own making, I’m going to print out one of these planners for real and discover the magic we can make together.
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I found a great planner posted by someone in Instagram, and I ordered it… now I’ve forgotten what it is but I’m hoping it gets here soon! At least we are making progress by noticing that we dive into something only to lose touch with something else. And yes, 3 tasks a day yesterday was actually too much. Ah well!
I certainly struggle with the feeling that I have not accomplished enough, not kept everything clean, not done everything that I should do. I have a lot more free time, probably because working is easier than being a parent. It’s obviously smart to realize that your time is finite and you need to be selective about how you fill it. I think I have a similar struggle with having unrealistic ideals that I cannot possibly live up to. I don’t expect perfectly compassionate behavior from anyone else I know, and I ought to stop expecting it from myself.
Yep, but we all have limited time. I think we need to be much more kind to ourselves too.