#218. 3 Tips to Help You Find Time for What Matters50 Amazing Moms With Dr. Christiana Stephen

Hi Moms,

I hope you enjoyed my last read. If you’ve been anything like me this week, you feel as though the days, the week, the whole month has flown by! This got me thinking about what can realistically be achieved in a month.

A little piece of advice? When it comes down to it, what we can achieve in a month is actually a lot less than we think!

Did you know that we overestimate what we can achieve in a year but completely underestimate what we can achieve in 5 years?

Reminding myself of this at times during the last month has allowed me to make time for the important things in my life, instead of overthinking the ‘to do’ list.

We’re all busy in our own unique ways, some of us are full time parents, others full time workers – some are both! Yet, we all have the same bad habit that sneaks up on us again, and again. when we get too busy, too tired, too overwhelmed, and that is the habit of overlooking the things that are most important to us.

Whether this be our family, our passions, our religion, our ‘me-time’, all of these seem to take a back bench when life becomes too demanding, and with the loss of this we tend to loose ourselves; our ‘why’ as I like to put it.

I call it our ‘why’ because we work, we grind, we study to live – and to live well – not the other way around. All these things should open doors, unleash opportunities and present us with possibilities, not tire us down so that we cannot pursue our ‘why’.

So here is my first tip:

1. Define your ‘why’

If you are able to do this, it will act as a continuous reminder of what is really important to you.

Perhaps you work hard to allow for a better life for your family?

Then ask yourself, is overworking yourself benefiting your family’s lives? Probably not! What will benefit your family is being able to come home from work, stepping away from the emails, turning off the work phone and being in the present; enjoying conversation over dinner, sharing a movie.

Repeat after me, ‘Quality time results in a better quality of life’.

Here are a few questions you can ask yourself to find your why:

Why do I do this?
Why am I stressed now?
What brings me happiness?
When do I feel most relaxed?
What do I value most in life?

2. Learn to accept ‘good enough’

Now, I appreciate this can sound kind of contradictive, especially coming from me! This was, and still is, the hardest thing to learn and implement in my life; I grew up as an overachiever, perfect was never enough, and still to this day I sometimes overcompensate.

The way to master this tip is to resort back to ‘why’, and identify how you can satisfy this on a daily, weekly and monthly basis – then anything else is not crucial and can be completed and left at ‘good enough’.

So an example:

Referring back to our ‘why’ we explored earlier, of wanting a better life for our families.

To meet this ‘why’, or achieve this goal, we may set out our daily musts as:

Eating together
Communicating with one another
Praying together

Weekly may look like:

Watching a movie together
Going on a walk with one another
Going to church as a family

Monthly may look like:

Visiting external family
Having a games night

These are the things that we would prioritize, everything else can take a ‘good enough’ approach.

3. Fuel with enthusiasm

This brings me nicely onto my next point. If you are enthusiastic about your ‘why’, if it is an innate passion, and want in your life then it will come naturally. Suddenly finding time for the things that are important to you will come easier, because you are educated on what those things are and you are truly looking forward to them taking place.

Through adopting that mindset we allow for opportunities to arise, because we are potentially more motivated to achieve our task at hand so that we can find time for our ‘why’ – whatever this may be.

Final thoughts

So I want you to go into the new week and upcoming month with a clear depiction of your ‘why’ and hold onto this tightly throughout the month of May, throughout the rest of the year, and throughout the rest of your life.

I would love to know about your why in the comments below, share your thoughts, opinions and habits you’ll be adopting to find time for what really matters.