I’ve got a question for you: What would you like to press delete on right now?
Go on, tell me about it.
- Is it a certain sports practice that’s been driving you nuts? (It’s at the most inconvenient time possible to get your kids fed.)
- Maybe a music lesson teacher who rubs you wrong, but you don’t know of anyone else to teach that instrument? (What if I ruined my daughter’s success as a flautist because of a mere personality conflict?)
- Perhaps one of your church volunteer activities that’s gotten to be more and more an exercise in willpower just to show up? (They said they really needed you, but you could really use some downtime, too – if nothing else, to clean the kitchen!)
Whatever it is, we’re going to talk about some strategies for getting out of your can-do-but-hate obligations.
Because newsflash, it’s really important to your overall life happiness to have as few of these as possible.
Let’s get started.
Delete vs. manage your time better
This might be unpopular, but I don’t care: Delete, delete, delete from your calendar.
Look, if your calendar’s going crazy with appointments and Gmail’s beeping at you every other hour for something you missed, your head is going to be in a bad place. You’re already behind when you’re trying to keep up with that kind of a schedule.
Instead, I want you to slow down to where you could get everything done even on a bad day.
You heard me – not an “I can fit this all in if the kids behave today” – on an actual no energy, the baby didn’t sleep well (so you didn’t either), the kids had a major discipline incident day.
Your regular needs to be the minimum achievable for your energy state. Not an “if everything goes perfectly” plan for the most productive day ever – and have that be your standard for ordinary days.
It just can’t happen.
Get realistic about the state of your life. Are you getting up at night with babies? Regularly dealing with blow-outs and outfit changes? Then I want you to put even less on your plate.
Got older elementary-schoolers, maybe even a preteen or two? Then sure, you can lean on them to switch the laundry for you while you take care of the baby’s spit-up.
But when you’re on your own? Make sure you can actually get everything done, please – I don’t want you turning into a frazzled mess just on the day-to-day stuff.
Get off vs. run faster
Similarly, you’ll never get on top of the #momlife hamster wheel by taking a class on running faster, how to multitask hamster wheels + food prepping, or mental strategies to slow the world down.
Nuh-uh. You need to step off the wheel. Like now.
Don’t try to fit more into the day; delete something (multiple somethings) from your day.
Don’t try to fit more into the day; delete something from your day.
You’re running crazy? Well, how would taking out one errand, one cleaning job, and one food prep task make you feel?
Is your day sounding manageable yet? Or do we need to chop some more? Snooze the house project planning, delete the “should read but don’t want to” book from your Kindle, and push off the closet organizing to another day.
You’ll live – and so will your closets.
It’s far more crucial that you have a good mindset as you go about your day, not a self-fulfilling, self-defeatist one.
Quit vs. get more productive
Lastly, the only way to fix “doing too much” syndrome is to stop doing a few of those things!
It’s just common sense.
Maybe you’re almost there – you just need more breathing time between appointments and outings.
Perhaps one night a week is double-booked, to the point where you almost don’t have time for supper – but if you shifted just one thing off that day (laundry, outing, crock pot meal?), you’d have space to handle it.
Great – find the day of the week that can take that other chore, task, or outing, and rewrite your calendar/planner/notes app.
See what you can rearrange this week, of your ordinary weekly to-do’s and appointments, to flow more in tune with your own energy that day (or afternoon or evening).
Are you always too rushed to get the towels in the dryer on Tuesdays? What if you did them on Thursday? Just play around with it and see.
The solution will present itself, even if you have to try a few iterations first.
You can do this.
As you reflect back on your week, or mull over the week ahead, where are you seeing the time-and-energy bottlenecks?
Where do you need to press the delete button?
Give yourself the gift of grace and freedom and do it. Hit delete and take a deep breath. Savor the feeling of not having to do it anymore.
Now go live your life with your delete button superpower ready to hand.
What three things do you need to delete most this week?
