Have you ever felt like your life is out of whack? You are on a hamster wheel out of control. You’re not juggling two balls in the air; you’re juggling 22. I’ve been there myself.
When did your life begin to look so different? When did my life begin to look so different? When did we become that frenzied student or mom or dad? We keep adding responsibilities to our already full plate, and we don’t stop to question 0r evaluate what’s on that plate. It’s like when we go to a family reunion or a Super Bowl party and we pile all kinds of comfort food to our plate because they look so good, but we never think about how bad we’re going to feel afterward. We keep adding responsibilities, but we don’t take any away. The reality is less of some things will lead to more of what we really want.
The reality is less of some things will lead to more of what we really want. Click To TweetSay yes to what we really want
When we say yes to something we are saying no at the same time. We rush, empty and depleted when we continue to add to our plate. When we surrender to the enormity of everyday life, then we forfeit joy, peace, happiness and contentment. We even forget gratitude because we are so overwhelmed that we forget to be grateful.
Society says that it is the norm. That is just how we do it. That kind of mentality creeps in and we just go with the flow, but our lives are not meant to be so full, to include so much. Reality is that less of certain things can lead to more of what we really want, but society says more things are going to lead to what we really want. The reality is less of things will lead to more of what we really want. \We need to questions ourselves. We need to get curious about certain things Why do we want more and more? You and I can say no. Tell a toddler it is time to go to bed. No. Tell a toddler it is time to leave the store. No. We used to say no quite often, but we don’t say no every often anymore.
Say no to…
Social media: Do we really need all the social media and be connected to everything? If you have to use it for business, maybe you can manage it differently. Maybe you can turn off notifications or schedule your social media posts so you aren’t on it every day. The reality is we don’t need social media. It can make our lives chaotic and crowd out other things in our lives.
Too many extracurricular activities for our kids: We can say no to a bazillion extracurricular activities especially that our kids are in. I do believe that sports are fantastic for kids. My own kids were in sports. It keeps them out of trouble, they learn to play as a team and listen to authority. They have to learn to lose. All of those things are awesome, but when you said that yes to multiple extracurricular activities aren’t you saying no to some other great activities that your family can do?
Being on too many committees: Someone told me when you step down from a position you are letting someone else be blessed by that same position. It’s true. Sometimes we don’t want to say no because we feel like we’re going to be losing out.
Clutter: You can’t say no to clutter in your home with dozens of things from Hobby Lobby, When we actually say less to some things, we can say more to other things. Cluttering our home takes us away from the things that we truly need.
We adopt the mantra of Larry the Cable Guy “Get’er done” or Rosie the Riveter. “We can do it.” We can adopt that mantra and think we are Wonderwoman.
Or…
We can breathe
We can believe we were meant for more.
We can choose a life of less.
We can say no to the world dictating to us what we should do or look like.
Here’s a great activity. Draw a stick figure of yourself on a piece of paper. Get two different colors of pencils or pens. With one color, write the things that drain you first: maybe it is the sports that you have to attend, your job, social media, toxic friendships, finances or your in-laws. Draw arrows out from your stick figure. What is out of whack or draining you? What is creating chaos?
The second thing you can do is to begin drawing arrows in with another colored pen or pencil of all the things that feed you: maybe it is taking a walk, reading a book, blogging, traveling, your friends, your husband or your family. Look at your drawing, What are the things that are draining you? Do they outnumber the things that are feeding you? Begin cutting things out that drain you.
Remember that slight shifts can make a big change. In the book “When Less Becomes More” the author Emily Ley writes, “What if the scenic route, the route with more twists and turns and time, is actually sometimes the better option?”
If you need some encouragement every now and then and you are feeling exhausted, let me send you some free video affirmations. It is a gift from me to you.
