More time will not solve your problems
Everyone is feeling a scarcity of time, and there are two big reasons.
One, there’s a lot of messaging about all the things that make an ideal life. These are both explicit and implicit, and they’re everywhere.
Explicitly, I’m told to have a robust morning routine.
Implicitly, I’m told to carve out the time to handle something important.
All this messaging comes coupled with a hidden expectation of female perfectionism.
The second reason you point to wanting time is that women do carry a lot. In all aspects of our lives. It’s the social gatherings and nurturing activities for members on your team at work. It’s the extra, often thankless projects picked up. It’s all the volunteer roles inside and outside of your organization. It’s the extra responsibility around the house. It’s remembering spirit week at your kids’ schools and planning in advance of each day’s outfits.
If your week was like mine, it’s sitting on hold for hours to do nothing more than schedule appointments.
Years ago I remember investigating my own time scarcity. A coach had suggested I take inventory of all the things I thought I should be able to do in a single day. What unfolded was an impossible list. The result literally made me laugh out loud. Until I saw it in front of me on my legal pad, I hadn't realized the unrealistic expectations I'd held for myself. And that was before I had a kid. Or owned a home. Or Inside Out had become what it is today.
When either (or both) of those realities buries you, it's easy to fantasize about life with more time. And it's normal to wander into that fantasy. Time becomes the predominant issue.
More time isn’t the answer
A recent session with a client shocked my longing for time. Time was something she had. She was winding down a yearlong sabbatical. She’d given herself permission to reset her career and take space.
Yet, she had similar struggles to so many of the women we hear from who don’t have time. This client, with all of her time, felt like she hadn’t moved anything meaningful forward. She’d decided she needed time and space, but she never sat down to ask herself what that would be in service of. The result was feeling like she had nothing to show for her year off.
It made me stop and think: She had time, but still felt like she’d done a lot that led nowhere.
The real answer to your time problem
Time isn’t what you need. You need intention and focus. And to relax the expectations you hold for yourself. (It'd be nice for society to relax their expectations too. Unfortunately that's not in your control.)
An important set of questions can both free up some of your time AND make better use of the time you do have.
Start with: What is most important to you?
The key here is to make this list very small. For me this list includes expanding Inside Out's reach and supporting my son to feel loved.
Once you know what's most important, ask yourself:
What is most aligned to that?
What are you willing to say no to because it doesn’t address that?
What do you need to turn toward to create that?
Invite in the gentleness
To ease up on perfectionism, create a list of the things you do. Day to day, it can feel like nothing. And the noise of the things we didn’t do or didn’t get to is loud. Turning down the volume on those things is hard (hello pervasive messaging).
Instead, turn up the volume on what you have spent your precious resources doing. Write it down. Share it with a trusted source. Acknowledge your brilliant use of your precious time.
Call for Reflection
What is most important to you? If you made that your primary focus, how would you adjust the way you spend your time?
Shine on,
Alicia