Are you over committing yourself, too?
Let's talk about what this looks like, and how it affects our lives and relationships.
If you feel like your life is in perfect balance feel free to skip this blog and find one of the several blogs that may be relatable to you!
Fact of the matter is, over commitment looks different for us all and in the world we live in today, so easy to do. All of our lives and journeys are different. How do we find more balance in our lives, take care of our family, take care of our health, make enough money to provide even the basics, be a good friend, family member (as many family member roles as you may play, daughter, granddaughter, mother, sister, etc) By the end of the day you may just want to tuck your face in your pillow and scream because how are we supposed to do we do it ALL?!?! How do we manage when all of the things and people around us are crying out and demanding our time and energy?
Why do we over commit ourselves, and how we can we stop doing that?!
I am still trying to figure it out... what I keep coming back to is "How can I prioritize all of this when it all seems like a priority?" What I do know is that if I can't take care of myself then I can't take care of anything or anybody else. So I have to be my number one priority. After that is when I start getting confused. My family, and my job... my job is to help me support my family, but my job has demands of its own... in turn may take away from my family. Side jobs, commitments with friends and family, etc etc. I just start juggling as much as I can to the best of my ability until... BURNOUT! I then want to shut down, crawl under the covers, and hibernate. Then I am in a world of trouble because NOTHING is getting done at this point!
I then sacrifice myself as the priority to be able to complete or get something else done... but then my own health starts to fade into the distance and suffer. It's this cycle of where do I need to be and what do I need to be doing to keep all of the juggling pins in the air so they don't come crashing down? Does this sound familiar to you?
At the end of the day, we need to reality check our expectations with ourselves of all that we have on our plate. This will look different in different seasons of our lives, and also different than other peoples' list of priorities and expectations.
Let's start with pen and paper. Jot down the things that mean the most to us, the things that are on our plate currently, and after we have recognized the amount of time in one day vs what is on our list, let's start eliminating things that we simply don't have time for. Is there a chance you may upset someone? Sure! Is it hard at times to compare our list to other's list? Absolutely. Stay focused, this is our own list and our own life. Doing what's best for you and your life looks different than what's best for someone else's life. Learning how to be true to yourself and sticking to what you align with for the healthiest life you can provide for yourself and your family is going to be HARD. You will upset others along the way, people will not always understand... you will have moments where you think, "Well she's doing it, why cant I?"
This is YOUR life to live and you have ONLY ONE....
So, let's get to it. Let's be an advocate for our own time and the way we spend it. Let's figure this out together, but for ourselves. Let's come back to the things that matter to us most, be real with our expectations, and figure out what has to give, because we can't do it all.
<3, XO,
Mak