Saturday, December 26, 2009

The More and Less of 2010

As I always do this time of year, once the excess of Christmas Day is behind me, I have been reflecting on the new year and the hope for change it brings. Last year I had such high hopes for where I'd be at this point this year and I am not entirely sure what went wrong. I have some legitimate reasons, some really good excuses and many more lame ones. The question then is what to do about them. I realize that I have to narrow down my focus and my goals. I can't be every kind of mom, the completely dedicated employee and the fabulous homemaker that I sometimes pretend I can be. Sure I can be any number of those on any given day, but I can't be all of them all of the time. It's time to really rethink the everywoman thing I have going on.

This led me to wonder what I want more of and what I want less of. I want less running around, stress, exhaustion and frustration. I want more health and energy, quality time with Nathan, more productive time spent. I want to spend more time with my husband enjoying life and less time trying to catch up. That was the easy part. How do I achieve this? How do I meet these goals? And what specific things are involved?

Here's my preliminary list, in no particular order:
1. Less take out = more healthy. It also means more meal planning, cooking, cleaning, food shopping, but with practice and consistency I know I can make better use of time already spent doing those things.

2. Less time on frivilous pursuits. It's ok to zone out on Facebook every now and again, but certainly less status updates, less checking to see if anyone cares about my status updates and less wondering what everyone else is doing. Also less time needs to be spent on other borderline interests (paid surveys, reading blogs and magazines I don't love, etc.).

3. Less excuses for not excersizing and more time finding ways to squeeze it in. This is a necessary move for so many reasons.

4. More organization. I need to put stuff where it goes and find places for things that don't have one. Part of this is also continued downsizing. I have too much stuff. I am hopeful that a move to a new house will really help push this along.

5. More quality time with Nathan. Less TV for him. More planned activities, crafts, learning etc. I'm not going to teach him a new language or anything, but I'm not his babysitter, I'm his mother.

Overall, I need to spend less time and energy on things I can't control and worry about what I can. I need to make good use of my time. I have the sneaking suspicion that if I spend less time wasting time and more time doing things that matter, I'll find I have a lot more time to spend.

Here's to hoping for a better 2010.