“Just Enough Hours “. . . . . what does that mean? What was I thinking?
I moved over to this blog coming off of a LONG period, maybe a lifetime, of thinking I could do it all. No, scratch that. I didn’t really think (as in believe) I could do it all, I just DID a lot.
Because I ‘had’ to. And no, I don’t really qualify the ‘had’. I really sort of did have to. No, scratch that. I didn’t have to.
Where, let’s start again – Yes, there were a lot of things I needed to do. (HAD to do) (as a single mom, an employee, etc)
But there were a lot of things I was choosing to do.
In any event, I would hear people say ‘there aren’t enough hours in the day’ and I was guilty of saying that too, but then I got to thinking about how much I already do, and what if there were MORE than 24 hours in a day….can you imagine? Could I imagine? NO! I’d be dead from all the ‘doing’.
so I came to believe that really we have JUST enough hours in each day. God set the light and dark for just the right amount of time. 🙂
How we choose to spend that time is up to us.
More recently I got to thinking about how people used to ask all the time – how do you do it all? Or they would say “wow, I don’t know how you do it all”. And either way it was phrased, I’d honestly try to tell them that I really wasn’t do it all WELL . Yes, I was doing a lot of things, had a lot of irons in the fire — but so much of it was only getting a tiny bit of me. And I finally hit a breaking point. Not really in terms of stress or anxiety or like I had a nervous break down. I just sort of started to think about my time and again thought about the ‘just enough hours’ and this time from the standpoint of – there are JUST so many hours in the day — a finite number – how am I spending them?
And it’s not just about time management. It’s larger than that. It’s about life management.
How am I valuing my time but more than that how am I valuing my life and the people in it. . . . .
I came across this quote a while back (erroneously attributed to Meryl Streep) and although I don’t agree with every word and I realize that it’s not a blanket to cover every situation (for instance, I do believe in loving others even if they don’t love me and I am big on smiling at EVERY one….) but overall, this struck a chord in me.
So WOW, that’s a mouthful.  And while I do many of these things I am much more conscious these days of what I ‘bring in’ in addition to what I’m putting out.
I had been struggling for a couple of years with leaving some things behind. Letting go of things and people who I had chosen to make a part of my life that really weren’t aligning with my core values or what I wanted to surround myself with.  And because of that dichotomy, it wasn’t healthy for me. The truth is, I should have let go a lot sooner. It would have been easier, more seamless, less painful. . . . . .
It has become less about managing time, using the hours and more about aligning it all with my values – who I am and what’s truly important to me.
Life is short and unpredictable and tomorrow is not guaranteed to anyone.
Not only are there ‘just enough hours’ in a day but there are only so many hours in a life.
Is how you are choosing to use your hours in alignment with what you think and believe and what from life? Â Time management is really life management. Shouldn’t it all align?
Share your thoughts below!