Hello EducatorDrMom community, I’m back! I’ve really missed writing articles on my blog and sharing content on my YouTube channel BUT the pause that I took for 2018 was a vital decision that reaped tremendous benefits for me personally. This article is dedicated to emphasizing the importance of unapologetically pressing the pause button in your life when necessary. This is one of those essential life lessons that I want to teach my children. 

I think so often we can get so bombarded with the expectations and agendas that others have for us, that we lose focus of the things that are most important to us personally. As a parent and spouse, I know that is a reality for many! At the onset of 2018, I was faced with the potential of falling into that trap but thankfully I recognized it right away and made some intentional changes to recalibrate and balance the many roles, responsibilities, and goals that were currently a part of my existence. These changes caused some major shifts in my day-to-day life that were critical in order to be able to adjust to the changes successfully without losing the quality of life in other areas of my life. 

These changes and adjustments required me to say no to some things and some people, as well as get rid of non-essential things in my life that took up valuable time, which all required a lot of discipline, focus, and prayer. Although it wasn’t a perfect year, I did accomplish most of my goals and I was able to balance working a full-time faculty position with a University (working from home), homeschooling, writing a book, family time, husband/wife time, cooking healthy meals, “me time” to focus on my health and wellness, and most importantly, time for daily prayer and meditation. How I do all of this still baffles me when I think about it. Somehow I still get enough sleep at night, I work when my children sleep so that I can still have focused time with them each day, and I’m able to eat healthy by preparing our own meals throughout the week. 

It occurred to me that we are all given the same 24-hours in a day but somehow, some people are able to accomplish so much more in their day than others. I concluded that time management is an essential ingredient that makes the difference. So, if you are struggling to find more time for yourself and your goals or you are overwhelmed by all that you have on your daily to-do list, then here are some steps to take to recalibrate and balance: 

1.    Take inventory of how you spend your time. For one full day, document how you are spending your time from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep. I know this may seem tedious but it’s essential to write everything down, which includes your downtime: ie. watching TV, scrolling social media, texting, talking on the phone, driving to and from work, etc. 

2.    Decide what is non-essential and eliminate it from your daily routine/schedule. Once you take inventory of your time, if you discover that social media takes up a lot of your time or taking work home takes up your personal evening time, then you have to make a conscious effort to redefine what those moments look like. Maybe you work during your lunch hour or go to work an hour early to get through that extra work so you can make space in your evening for working on your personal goals or relaxing properly. Or, maybe you decide to not get on social media until the end of the day after you have accomplished all of your professional and personal goals. Maybe you go to bed an hour earlier, so you can get up early to have time for yourself or workout. The way that we each eliminate “time-stealers” will be different. BUT the one consistent thing will be sacrifice. I can assure you that this step will require sacrifice! In order for me to be able to work from home, I have to get up at 3 am a few days a week so that I can protect the time throughout the day with my children. This sacrifice requires me to go to bed early 3-nights a week so that I’m not working sleep deprived, but the pay off is worth it! I get half of my workload done before my family awakes in the morning, which gives me free time throughout the day to attend to my children and spend quality time with them. 

3.    You must be disciplined. This step may require an accountability partner or some form of personal accountability to help you get into a new habit and break the old one. For example, I use a time monitoring feature on my phone to help me monitor the amount of time I spend on social media. I set my phone for 30minutes each day and when I am approaching 30 minutes, my phone warns me and then when I hit 30 minutes it disables all of my social media apps. Another example for me is with working out, I have a friend check-in with me M-F to make sure that I have worked out each day. This keeps me accountable and helps me not to skip days. You will have to put some extra effort into this step! It’s really hard to get out of a routine that you have been accustomed to for a long time but the reward will be greater later. 

Application: Do you need to press the pause button in some area of your life. Sometimes we unknowingly overextend ourselves and end up burned out. Take a moment to reflect on where you need to recalibrate or gain balance in your life, and then take the identified three steps as a starting point get where you want to be. 

Remember, I never try to make my experiences or knowledge a principle or standard for others but I share my experiences and knowledge with others hoping that through sharing, I might positively impact, inspire & empower someone else’s life. – Jill