Katherine - posted on 04/28/2012 ( 13 moms have responded )
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I had really ambitious plans for tonight:
Get home from work (around 6pm).
Do homework with kiddo.
Practice piano with kiddo.
Bedtime stuff and then read a chapter of Harry Potter with kiddo (we just started the first book).
Make dinner for tomorrow night.
Call mom.
Catch up on work stuff.
Get stuff organized for tomorrow.
Write this blog post.
Do yoga.
Read (currently making my way through the Steve Jobs biography, although very slowly).
Get to bed by 10pm.
Ha! I hope you’re laughing because seeing all my plans written out here makes me laugh with the realization that I was kidding myself thinking I can do all that and get to bed by 10pm (an epically early time for me, mind you.)
I’m terrible about making insanely unrealistic to-do lists. In fact, as I started writing this post I glanced at my to-do list sitting next to me and it’s not a list that I could have possibly accomplished in one day. Yet when I wrote it this morning that’s what I was aiming to do. And the downside is that now I feel like I failed when in fact, I wasn’t going to ever succeed in the first place.
I know we hear this advice all the time but I’m going to repeat it again and try to listen myself this time:
Sometimes you just have to do less.
Also known as: Give yourself a break. Realize you’re human. There are only 24 hours in a day. You can’t do it all. (Shall I keep going?)
So here goes my attempt to practice what I preach. A half hour of yoga would be really beneficial right now, especially because I skipped my regular yoga yesterday and my body is stiff and my mind is racing. But I am tired and I am deciding that resting (and attempting to get to bed at a reasonable hour) is more important so I am going to skip it. I’m also going to put this computer away as soon as I finish this post and not catch up on work. I might hate myself tomorrow morning but I also know that I would be horribly inefficient if I tried to be productive now and have a better shot at plowing through the 20 must-reply emails first thing in the am. And the whole getting organized thing? I’m going to ask my husband to check kiddo’s dance bag stuff (yes, going to ask for help, did you hear that novel idea?) and trust that we’ll figure out the rest in the morning.
In other words, I am going to choose to do less, to not attempt to get everything on my mental to-do list accomplished and to get some rest instead. A day at a spa would be perfect, but getting to bed when I need it because I’m exhausted is close second.
Do you write unrealistic to-do lists or are you pretty good at not trying to be a constant to-do overachiever?
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