“I’m just so busy.”
How often do you hear that these days, usually with an exacerbated tone?
I’ve said those words many times myself.
We’re all busy. And I’m not just referring to adults. Kids are busy as well and they grow-up to be even busier adults.
Back in my day – the 1980s – life wasn’t so busy, and I was oblivious to how busy my future was going to be.
I spent my summers riding my bike, watching videos on MTV, listening to the radio, and spending time with friends for hours at a time. Eventually I worked during the summer months but I still had plenty of free time to kick back and dream or enjoy life. Despite my spotty track record for keeping an eye on my little sister – a task bequeathed to me as the oldest of three kids – I managed to land a few regular babysitting gigs.
During each school year I made the honor roll, and in college I chose a double major and a minor, because majoring in one area of study wasn’t enough.
Somehow I managed it all with ease and flow… except during those last minute cram sessions before finals. Those were stressful times. But I graduated college prepared to work full-time and still enjoy life.
I hit the ground running by landing my first official corporate job. I felt the urgency of my fellow travelers in the rat race. They were breathing down my neck and pushing me to move at full-speed toward the shiny water cooler of success.
And this continued throughout my corporate career. Life felt incredibly imbalanced.
Each time I quit a job I hoped for a slower, more manageable pace. At times I could find it, other times I had to create it, but too often I was in a state of chronic hurry-worry.
What happened?
Some might say it’s just the way life is. It’s part of being an adult.
Others might say times have changed, with the lines between work and life becoming increasingly blurred.
Both of which make sense, and there could be other reasons. I do know for sure that somewhere along the way I got the message that I had to be a productive, hard-working adult and that would lead to a life of happiness and success. Sleeping in or being sick was for wimps. Forget taking more than a few days off for vacation. There was an expectation to give all of myself to a job and sacrifice my personal time, leaving little to no room to reflect on my life, enjoy my passions, and explore the needs of my soul.
Perhaps you’re working 40+ hours a week with hardly any time off. Or when you are on vacation, you’re still working.
Maybe you sit through a busy commute to arrive home in time to rush your kids off to soccer practice or piano lessons. After you return home it’s time for dinner, homework, baths, or some combination thereof. Later in the evening, after the kids are in bed, you check your phone for any updates at work or on Facebook… because you don’t want to miss any big news. FOMO is real.
Even if you don’t have kids, you still feel as if you have no free time. When you do, you feel guilty, scheduling yourself back-to-back without any time to breathe. You’re convinced that if you’re not constantly busy, you don’t have the right to exist.
When do you have time to relax? When do you have time to reflect on what’s working in your life and what isn’t?
There are plenty of articles out there about how to manage your time. I even wrote one myself. But one thing those articles don’t address is the pervasive “do more, be more” mentality.
You know you’re trapped in a vicious cycle that you want to escape, but you don’t see any other options.
It’s hard to see other options, especially in a culture that encourages a frantic lifestyle and discourages rest. But if you rest for a few moments you’ll realize it’s all a big story, a projection of other people’s hopes and fears onto you. And you might realize it’s a nightmare that you desperately want to break free from.
If you want to stop running on the hamster wheel of life, here are a few things I’ve learned that I hope will help you too:
You won’t lose everything if you exit the race. You’re not lazy or worthless. It’s a belief you have because you were trained from an early age to build this life. This wasn’t a devious plot masterminded by Pinky and the Brain, but the care and concern of well-meaning parents, teachers, cousins, neighbors, Girl Scout leaders, softball coaches – everyone who wanted you to be happy and successful in life and in the ways they knew how. You were convinced this was the way to be and you wanted to please them. You didn’t want your family to disown you, and you didn’t want to live under an overpass.
When you exit the race, you affirm that who you are is more important than what you do. You’re so much more than your to-do list. You’re worthy as you are regardless of how much you do or don’t do. And you’ll find that you’ll only lose the things that no longer serve.
You have options. They may not be obvious yet. Right now all you know is that you must follow a script otherwise you won’t be successful, much less happy. But if you continue to wear the straightjacket of busyness, you can’t expand your arms and welcome the flow of joy into your life.
You can choose to redefine what makes YOU feel happy and successful.
Change the story. You always have a choice to keep going or step back. You can decide how busy you want to be. To believe otherwise is to believe that you don’t deserve to stop, relax, and reflect on what you think or want most.
Busyness keeps you stuck. You might think you’re moving forward as you’re quickly checking-off items on your to-do list and getting numerous pats on the back, but with all this movement you’re missing out on the whole picture. You’re missing out on opportunities to figure out what you need in life and whether your current course is getting you there. Instead, you’re running blind on a track laid out by others. The busyness is a substitute for your peace of mind.
You can’t hear yourself if you’re not still. Make time for rest and solitude so that you can access your true aspirations and inner strength. You may not get any outside strokes, but the inner strokes will feed your soul.
Are you done with pushing and striving to make things happen? Are you ready to connect and be really present with yourself and your loved ones, and nourish your soul with the meaning it craves? You can stop and say No to the busyness, and sift through the external noise so you can connect to what your heart truly wants. Are you ready? Let’s talk!
