“Doing is never enough if you neglect Being.” — Eckhart Tolle
If you are anything like me your “to do” list never seems to empty. Even with all the amazing things we get done, there always seems to be more to do. Our overflowing “to do” lists lead to our feeling overwhelmed and stressed out, and often reinforce a sense that we are not enough just as we are. We may even wonder what is wrong with us if we think that everyone else can get things done while we feel like we are drowning in our “to do’s”.
As a result, we get trapped in a cycle of busyness trying to keep up with our lives. This busyness is at the core of our habit of self-neglect as we end up focusing on everyone else’s needs while neglecting our own. Often, we don’t even show up on our “to do” lists and if we do our needs continue to get bumped to the bottom as we prioritize other things and other people.
Some of us may even perceive our busyness as a badge of honor believing that the busier that we are the more important we are. The problem with buying into this false belief is that when we attach our value to how much we get done it invariably leads to feeling disconnected from ourselves, what is important to us, and eventually to exhaustion and burn out. This is not a sustainable way to live and undermines our confidence, self-worth, and belief in ourselves.
I love this wisdom from Joshua Becker, “Busyness is, at its core, about misplaced priorities.” You see the busier we are the more we feel like we are on a hamster wheel of life, finishing one task just to begin the next. We rarely pause to appreciate what we have completed and may not allow ourselves to feel a sense of accomplishment as there is still so much to do. We schedule ourselves every minute of the day to get it all done and wonder why we are so exhausted all of the time. Living this way is unsustainable and leads to illness, depression, anxiety, and feeling unfulfilled and burned out.
When we choose to be the empowered artists of our own lives, we can stop living this way. We can choose to have our “to do” lists grounded in what is truly important to us and authentically reflect our priorities. We can choose to create more spaciousness in our days and transform our busyness into more peace, joy, and meaning. We can prioritize our peace of mind, living more intentionally, and having space to breathe and enjoy our lives. Can you imagine how inspired and nurtured you will feel to have more spaciousness in your life?
Here are five empowering strategies to begin creating more spaciousness in your life:
- Intentionally Plan. Part of prioritizing yourself and creating more spaciousness in your life requires that you intentionally plan some pauses in your day. Begin breaking your habit of business by scheduling space on your calendar to do nothing. Make a commitment to not schedule every moment of your day with activities and notice the difference it makes. Give yourself at least 5 minutes each hour to connect with yourself, your breath, and the present moment. You can also create more spaciousness in your life by meal planning, making your lunch the night before, prepping for the next day, ordering groceries online, and any planning activity that will decrease time pressure so you can be more present in your life.
- Mindful Pause. This is an excellent strategy to increase your self-awareness and self-compassion. Mindfulness simply means paying attention on purpose with curiosity, non-judgement, and compassion. Throughout your day schedule mindful pauses to tune into your feelings and needs so that you can choose to nurture yourself and live more intentionally. There are many ways to take a mindful pause including: using the STOP acronym – Stop, Take a Breath, Observe, Proceed; putting an alert on your phone with a pleasing sound at several times during the day to remind you to pause and take a breath and check in with how you feel; intentionally plan breaks between activities to just be. You can schedule mindful pauses in your calendar to take three deep breaths and notice what sensations you are experiencing in your body and anything else you want to bring your full attention to at natural times in the day like between activities, at lunch, during bio breaks, etc. The more you mindfully pause in your day the more sense of spaciousness you will cultivate.
- Listen to Your Own Wisdom. Nurturing a practice of mindfully pausing throughout your day will allow you to access your intuition and listen to our own wisdom. When we listen to our authentic inner voice we are more equipped to set boundaries, prioritize ourselves, make empowered choices, and truly know what is important to us. When we create space to listen to ourselves we can live more intentionally and transform busyness into health and well-being. The more you listen to your intuition the more you trust it as you have ongoing evidence of how spot on it is. If you find yourself looking for answers outside yourself, tune into your own wisdom and truth and listen deeply. The more you listen to your inner mentor the more spaciousness you will cultivate around you and the more you will embrace your beautiful authentic self!
- Acknowledge Yourself. To support you in embracing your beautiful authentic self, cultivate a regular practice of acknowledging yourself. This is a powerful strategy to break the chains of busyness and celebrate your accomplishments both big and small. Every time you take a mindful pause to check in with yourself acknowledge yourself. Each empowered step you take celebrate! Before you go to the next item on your “to do” list acknowledge all that went into you completing the last item. Gamify the practice of acknowledging yourself and see how many times a day you can do so. Remember negativity is like Velcro® on the brain so we need to feed ourselves more positive information to counter all the negative we are exposed to. Choose to recognize yourself and all you do in the world and notice the sense of spaciousness that creates in your life.
- Notice the Blessings. A natural result of creating spaciousness in your life is all the blessings you will notice that you missed when you were busy. Gratitude is both a strategy and a wonderful consequence of having more space in your life. You will be more grateful for your precious life and enjoy more moments with deep appreciation. Pausing to notice the blessings around you will help you create space in busy times and not take anything for granted. Weave gratitude into your day and you will feel more and more spacious.
May you feel empowered to create more spaciousness in your life and nurture peace in the world from the inside out!
Sending you so much peace, love and gratitude, Kelley
