Balance as a Mom, Gym Rat and Business Owner

Sometimes I feel like  Gumby...Stretched all over the place. Especially as a mom. I've talked before about how much we do as moms. Yesterday, we celebrated Easter with our family. With family time and the obligations of my daily life...the gym, food prep, the kids, my business, my clients, my husband, the house, the laundry. I feel my life is in chaos.

I have had to ask myself what chaos actually is. I think this image sums up how I feel.

Chaos is the lack of order, or balance in our life. As I am preparing for weekly team call that I lead each week, my business topic for them is to become orderly in the chaos. What does that mean? Sometime our lives feel unstable. We just don't know how to respond to outside stimuli or we don't respond well to something that is not in our daily routine.

How do we know what our daily routine is unless we HAVE a daily routine? It seems like lately, everywhere I turn, I see things pointing to balance...and yes...there is an oil for that. Having a healthy balance in my life looks different every day. And for that matter, every hour. Things pop up so quickly in my daily routine and sometimes, they are unexpected. Those time suckers can cause me to spiral down into losing hope of getting anything accomplished for the day.

I have found that getting organized is as simple as being disciplined to use my calendar. Someone once told me that I don't have a physical boss. But my boss is my calendar. I thought that was funny at first...insert the eye roll. The only boss I have is MYSELF! Yep...I am the boss, the boss of chaos. lol.

So I decided to use my calendar. Balance my life by giving one of my obligations of trying to remember everything this family and my career needs...and do you know what happened? It was amazing.

It freed me up to let things happen. Let my creative mind be free, within these calendar boundaries. As children, we needed boundaries. And we wanted to know what those boundaries were. That's why we tested the waters...to see how far we could go before our parents put their foot down.

This IS human nature at it's best. So as adults, where are our boundaries? Well, as said before...in our calendar. So here is some advice, from one busy mom to another. When you are putting your calendar together think about these 6 steps:

1. Make sure you are setting realistic goals for the day. Don't set yourself up for disappointment. Don't try to cram everything in if it doesn't fit. Put the things in that are the most important to accomplish for the day first. Picking up the kids and going to the gym are the most important thing for me each day.

2.Schedule the important things that tend to get left out each day. YEP...I schedule my gym time each day. Yep...it's in my calendar. Yep...I get notifications to get away from my computer so I can take care of myself!

3. Keep a list of the things I need to do for the day and PHYSICALLY cross them out once they are accomplished. I'm not going to lie...sometimes I do a little dance. There is no better feeling than crossing something off your list. I feel so empowered!

4. If you don't complete a task, don't bang your head on the wall, just write it in to tomorrows list. And remember, be flexible!

5. Keep your calendar with you at all times. I love my calendar on my phone, but I make sure it's on my physical, paper calendar at home as well. And I always use a pencil. You just never know when you are going to have to reschedule something.

6. And my favorite rule...Don't forget to schedule some personal time. Whatever that looks like for you. Maybe it's to read a book. Or to pray. Or do yoga. For me, it's the gym. Find what you like to do...and do it. Even if it's for just 10 minutes.

When we follow these guidelines, we can be focused on the present, knowing that our brains are not trying to remember a million things at once.

Now, for me...I've used up my blog time in my schedule...now off to the gym for ME time!

Until the next blog...