Busy, busy, busy…..boom!
Do you ever just wish that there was some time that you could set aside just for you?
I love doing a lot of different things and being busy but sometimes when my schedule gets too full, I feel that I’ve lost touch with myself.
Sound familiar? Then it’s time to get some ‘me time’ in your life.
Time out for yourself is not selfish – it’s important. Everyone deserves a little time out!
Allow yourself permission to have ‘me time’.
How I made ‘me time’ happen
I run a business, I’m a wife and a mum to teenage twins and so life can be a little busy at times.
A couple of years ago during a really busy period in my life I realised that there just wasn’t any time for me – time to enjoy some solitude, recharge my batteries and reconnect with myself.
I knew I had to change my behaviour and do something different – I had to make change happen.
I still needed to put the same number of hours work each week into my business, I still wanted to spend time with my husband, family and friends and I still had the weekly commitments of taxiing teenagers to their activities.
I considered all the options for getting back some ‘me time’ and what would make the biggest impact in my life and would be the easiest to do. I opted for reorganising my working week and to take every Friday as a ‘Fun Friday’.
I discussed my plan with my colleagues and customers and was amazed how quickly my working week moulded around the change. My family and colleagues soon started asking what I had planned which kept me committed and accountable.
I put in place some rules - no checking emails or answering work calls and I had to plan and schedule to do something like meet a friend for a walk or visit a favourite place.
‘Me time’ walk at a cold and frosty Loch Lomond
For the first few fun Fridays it felt selfish and indulgent to be taking time out just for me but the benefits to my mood and well-being were almost immediate and I started to view it as self-preservation.
Taking time out for yourself doesn’t need to involve an entire day but there are so many little moments that you can capture for yourself.
6 top tips for making time for yourself
1 - Know your why
Be clear why it’s important for you to have time for yourself.
Think about how you will feel if a year from now, two years, five years, ten years from now you don’t make time for yourself?
2 – Shed the guilt
Everyone deserves a little time out. It’s not whether you deserve it – it’s whether you can afford not to have it.
We all owe it to ourselves to make some time for ourselves. Give yourself permission to have ‘me time’.
3 - Think about what you could do differently
Ask yourself what are all the desired behaviours I could do to make time for myself? The best way to think about wording these is to think ‘if someone else was watching me what would they say I was doing’?
Write down (research has shown that writing it down makes it more likely to happen) of all the ways that you could potentially take some time for yourself during your week? Could you - take a bath, go for a walk, read a book, do some exercise, and pick a box-set to binge watch?
Think about all the things you used to enjoy doing before life got so busy!
4 – Start small and make it count
It doesn’t matter how little time you have to begin with - make it count.
Aim for quality, not quantity.
Pick one activity that will give you the biggest impact and are easy for you to do.
5 – Schedule in time
In the same way that you schedule in all your other activities ‘me time’ is more likely to happen if you schedule in time for yourself.
Don’t wait until you have burned out to treat yourself to some time out.
6 – Monitor progress
We are more likely to change things if we monitor our behaviour because we are giving our attention to it.
Every time you take time out take a moment to register how you felt afterwards.
Note down what you did and how it made you feel as this can help to strengthen your resolve to make it happen again.
Everyone deserves a little time out.
Share your ‘me time’ fun in the comments below.
Best wishes
Register for blog posts direct to your inbox.
Behaviour Works aim is simple. To help to make change happen in their personal, family or working lives. Every week we help people across the world with their own change journey with our online training. Check us out at Behaviour Works.
Loch Lomond Photo by Eleanor
Splash Photo by zhang kaiyv on Unsplash
Laptop Photo by Nick Morrison on Unsplash
