A common complaint I hear from moms is, “I don’t have enough time.” As moms we balance so many things: caring for our children, working on our marriages, keeping up the house, working or volunteering, not to mention taking care of ourselves. Often there doesn’t seem to be any time left for us and our interests or dreams. We can start to feel like we are in a never-ending sea of “have-to’s” and that we never have time for “want-to’s.” We can begin to feel a growing resentment and frustration that there isn't enough time. But there is a simple shift that can help us feel more peace and contentment in our lives, without having any more time. We explore this on the podcast episode this week.
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A common complaint I hear from moms is, “I don’t have enough time.” As moms we balance so many things: caring for our children, working on our marriages, keeping up the house, working or volunteering, not to mention taking care of ourselves. Often there doesn’t seem to be any time left for us and our interests or dreams. We can start to feel like we are in a never-ending sea of “have-to’s” and that we never have time for “want-to’s.” We can begin to feel a growing resentment and frustration that there isn't enough time. But there is a simple shift that can help us feel more peace and contentment in our lives, without having any more time. We explore this on the podcast episode this week.
Free Coaching Session
Sign-up for a free coaching session.
Schedule
One-Minute Wisdom
Each week I carefully craft a short perspective shift or tool that you can read in about a minute. You can sign up here.
Follow me on Instagram: @theexpatmomcoach or on Facebook: @theexpatmomcoach
Ep. 73 “I don’t have time” is a Lie
Intro
Virginia has just had 5 snow days in a row. Our family just finished the holiday break and we had a wonderful time together. We had to change plans a bit due to COVID, but we all had a wonderful time. I had arranged my work schedule so I could really focus on the kids. But I was looking forward to catching up on things and accomplishing things I had put off when the kids went back to school. On Sunday evening, we got word that there would be a snow day the next day. My kids were over the moon excited because we have never lived in a place with snow that they remember. They couldn’t wait. I was a bit bummed regarding my work because I knew I had a lot to do, but I figured I could mostly push it off again to help them have a fun day. The kids made snowmen, and snow angels and caught snowflakes on their tongues. I tried to get some work done—but was interrupted several times by the kids needing things. I realized it was fine. Then….the notification came that we would be having another snow day the next day. I started feeling a bit anxious— I had to get some things done. I had some important deadlines, clients and work piling up.
I took a deep breath. I told the kids I needed to work on some things in the morning. They were so sweet, they really tried to be independent but it was a non-stop parade of needing gloves put on, needing carrots for snow men, needing lunch, wanting hot chocolate, fighting between siblings and on and on. Sometimes I helped but felt frustrated I wasn’t getting anything done. Sometimes I asked them to wait or be independent, but I felt guilty as I heard them fighting or falling apart. By noon I my patience had run out. I found myself getting bugged at everyone and angrily putting socks on my 6 year old who was crying because her feet were cold from being outside, and stomping around frustrated getting things for kids as my deadline loomed closer and I felt my anxiety and resentment rising.
My husband who easily could have said—“you need to pull it together,” was thoughtful and said, “Why don’t you take your computer and go somewhere and work for a few hours.” I did. And it was so helpful. But it also gave me a chance to reflect on things. Why was I so bugged? Why was I so frustrated at my kids for needing things? Being a mom is more important to me than the other things I do. I was excited for them to enjoy the snow. I usually love more time with my kids. Why was I so mad? I realized it was because I felt like I didn’t have time to do what I wanted to. I felt like I HAD to do everything they needed instead of doing what I felt like I wanted to or needed to do. I began to feel like a victim almost to my family.
I cannot tell you how often moms bring a version of this topic to coaching. So many moms feel this way. Often it’s not just a particular situation like mine was on one day—it’s often a broader experience of trying to balance caring for our children, working on our marriages, keeping up the house, possibly working or volunteering, not to mention taking care of ourselves; and there just doesn’t feel like there is any time left for us and our interests or dreams. We can begin to feel a growing resentment. We begin to feel almost like a victim to our lives.
As I coached myself and realized what was going on, I was able to step back and give myself some compassion. I was also able to see what my thought processes were that were creating this experience. I was able to deliberately choose to approach things differently moving forward. And it was a good thing because we’ve had 3 more snow days! An entire week of snow days this week.
On the podcast today, I’ll address this lie that we often tell ourselves, “I don’t have enough time.” I’ll offer a different perspective that I hope will be as useful to you as it has been for me and my clients.
One-Minute-Wisdom
I don’t have time
In our modern world and especially as moms this belief that “I don’t have time” feels like a fact.
Our to-do lists are so long as moms, and we can rarely even get to them because we have so many other demands on our time with kids and life and work and responsibilities. It’s easy to feel like we even lose ourselves sometimes.
I get it. I felt this way for many years. I was exclusively a stay-at-home mom for 12 years and when self-help experts would say, “Take time for yourself,” I used to roll my eyes thinking…you know how much work it is to get a babysitter so I can have alone time, or do you know how much work it is to clean up the house and deal with the fighting after I take an hour in my room alone? Not worth it.
Have to vs. Want to
But I want to offer you a different perspective. What if “I don’t have time” was a lie? What if this thought wasn’t useful or true?
The truth is, each of us has 24 hours everyday. We get to choose what we do with it and how we think about that 24 hours. Most of us have a long list of things we think we HAVE to do. And we probably have a good reason why we HAVE to do them. Then we feel stressed about getting them done, and resentful that those things take so much time that we can’t do other things we WANT to do.
The problem with approaching our days this way is that it robs us of enjoying what we’re doing because we’re so frustrated and overwhelmed and mad that we are just responding to all the have to’s. Often, the reason we feel like we don’t have enough time, is because we don’t get to do things we WANT to do. Want is a powerful drive and when we feel we’re just doing what we have to, part of us longs for something more. It feels like more time would solve the problem. If we just had more time, we could do what we have to, AND what we want to and we would feel more satisfaction. But the truth is, that even if we had more time…the root of the problem wouldn’t be solved. The human brain always wants more.
There is another way to feel more peace. And the good news is you don’t need any more time for it. Let me show you how this works by walking you through how I helped one client shift her perspective on this.
Client Example
One of my clients came to me and told me that she was resentful and discouraged that she didn’t have time for herself and what she wanted to do. She had lots of evidence to support it. She was a busy mom of three young children. They were remodeling their home. Her husband worked in consulting and was gone most of the week. She had responsibilities in the community and the list goes on. Things SHE wanted to do felt like they were impossible to fit in…things like reading or chatting with friends.
The more she thought about her life and how little extra time she had for what SHE wanted to do, the more discouraged and resentful she felt. It began to feel like her life was just going through the motions and doing what she had to do, rather than what she wanted to do.
I think lots of mothers can relate to this.
But I want to offer a different perspective that has been really important and useful for me. It’s something that has allowed me to feel more peace and contentment and sense of self about my life without necessarily changing what I’m doing per se…
Take Inventory of What You’re Doing
When this mother came to me, I asked her to list out everything she did in a typical day. She listed everything from caring for children, to getting ready, making food, helping a neighbor etc.
I also challenged her to make a list of things she didn’t have time for. They included things like take a bath, read a book, chat with a friend.
Label Them as Have to or Want to
I asked her to label each item as a have to or want to item. As we went down the list, most of the things she did each day were have to’s. Most of the things on the list of things she din’t have time for were want-tos.
I challenged her to really think about this. Were they really all “have to’s?” The truth was she didn’t HAVE to get up in the morning. She could leave her family. She could get a nanny. She could choose to let her children run wild all day and not get them ready. No one was holding a gun to her head forcing her to take dinner to her neighbor.
I encouraged her to really take everything off the table and consider she did not HAVE to do any of it. Of course her brain immediately rejected this idea. She said, “But I have to take care of my kids. I can’t walk out on my family. I can’t stop making dinner.” I asked her why not?
She explained that she wouldn’t be an irresponsible parent if she didn’t bath them and dress them. She said her children could get hurt if she didn’t pay attention to them. They’d all be eating fast food if she didn’t make dinner—and that wouldn’t be healthy. I told her I agreed. But, I wanted to point out that she still didn’t HAVE to do those things. It sounded like she valued those things. And that was important to note. But they still weren’t things she HAD to do. Sometimes we fool ourselves into thinking we don’t want to do things because they seem SO important. Stepping back and looking at the consequences of NOT doing things can be useful in helping us realize we DO want to do something.
Creating a WANT schedule
I suggested we re-create a daily schedule full of wants. Not just full of things on her original “want” list, but a broader list including some of the wants she might have been discounting as have tos. I suggested that she weigh her desire to have healthy food for example with having more free time. I suggested she weight her desire to to have kids who were cleaned and dressed and safe against her desire to read a book. I wanted her to really take back ownership of anything she decided to do. There wasn’t any agenda. I just wanted her to really own and choose to WANT anything she chose to do.
As we went back and filled in the schedule, she realized that looking at it in this new way, she actually put most of the things she was already doing back on the schedule. However, this time it felt a bit different. Rather than feeling like she HAD to do this long list of things, she saw the tasks differently. She was able to see them as things she CHOSE to do. In other words, things she WANTED to do. There were a few things she decided to shift. Things she realized maybe she did want to shift. And that can be a valuable part of this too. Looking at and examining our choices like this allows us to make changes and notice where we want to make changes.
Owning it
Once we decide we WANT something, it’s easy to lie to ourselves and tell ourselves we HAVE to. The truth is, we don’t. Owning what we chose to do and recognizing that we do want things can really shift the way we feel an experience our day.
Have you ever noticed the difference in your time perception between doing something you HAVE to do, vs. things you WANT to do? I know for me, when I’m doing the dishes….something I have to do—15 min. Feels like a long time. Yet, when I’m chatting with a friend—something I WANT to do, 15 min. Flies by. It’s the same amount of time, but we experience it differently. When we WANT to do something, we approach it differently. We enjoy it more. We don’t wish it away. We don’t think about other things we’d rather be doing. We actually enjoy what we’re doing, and ironically we create more evidence for the fact that we DO want to do more of those things we chose as our top priorities.
The brain is very tricky. It will tell us it wants to do things that feel good in the short term and cause us to feel deprived when we don’t. But the truth is often when we think about it, we’re doing things that matter to us in the long-term. But we forget to own that. We start to feel resentful about having our time usurped by demands. Stopping and re-owning what we are doing as things we WANT to do vs. Things we HAVE to do, can make all the difference in feeling more at peace and recognizing that we have plenty of time.
Not plenty of time to do everything….but plenty of time to do the most important things to us.
Applying this process
This is a simple process that we can apply in a variety of situations.
Let me walk you through one more example of this process with a different client.
One of my clients works full time, has a young family, lives in a foreign country and has wonderful ideas about entrepreneurial ideas she wants to pursue. But she feels discouraged and almost paralyzed thinking that she doesn’t have time because of all the other things she has to do.
We applied a similar process as the one I listed above. We took inventory of a typical day for her. We discussed want to and have to items and took everything off the table. I reminded her she could quit her job, leave her family, or choose not to sleep. Of course I wasn’t recommending those things, but I wanted her to see that she didn’t HAVE to do these things. We talked about the consequences of not doing some of these things…she might not have the same income if she quit her job. She might miss out on time with her kids if she worked on her project in the evenings. She might not feel well if she didn’t sleep. She might have to do less perfect work at work if she added this in. But we also talked about the benefits of pursuing this entrepreneurial idea. We only added back in things she WANTED to do. In this case she decided that actually she didn’t want to trade time from anything else she was doing. She WANTED to do what she was doing and save this entrepreneurial idea for a different season of life.
There wasn’t a right or wrong here. She could have easily decided she wanted to do less perfect work at her job and make time for this entrepreneurial idea for example. But in looking at it all and examining it—she could own her decisions. She didn’t have to add all the negativity and disappointment she was putting on herself about not pursuing her dreams. She could just own and enjoy and want the life she had created, realizing that it was enough. It WAS what she wanted, not just something she HAD to do and was holding her back from living a better life.
We also talked about the idae that she would likely have her old thought of “I don’t have enough time” or “I am missing out by not pursuing this idea now” pop up. We talked about how to allow those and give compassion to herself for them, and also to remind herself what she had chosen and enjoy it.
Snow Drama
I want to circle back to my drama over the snow day and feeling like there just wasn’t enough time to help my kids all day and do all of my work and meet my other obligations. Resentment or anger was my clue that I was making myself a victim. I was telling myself I HAD to meet every need of every child, I had to meet every work deadline, I had to keep the house running smoothly and sleep and make good food and make things fun for my kids. The truth was, I didn’t HAVE to do any of it. When I stepped back and re-evaluated what I really wanted (not just wanted in the moment or what I thought I SHOULD do: In taking it all off the table and looking at what I wanted not just now but in the long run too, I realized I wanted to enjoy this time with my kids. I also wanted to make sure I showed up for my clients and that met some important deadlines. But, I was able to realize there were some to-do items and some work things I could put off. I was also able to realize it was okay if my kids watched a bit more TV and if the laundry didn’t get folded. My girls had a wonderful week playing in the snow. We went out to eat together and watched Anne of Green Gables. I was able to to enjoy being with them during those times without feeling frustrated that I wasn’t getting things done.
And, my girls had lots of time on their own reading, playing games, playing barbies, AND being bored, fighting, and watching screens. I was able to get some things done and for the most part not feel guilty that I wasn’t with my kids. Of course there were still moments I felt torn in different directions or, I wished I could get more things done. But, because I stopped lying to myself that there wasn’t enough time, I felt a lot more peace and contentment. The truth was, there was plenty of time to do what was most important this week given our circumstances. Once I just accepted the circumstance instead of resisting it. Once I decided I didn’t HAVE to do any of it, I could decide what I ultimately wanted to do with the time. And that made all the difference.
Let’s summarize:
When you find yourself thinking, “I don’t have enough time” and feeling feelings like resentment, discouragement, and frustration…you might consider following the this process:
The idea that you don’t have enough time, is a lie. We all have 24 hours to choose however we want. And, we don’t HAVE to do anything. Taking back ownership over what we choose to do with that 24 hours can replace resentment and discouragement with peace and contentment.
Change to Podcast
Now, this is a perfect Segway to talk about some changes coming up to the podcast. As I have been looking at my year and my work/life balance, I’ve decided that for the next while, I am going to move the frequency of the podcast to every other week. I want to make sure I have enough time to really be present with my kids right now, and I want to make Sure that I have the time to create quality podcasts and focus on coaching my clients. Hopefully this gives you time to enjoy and catch up on other episodes you may have missed as well!
Coaching
And, if you’d like to apply some of the material you’re learning on the podcast, you can sign up for a free coaching session in the link in the show notes, or on my website at The Expat mom.com