You’ve Been Planning All Wrong: The Importance of SEASONAL Living

What if you’ve been planning your life all wrong? What if things didn’t have to feel so dang hard all the time?

In this episode, you’ll learn all about the forgotten wisdom of seasonal living: that is, aligning your activities and expectations with what’s feasible for that specific time of YEAR.

The hidden truth is that planning the same way all year long only sets you up for hardship because no two months are the same.

After reviewing what past societies knew and honored yet our modern one ignores, I break down four different seasons based on moms’ ever-shifting needs and schedules. 

You’ll learn why intentionally recalibrating your goals, tasks, and commitments according to the changing rhythm of nature is key for productivity, happiness, and success.

BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER:

• How the 24/7/365 pressure to be productive sabotages your success
• The many internal and external factors that affect how many usable hours you have in any given week
• What pre-modern cultures knew and honored that our modern consumer one has forgotten: the importance of working in harmony and cooperation with nature and society
• The four different seasons of personal development based on what’s realistic and necessary at different times of the year
• How not living seasonally adds extra stress to your body that not only causes significant emotional and psychological discomfort, but disrupts your natural hormone function resulting in insulin resistance, weight gain, moodiness, fatigue, and depression

AS MENTIONED:

Join the Moms Making TimeTM Society to get the structure, resources, motivation, accountability, and SUPPORT you need to reclaim your time, rediscover yourself, and reignite your joy so your whole family can flourish. Every month you’ll be guided through a new personal development theme based on the life-changing principles of seasonal living.

HOMEWORK:

Your homework for today is to reflect on the extent to which you’ve ever experienced misalignment or extra stress from attempting the certain things at the “wrong” time of year. Moving forward, how do you want to feel this summer and beyond? What does your personal and family life look like right now? Is it a season for working hard and achieving, or for gently pulling back and relaxing? When do you think that will flip and why? Share your thoughts with me via email or DM if you'd like personalized feedback!

COMING UP NEXT:

Don’t miss next episode where I’m going to walk you through the three stages of personal growth to help you identify which stage you’re in and which specific tools and resources are best suited for where you’re at in your journey. Spoiler alert: these aren’t necessarily linear and it’s certainly not a one-way path where once you arrive at a certain point you stay there so it’s crucial to get these tips and be prepared for life’s next curveball. 

CONNECT WITH AMBER: Website | Instagram | YouTube | LinkedIn

Ready to finally get to the root of your problems and change your life FOR GOOD? Book your free 60-minute consult to learn more about working 1:1 with Dr. Amber.

Transcript

0:00

What if you've been planning your day-to-day life all wrong? What if things didn't have to feel so hard all the time? In this episode, we're diving into some crucial forgotten wisdom from times past to open your eyes to the science-backed art of seasonal living. It's going to change everything. You'll see. Welcome to More Time for Mom, where overwhelmed moms get science-backed strategies to overcome the hidden sources of stress stealing your time and joy. I'm your host, Dr. Amber Curtis. Ready to make more time for you? Let's dive in. If you're listening to this podcast, I'm going to assume that you are a planner, someone who regularly sits down to schedule out what you're going to do when so you can be as intentional with your time as possible. And if you're not a planner, don't worry. If anything, you're going to get that much more out of this episode. Planning is invaluable and one of the key ingredients to getting a lot done while ensuring how you spend your time aligns with your values. It's also essential for logistics so those bazillion work meetings, doctors visits, and kids activities don't fall through the cracks. But here's a hard-learned truth. Planning the same way week after week, month after month doesn't work. I'm sure you've noticed that. Sometimes, everything seems to go great and run so smoothly. Other times, it feels like everything's falling apart. It's not just about how much is going on for you one week versus the next. It's not even about the number of unexpected surprises that come up and derail you from your plan. The problem really comes down to having unrealistic expectations, both of how much you can or can't do and what specific tasks you're attempting that are out of sync with what's going on in the wider world around you. For instance, every December, January, the productivity gurus are shouting from the rooftops about how important it is to set your annual goals and make your yearly plan for success. But if you are a busy, hardworking mama, you know that at a minimum, you don't get a chance to do that until your kids go back to school from winter break. Even then, I've seen year after year working with one-on-one clients that moms don't really start to catch your breath and have the capacity to dream and set goals until mid to late February at the earliest. Similarly, Every May, moms go into overdrive managing school activities, spirit weeks, sports games, teacher appreciation, and end-of-year teacher gifts, summer camp sign-up, field day, final exams, and graduation. These immediately consume all your available brain space, not to mention hours of the day. and leave you feeling fatigued until they finally subside. Every October-November, you want to lock into that ambitious fourth-quarter energy to slay big goals before the end of the year. Except that's right when we turn the clocks back, so the time change messes with your and your kids' sleep schedules. It's also when sickness starts running rampant and colds leapfrog nonstop from one person to another throughout your whole family. Here's the hidden truth that our ancestors knew and honored, yet modern society has completely forgotten. You are not a machine. You were never meant to go, go, go 24-7, 365. And even if you wanted to, you literally can't. Yes, there are technically 168 hours in every week. as we established in episode 12 on three huge myths about time. But your number of usable hours varies significantly based on external factors like how many hours of daylight there are, the temperature outside, the typical weather patterns for that time of year, sociocultural norms for holidays and activities, time changes, etc. Believe it or not, your available time and physical capacity also vary based on biological and physiological factors happening inside your body, like the amount of cortisol pumping through your veins, melatonin secretions that make you feel tired, and general clarity of mind. Older societies knew all this. They followed the cyclical seasons of the year by prepping and planting in the spring, tending hard all summer long, reaping harvests in the fall, and essentially hibernating all winter. They modified their daily activities based on when the sun rose and went down, naturally waking up earlier, and staying awake longer in the summer months when that was possible. Knowing how little would be feasible in the winter, they actively prepared ahead of time to store up food and do projects that they couldn't do in freezing temperatures or dark, candlelit rooms. They didn't hound themselves for being unproductive in those winter months. They knew there was a very real, legitimate reason why they couldn't. Similarly, they made the most out of the warm, bright months that they could, knowing that their livelihood and very survival depended on it. All that started to change with the advent of electricity and has changed all the more rapidly in recent decades as dual working households became the norm and success became all about maximizing what you had to show for the hours you worked. Then with computers and the internet came the ability to work anywhere, anytime, essentially implying that you should. Now with smartphones, you're supposed to be at everyone's beck and call all the time, instantly responding to emails and messages, using all your time for some productive endeavor. It's ironic that marketing and consumer behavior underscore the detrimental effect all this has had on our bodies and relationships. Instead of spreading awareness about the dangers of working on your computer or phone too much, you're sold blue light-blocking glasses so your circadian rhythm won't get disrupted. Except it does, so then you're sold sleeping pills and relaxation aids and alcohol as a way to wind down after a long hard day, which just messes with your hormones all the more. Instead of being used to only having certain kinds of foods when they were in season, you're now sold genetically modified ones that you can get any time of year. Rather than go down that tangent, The key point is that it's so easy to think something is wrong with you when you don't feel good following that 24-7, 365 rat race. It's not. Even or especially if you've got seasonal affective disorder, there's a chance that this could be part of the problem. As a side note, approximately 10 million people in the U.S. have seasonal affective disorder, and women are four times more likely than men to develop it. While it's typically referred to as something you get in the winter, feeling depressed because it's so gray and damp and gloomy, it's also surprisingly common in the summer when it's hot and muggy and you're cooped up indoors. What's missing is that deep appreciation for how beautifully your body was designed to work in harmony and cooperation with nature and society. How do you do that? It all comes down to the science-backed art of seasonal living, which is simply aligning your activities and expectations with what's feasible for that time of year. I am telling you, this changes everything. It's so simple in theory, but so not practiced by 99% of the population. That's why it's one of the cornerstone things I teach inside my Mom's Making Time Society. Every month, I guide you through seasonally appropriate personal development themes that help you make the most out of nature and your body so that you are not expecting yourself to perform at levels that aren't realistic or to accomplish tasks and goals that aren't aligned with mom's real needs and schedules. I've organized seasonal fluctuations into four different categories. each of which requires a completely different approach to productivity, time management, goals, personal development, and most importantly, your physical and mental health. December, January, and February are what I call the wintering way, where it's all about letting yourself hibernate and heal. Just like the trees are bare in the winter but are actually prepping hard internally for their new spring growth, that's what you need to do too. March, April, and May are what I call Fresh Start Spring, where we focus on cultivating and committing to your dreams, the same way that a farmer would go out and intentionally plant certain kinds of crops in certain areas based on the principle of companion planting, where he knows what kinds of crops grow best with each other. June, July, and August are what I call strategic summer, where you want that Goldilocks mix of ease and flexibility and family time while also elevating, not backsliding on, your progress. This is like the farmer that is out pulling the weeds and making sure all the crops are getting watered, but then intentionally sits down to take that wonderful midday nap. Then October, November, and December are what I call strong finish fall, where you anchor back to your original intentions and do whatever remaining work there is to reap and achieve the fruits of your prior labors. It doesn't matter how many kids you have or how old they are, you too can adopt this seasonal living approach by reflecting back on what kinds of things are typically going on or come up for you at different times of the year. How do those impact the daily habits you are attempting or the big goals you set? I can't reiterate enough that your capacity, meaning the physical and emotional energy you have available for something, naturally ebbs and flows on a rhythmic basis. To avoid burning out, or even working harder than you need to be, you have to make sure that what you're focusing on matches what's realistic for you in that particular season. And not just season of life, but season of the year. There are so many layers here, and obviously we are just skimming the surface in this episode. But if you want to learn more, you are so invited to join us inside the Moms Making Time Society, where busy mamas commit to prioritizing themselves and what brings them joy, knowing that that's how their whole family flourishes. Link in the show notes for more details. And if you're listening in real time, it's the perfect opportunity to get in on our June theme of designing your simple, spacious summer. Members just got a 25-plus page workbook to start them on their seasonal living journey. July's theme is finding joy in the juggle, making time for you, which is perfect for moms who are going crazy with kids home this summer and everyone being out of their normal routine. And then August's theme is handling transitions with grace so you can have the best, most effortless, stress-free back-to-school season possible. To bring this full circle, let me underscore again why seasonal living is so important. Because when you don't align your efforts with what's seasonally realistic, it causes so much extra stress to your body. Not only does the gap between your expectations and reality widen, causing immense psychological discomfort, but the stress literally throws your body into a heightened threat response where all the extra adrenaline and cortisol then impede other hormone functions, causing things like insulin resistance, weight gain, moodiness, fatigue, or depression. Together, these make you short-tempered and cranky, so you are more likely to snap at your husband, yell at your kids, feel horrible in your day-to-day life, and not get nearly as much done as you otherwise could. I'm telling you, so many of the, quote unquote, secrets to success and happiness are so simple, yet definitely not common knowledge, let alone common practice. Things like seasonal living aren't the silver bullet that's going to make everything in your life instantly better, but they also make a world of difference because you are finally going with the flow of your body and nature's innate rhythms instead of swimming upstream of the current. Whether you join us in the Moms Making Time Society now or not, I urge you to give seasonal living a try. I'm not saying you have to wake up with the sun or start homesteading to store up food to last you through the winter, although amazing if you're into those things. I just want to plant the idea, pun intended, of starting to make your plans with your body and the wider rhythms of nature and society in mind. It's incredible. You'll see. Your homework for today is to reflect on the extent to which you've ever experienced misalignment from attempting certain things at the quote-unquote wrong time of year. Even thinking back to this past May, did things feel smooth and easy, even if full and busy? Or did they feel overwhelmingly hard and stressful? Similarly, how do you want to feel this summer and beyond? What does your personal and family life look like right now? Is it a season for working hard and achieving or for gently pulling back and relaxing? Why? When do you think that will flip? Join me back next episode where I'm going to walk you through the three stages of personal growth to help you identify which stage you are in and which specific tools and resources are best suited for where you're at in your journey. Spoiler alert, these three stages are not necessarily linear and it's definitely not a one-way path where once you arrive at a certain level, you stay there. So it's crucial to get these tips and be prepared for life's next curveball. Don't miss it. And until then, remember nothing you do changes how wonderful and worthy you are. Have a great day.