One of the biggest challenges my clients say they face is not having enough time for themselves since having kids. I totally get this – literally overnight we became responsible for not only taking care of ourselves but every, single need of another little human. In the early days they really are reliant on us for everything and it’s natural that during these months it’s very hard for us to find a moment to ourselves. This is part of parenting a newborn, a baby, a toddler even to some extent, but what about when your kids get older and can start to look after themselves a bit more?
Before I had my daughter, my lifestyle was pretty relaxed. I lived in Mexico and worked a two-day week as a therapist and had a five-day weekend. I had a lot of spare time, I surfed, read, went on long walks, spent time with friends, danced. I could literally spend the majority of my time doing whatever I wanted. This naturally changed when my daughter came along and for a couple of years there even fitting a shower into my day required extensive forward planning. And I loved these early days. I was 37 when I had my daughter and had wanted to have a child for as long as I could remember. Despite that, I was surprised by how easy it was for me to give my all to her as I’d been worried that having spent so many years satisfying my only my own desires it would be hard to give that up. I felt so fulfilled though. In those early days, I didn’t find it hard to give up my free time for her, I didn’t need anything else in my life then.
That changed as she got older though and there was a time when I started needing more time for me. I’d started working more and between that and looking after my daughter I really needed time out for me. Time to do the things that made me feel like me and made life feel exciting rather than a constant cycle of working, washing up and packing lunches. I didn’t want that. It’s hard not to get pulled into a life where we spend so much of our time making sure everyone else’s needs are met that we start to ignore our own. There’s a societal message too that this is what modern-day parenting needs to look like. But the thought of the next twenty years spent working long hours at work and at home, feeling stressed and overwhelmed, in chaos and swamped by too many demands on my time filled me with dread and I refused to do it. For me, that’s not what life’s about.
Don’t get me wrong, I have a five-year old and I run two busy businesses, I’m also studying and I don’t have any family nearby so life is busy. But there are so many things that I do to make sure that life is busy, exciting, enjoyable, rewarding and fulfilling rather than busy, stressful, chaotic and overwhelming.
If life feels more like the latter to you right now, I could give you loads of tips that would genuinely make life much easier. But hearing them and putting them into action are two different things. What I find with my clients is that as long as they think that parenting life is inevitably stressful, their actions will reflect this. And this, in turn, will reinforce their beliefs that life is inevitable stressful. First, they need to understand that an easier, more peaceful life IS possible.
The first step to creating a life that is jam-packed but still peaceful is understanding that it is possible by simply changing the way we do things. If I can find the right balance and they can find the right balance then anyone can. The first step to creating change, to creating the life you want, is by knowing that it’s possible or at least or at least believing it enough that you’re willing to give it a go
If you are ready to create a life that is less stressful, less chaotic and overwhelming, to create an easier and more peaceful way of life for you and your family then send me a message and I can show you how 🙂