Ease

It's almost a given in attachment parenting that some or all of the parent's needs will be unmet. Be it sleep or lack of personal space, there's usually something parents would really like that they forfeit to care for small children, for a time at least.

For a long time now one of my greatest unmet needs has been ease. Granted, it seems a lot to expect ease in my life with the choices we made about moving to a building site and having a third child: small children and project houses are hardly renowned for being easy, stress free ventures! However, I really like to think that it is possible for us to have our needs met whatever the circumstances, even if it's not always, ummmm....easy :-)

If my situation precludes fundamental needs being met, perhaps I must reconsider whether meeting this need is truly a priority. Perhaps if I'm honest, those needs can wait a few years, or slide down/fall off my list altogether. Or maybe some (big) changes need to happen.

As much as I have wanted to believe I don't deserve ease at the moment, because of the circumstances of my life, I keep coming back to a place where I feel I must shift things, both practically and emotionally, to achieve a more peaceful inner state and a sense of ease of being.

Some ways I am trying to make life easier practically....

• Beginning (see my last post!) 
• De-cluttering I used this 40 day declutter guide, I'm still working to clear out the stuff we don't need. 
• Being organised with food -meal planning, making easy/quick meals, prepared ahead of time wherever possible.... doubling/trebling up on cooking so I can prepare lunch/dinner and something for the freezer at the same time.
• relaxation of my standards- seeing past mess, making easier meals, washing clothes (and dare I say it...myself) less frequently. Acceptance of the fact the housework will always be there for me!
• little and often- washing, tidying, etc. Sometimes this is the best way but sometimes i need to...
• Blitz big jobs...tick them off once and for all! 
• keep a shopping list in my notebook, write down items as soon as I realise I need something, make lists from my meal plans...
• Bulk buy when I do go shopping, especially at the Wholefood Grocery store.
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Emotionally, finding ease is much harder, but when i pare the situations I find most difficult to live with back, ease seems to constitute a few different things for me: acceptance, realism, clear boundaries, honesty, freedom. Funny how these little words embody so much internal struggle! It's been feeling like ease has been something to strive for, but I realise I have to find it here and now in each moment to really live with ease. Life is always imperfect, but I can always make the choice to live simply.

How to eat an elephant?...

I'm really feeling a shift in myself in my attempts to change my procrastination habits. It's taken me quite a few years to get around to this....  :-)

The logical and practical reasons for doing things little and often hadn't escaped me, but actually getting round to changing my procrastinating tendencies was more problematic. However, for a while now I've been managing to break things down into little steps in order to tackle bigger jobs. And it feels really really good to be getting somewhere, finally....

Regardless of the task, choosing short bursts of activity have really focused my energies and helped me reframe my perception of time. I can achieve more in 4 x 15 minute bursts throughout the week than I can when I wait to get a whole hour "spare" to dedicate to something. The sense of overwhelm is slowly decreasing as I work through my enormous to do list.... Doing little bits also means that I can keep up with my everyday tasks better than if I try to take too much time out from the daily drudge to tick things off my list.

I'm also realising, and I'll admit to being a bit slow picking this up too, that the only way I'm going to survive parenting in the way I choose to is to accept this! Just doing lots of little bits seemed so frustrating to me, so I'd struggle to begin. But actually, I'm doing more this way. Being productive feels good, and I'm managing to keep some of the promises I made to myself to care for myself better and to try and balance life as a busy Mama and homemaker.

How do you motivate yourself? Do you struggle to find time for you?

Forgive me if all this sounds very obvious. Perhaps everyone else is much better at this than I am. It's taking me such a long time to get to grips with living one bite at a time!

Testing testing

does it work?....I'm testing. I am quite excited about this development! Must check spellings or my blog will be littered with dreadful phone text typos....

Here's a lovely picture of Cosmo

mobile blogging

I've just discovered I can blog from my phone. Huzzar. I might actually stand a chance of posting some stuff up more than once a year.

I'm determined not to become totally addicted to my smartphone, and of late I've been very consciously turning it off, ignoring it and pretending it doesn't exist. But I can't deny how much I love having the internet at my fingertips or how easy it makes browsing eBay, Facebook and Pinterest. I want to harness this technology for the greatest good possible, since I'm making the choice not to reject it outright.

Writing is definitely for my greatest good. A sanity saver, but best done little and often. So hip hip hooray! for the Blogger app that is currently zapping through the ether to my phone....I hope it's good!