Why I Stopped Sticking To A Daily Schedule & You Should Too

Feel Good Project day 101

Working from home full time now (as many can relate to I am sure) has it’s own set of challenges. The typical time management learning curve, how to fit in dog walks without having them cut up my day too much, as well as fitting in workouts, family time and chiropractic appointments– can all be a bit interesting.

It’s starting to settle in a bit, although I am sure it will constantly evolves like everything else in life that never stays the same and constantly changes.

Committing to starting my days with my Desire Day Planner (from Danielle LaPorte) has been such a great exercise for me as far as setting my intentions and goals for the time ahead of me that day. Although to be honest I only get to half off my list most days if I am lucky, what matters is that I show up and prioritize my time.

Today was interesting, as it became very clear that just loving people and making time for chats with friends and neighbors was how it was supposed to play out. I decided to roll with it.

Living in a concrete jungle, where our houses and apartments are jammed together so close you can barely catch a breath (OR peace and quiet for that matter), Justin and I often find that we can lose many precious hours each day by just walking out the front door and getting caught up talking with eager neighbors who seem to have all the time in the world.

As horrible as it might sound, we often avoid these situations and try to get by with friendly waves from a distance, because once we engage, it can be a LONG time spent away from work and progress.

While I know there is a fine balance, we are still learning. Today I felt like I was starring in a movie about a gal in a small town where she knows everybody and everybody knows her (Cheers?), and it became so apparent that I was just supposed to slow down and give in to some friendly and loving conversations, without checking the clock or running so strictly by the amount to do in my planner.

What should’ve been a usual 25 minute walk with Maggie this afternoon turned into an hour and 20 minutes. What we would have missed though had we stuck to our usual pace and plan:

• Meeting new neighbor we’d never met name Linda while she was having a hard time walking up a hill from the beach (she seemed to have a disability of some sort and needed to take her time and was up for a chat about our dogs), so we spent about 10 minutes talking to her. She also filled me in on what life was like in our town growing up here as a child in the 60’s.
  

• Seeing a beautiful elderly couple walking their big white lab through the park. Ginger (the pup) had just had her front right leg completely amputated, so the man had a soft towel in a U shape under her chest to aid her so she could still walk around with just three legs. He said she was 11 but hated the words, ‘put her down’ as she still loved life and as long as her tail was wagging, he’d do anything to keep her around longer. Beautiful and touching. Found myself holding back happy tears.
  

• Connected with neighbor Andrew who lives down the alley with 2 little white dogs, and heard all about his new baby boy, and what a joy it is to be a father.
  

• Was offered a ton more lemons by our neighbor Robert while coming back up our street. Always good to not be in a hurry, as he seemed to really appreciate some company this afternoon, as he lost his partner to cancer just a year ago, and life can certainly be lonely. We shared some laughs and picked lemons from his bountiful tree.

SO, I have to say, today just paid off to NOT hurry or be stuck on a list. Letting life happen and choose to be a part of it in this way was more than worth it, and guess who got the biggest blessing from it???:)

FEEL GOOD MOMENT OF THE DAY: Meeting another couple at Dr. Bergman’s office today who listen to our show! Thank you Sarah and Josh for making this great new connection-it’s always so good to make new friends who have a lot in common! 🙂