Making the Most of Time

Big Ben: one gigantic time keeper

Time is a curious commodity. We often wish we had more, and we often waste it. Sometimes, we wish it would go faster, and other times we wish it would slow down or stop all together. We want to protect it and sometimes have a hard time sharing it or giving it away.

Lately, my relationship with time has been changing. A few months ago, I left my full-time day job so that I could devote more of my time and focus to my art and jewelry. When I worked my 9 to 5 job, time was a constant source of frustration. I never felt like I had enough of it inside my job to get all my work done or outside my job to do what I loved to do: be creative and be with friends once in a while. I longed to free up more time, especially for my creativity.

When I finally left my job, I expected to feel this immense time-frantic weight lift. Strangely, it did not, and I still find myself wishing there were more hours in the day and another day in the week so I could be in my studio longer getting more done. What I'm learning for myself is that, as long as there are things to do, I will always feel like I could use more time. I know others have the opposite struggle of not knowing how to fill the hours of the day. But for me, I'll always long for more time and wish I didn't need to sleep so that I could have more waking hours.

So in recognizing that my frustration with time has not changed despite the change in my life situation, I realize that I need to work on my relationship with time. I'm trying a few things to do this:

• trying to be patient and not get irritated when I'm interrupted from doing something I'm determined to keep working on or get finished
• not work while I'm eating a meal
  
• taking a little time each day to do something healthy (that my mind says I don't have time for), like going for a walk or playing piano
• stopping work in the late afternoon so that I can spend some time making a meal to share with my husband
• going to bed at a somewhat consistent time so that I'm not tempted to keep working or playing into the wee hours

Hopefully some of these things will help and lead to other helpful habits. Only time will tell ;o)

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