Part of my hope for 2018 is that it will be a year with more space.

I appreciate having fewer plans and more empty space because it allows for more time for creativity, and more opportunities for restoration and reflection.

However, often empty space on my calendar leads to hours of lost time on social media and feeling like I didn’t “get anything done.”

I am generally all about productivity, which is a good thing to be about as an academic who is also a mother since there is almost always a demand on my time.  I can take one day for restoration like yesterday but after a single day, I start getting antsy, and even yesterday, I still got a bunch of stuff done, I just felt more zen about it because I lit a candle and didn’t have anything planned afterwards.

So, here I am today, with a 4pm presentation scheduled (so there’s something upcoming to do and I need to stay in “get things done” and  “be professionally competent” mode), dinner in the crockpot, 4.5 miles run, a section of a new paper written, a bunch of articles downloaded for the lit review for that paper, a homemade rainstick (because I can’t find mine and I’m presenting on classroom management strategies) crafted, and a sneaking suspicion that I am supposed to be doing or that there are millions of things I should be doing in the next hour and 20 minutes before I need to leave.

Then I remember to breathe and blog.

This time is a gift.  So, I could stop and ask myself what I’d like to do with it.  That would be new and different.  But good and different.

So, I’m going to light a candle and make another cup of tea, check on the crockpot and that e-mail that came in while I was blogging, maybe put on some classical music and read something.  I can do this. This is what I want to do. Or it won’t be and I can give myself permission to veg out on social media.  It’s just an hour.

Working on being me instead of doing me this year. It’s a work in progress.