Feeling like you have too much on your plate to juggle? You’re not alone, and many adults are increasingly noticing it. Pew Research Centre found that 60% of adults found their lives too busy to enjoy, and 11% said the fast pace was impacting their health.
Does this sound familiar? But what can you do? Life is busy. Between juggling a career, family life, and social life and adding in extras like exercising, caring for pets, raising children, managing household chores, and caring for your health, it’s really not hard to see why people are struggling to find time to relax and wind down. These ‘extras’ could also include volunteering, attending social events, or pursuing personal hobbies like painting, gardening, or playing a musical instrument.
This post will look at some ways to reclaim time for yourself and help you get some much-needed downtime to rest and relax. Because everyone needs to relax.
Schedule Time
Imagine the relief of adding relaxation time to your diary as if it were an appointment. If you don’t specifically make time for it and factor it into your day or week, you’ll likely push it aside. But you don’t have time to do that. If this thought is running through your mind, take a moment to look at your schedule. Find an empty slot, schedule it for downtime, and don’t rearrange it or book anything else in its place, whether it’s tomorrow, next week or next month; find it and book it. This simple act can bring a sense of relief and anticipation for the much-needed relaxation time.
Schedule Micro Breaks
If block booking long chunks of time don’t work for you, then how about micro chunks of time instead? This can be 10 minutes 5 times a day when you move away from what you are doing at that moment and do something that relaxes you or takes your mind off what you’re currently doing. It can be going for a quick walk, a 10-minute power nap, taking a break to play solitaire on your phone, calling a friend, or doing anything you want; it just needs to be relaxing and not work or your usual life activities.
Micro breaks shouldn’t be just a one-time thing; they are something you need to implement regularly. These short breaks, taken as frequently as you can, can be a game-changer. They can help reduce stress, improve focus, and boost productivity, providing you with the support you need to manage your busy life. Knowing that you have these regular breaks to look forward to can help you feel less overwhelmed by your schedule.
Book A Self-Care Activity
Book an activity that you need to carry out but it can be tricky to find the time for. If you’re neglecting yourself, then this is probably the best thing you can do. Make reservations, be it with friends, at a spa, go shopping, play golf, get your haircut, or take up a new hobby that requires you to join a club. Anything. And then add it to your diary as some “me time”. It does feel like going against finding time for yourself when you’re already busy to book additional things. However, this time is different and will be something that you can enjoy. It is solely based on your needs, and this is what counts.
Much like scheduling in time, as mentioned above, this practice not only gives you something to look forward to but also makes taking time for yourself a non-negotiable, putting you first even if it’s just a short time lost in an otherwise busy month.
Take A Digital Detox
Ever feel too connected, and you need to not be so easy to get hold of? Or are you guilty of spending too much time on devices? Everyone has this issue from time to time, and taking a digital detox can help you reclaim some time and just stop. A digital detox involves taking a break from all digital devices, whether it’s an hour or just 20 minutes, to stop and take a break. Be it when you’re eating or driving, the devices go away. You can also establish free zones within your home, such as the bedroom, where you don’t take your devices and simply stop and relax or do other non-digital activities.
Increase Your Sleep
Busy people tend to have poor sleeping schedules, and if you need added downtime and rest, then adding to your sleep can be a great place to do this. Either go to bed slightly earlier or sleep in a bit later if you’re an early riser. However, adjusting how you sleep and prioritizing it can be a great way to find time to rest. You simply need to be strict about bedtimes and the cut-off for your day. Stop the doom scrolling, don’t watch the extra episode of that new show, head to bed instead, and give yourself time to relax.
Having a good night’s sleep can help you feel refreshed, give you more energy, and help to improve your overall health as you feel better. Poor sleep is linked to mood imbalances, excessive eating, poor judgment, and generally feeling rubbish. Even an extra 30 minutes of sleep per night can be beneficial, so make this something you regardless and see the impact it has.
Get Help
If time is short and you’re stretched thin, it can be a good idea to see if you can get any help. This might be from family and friends who can help you out with something such as taking over a task, doing the shopping, babysitting, etc. Simply tell them you are busy and need help managing your schedule or finding the time. Understanding family and friends might be able to offer you assistance to help you juggle things on a short-term basis, or they can support you in easing your workload by helping you manage your time better. Or it might be that you just need this to be a sounding board you vent to so you can see the wood of the trees and start to make changes yourself.
Would you find professional services more appealing? Would booking a cleaner for a couple of hours per week be helpful for you, or would hiring a nanny or babysitter work better? Or do you need to talk to someone, and therapy could be beneficial? This time is dedicated to getting what you need, how you need it, to help you boost your life and find a better equilibrium than you have right now.
Whatever you need, try to find someone who can take some of the load off your plate for you, even if it’s infrequent. Use this time to do something for yourself or quite literally nothing if that is what you need to do.
Revisit Your Schedule
A great way to find time in another packed schedule is to look at what you’re actually doing and ask if you need to do it. Are you doing things simply because you’ve always done it, or do you think you need to be doing it? Outside of the essentials in life, i.e., working or looking after children and maintaining your home, are you putting additional things to your schedule that you actually don’t need to do and can cut out? If time is too tight that you can’t stop to breathe, then it’s worth assessing if you really need to have your plate piled so high and what you can take off to make things easier for you.
Make A List
Writing down everything you need to do and giving it timeslots can be an excellent visual representation of your life each day. You can use digital calendars and apps to do this if you prefer. But take some time to sit down and chart a few of your days to see how they look.
Include times you leave for work, the length of your commute, when you arrive at your workplace when you pick kids up, walk the dog, feed your pets, what time you eat, how long grocery shopping takes you, etc. Anything and everything needs to go on this list. Why?
If you really aren’t great at managing your time and need to see where time is maybe being wasted, or you want to find time to stop and relax or restructure, this is the best way to do so.
Sure, you can write down work from xxx to xxx, but does this take into account your commute? And how long it takes you to get to and from work? Probably not. Seeing exactly what you do and when and how you currently manage your time can be a great way to identify habits and patterns and then look at where you can make changes to make things more beneficial to you.
Go Digital
In stark contrast to taking a digital detox above, going digital can actually save you time. It’s not for everyone, and it might take some adjustments depending on how digitally savvy you currently are. But going digital by using online activity to help make your life easier. It could be hosting Zoom calls instead of physical meetings to save you on travel time, opting for telemed or virtual healthcare appointments where possible to save you from having to travel to speak to healthcare providers or doing your weekly shopping online so you don’t need to go to the grocery store yourself, and you can spend the time you save doing something else.
