Lately, life got out of control. The end of summer was not nearly what I had planned for. In fact, I often wonder how my best laid plans – such a skillset for my professional life – manage to go so seriously awry in real life. But, scratching summer off of my list, I’m now ready for fall and ready to once again reassess, reimagine and restructure my life.
Truth is, for all of my bluster about living differently and how “as of May 19th” I was unofficially more part-time, I wasn’t. There. I’ve made my confession. As the world of consulting goes, when you have a billable target and someone wants to contract for the majority of that time, you take it… even it means you’re not really working part-time. But now?
Well, a few things have come together to set me up for success. First, for someone who only needs to bill 75 hours a month, I’m set to have a cushion of about 60 hours at the end of September. That drops my work commitment in October, November and December by an additional 27%. Secondly, even though we have a lllooonnnggg way to go on this house, we have made progress. Getting the floors laid upstairs – a project we plan to start this weekend – is the last major project we have to finish. Then, there are only little projects – trim around doors and windows upstairs (downstairs is done), baseboards throughout, some fixes in two of our bathrooms and installing the shiplap ceilings in two other rooms. None of them are overly small projects, but they won’t actually take much more than a weekend each to complete. So, check number two on slowing down.
And finally? Well, it’s been slow going but it’s finally getting through my brain that I have to choose a slower lifestyle. I can keep pushing, keep trying to get an extra hour ahead here or there, add in another “nice to have” project over there and clutter up my life with to-do lists. Or, I could stop. I could say, “No, I’m not joining that project” and “Yes, once the floors are down we are taking a break.”
So guess what? I’m going to stop. The entire month of August, I prayed that I could somehow get back to our normal life. That I could go back to having all of my small problems and be at peace with them if I could just get rid of the big one. So, you know what? My prayers got answered. And the result? The times – like the leaves – are “a changing”.
Next week, I unfortunately have to travel again and I have one more final, final trip coming up in October. But that’s it. I will not travel for work again this year. I am slowly getting control over the garden and perhaps this weekend I will finally can the beets that have been so patiently waiting their turn to be harvested. I will still help my husband lay floors, hang out with my sisters, play with my kitties, do the endless picking up and cleaning around here, and make healthy dinners. But I’m doing it at a slower pace. What’s left on my docket today? Hmm… just unloading and loading the dishwasher and making dinner. Simple enough, right?
And so it begins, again. I am once again restarting the clock and reinitiating my efforts at living a slower, more relaxed lifestyle. I look forward to the days when this is less of a pipe dream and more of a lifestyle. After so many fits and starts, I do wonder if I will ever truly learn these lessons I’m desperately trying to teach myself. And yet, I comfort myself with these two thoughts: First, I know that even though its fits and starts, there are times when I truly do live better and I wouldn’t have that experience if I never tried. And secondly, I understand now – much better than I did before – that doing less for awhile is going to take more effort. I do have to learn a new lifestyle and even if it’s a good thing, it is still a series of conscious decisions to get me there.
So, the struggle truly is real. I’ve learned that. You can create the environment for a better life, you can cognitively know what you want it to look like and you can take deliberate structural steps to get you there. But internally, you have to change you. You have to stop doing what’s comfortable and known and begin to act, ever so awkwardly, as this “new person”. You have to take decisions you wouldn’t normally think about and pause to make sure that the decision you’re about to make aligns with your new life. I have to make conscious decisions to choose well everyday. That’s been a stretch for me. I tend to fall back into my regular habits. But the dream – this golden ticket to a life I’ve always wanted – is certainly motivation.
Today it starts, again. I am committed to doing better.
The Yuppie Homesteader 