LYBFL: Pressing Pause

ByChristie Burnett

I am so tired of being busy. This Living Your Best Family Life series began because I felt like our life was passing me by on fast forward – juggling children, a household, a marriage, work and ‘life,’ often on little sleep as our smallest family member takes time to find her rhythm. It’s hard.

Weekends typically offer little respite as they become crammed with all of the things there is so little time for during the week. There seems very little down time, time to switch off.

Too often I find myself frustrated, short tempered, upset.

This is the season we are in. I get that. For various reasons I cannot simply drop any of my current responsibilities. Instead I try to find work-arounds, I try to be in the moment, mindful of what I am doing right now, I think about my simple goals as I set priorities and tasks for each day, I think in small steps towards bigger plans, I try to find moments of quiet in the busyness of the everyday.

And I am trying to press pause more regularly.

Hitting the pause button usually happens on the weekend so I can make the most of the little time that we actually have together as a family. Even though it makes sense for me to work more on weekends because Dad 101 is home to help look after the girls, instead I have made a more consistent choice to press pause on the busyness of ‘shoulds’ to make time for the ‘wants.‘

We are not talking about going out or doing anything fancy, instead choosing to work together on family projects around our home. Projects that we have wanted to get to for the longest time. Like the recent reorganisation of the playroom, and making a start on sorting through ‘stuff’ that has been sitting around for way to long. We’ve begun freshening up our back garden so we can enjoy it more as a family this summer and there are some minor indoor renovation projects that have been moved up the list.

We are definitely making slow progress in the scheme of things (after all, working around two small children can be tricky) but it feels good to be tackling projects that have been on hold for far too long, and we are making a conscious effort to accept that we can only take small steps towards actual completion. It has been good for Dad 101 and I to work together instead of us each getting on with our individual commitments or responsibilities independent of the other, which is how our weekends have gone for far too long.

While I would like to say that pressing pause means sleep ins or cocktails by the pool, for us, right now, that is just not plausible… it’s just not where we are at. But it feels good to disconnect from the everyday rush to spend time on things that are for the longer term good of our family.

Could you benefit from pressing pause on the busyness of everyday life? How would you spend the time?


Christie Burnett is a teacher, author and mother of two. She created Childhood 101 as a place for teachers and parents to find engaging, high quality learning ideas.

6 Comments

  1. That is the best quote… and the worst! Deciding on priorities can be hard, but you are right… it’s worth it!

    1. It is hard, you are right but I find Seth’s quote a great reminder to keep asking myself if my time today is being spent how I truly want it to be spent.

  3. last year I worked really hard on slowing down, this year my daughter started school, my son was at kinder and we got all ‘caught up’ again.
    I’m reining it in and again next year it will be my focus.
    time at home is such cherished time, I want so much more of it.

  4. I loved reading this post. I think sometimes around the holidays we feel this need to do all of this extra stuff when it really isn’t necessary or even beneficial. Our family has been purposely keeping things simple and focusing on more family time and it has been wonderful!

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