So I survived the weekend! I thought that I would crumble on the weekend and succumb to a sleep in, I had hurt my shoulder quite badly so was taking pain killers which made me drowsy so I had expected it to be harder to get up early, but I still managed it. The pay off was the morning of Day 14 when I leapt out of bed at 4.30 without a problem.
So many of the articles and seminars that I have been following over the past few weeks around habit change, refactoring your life, improvement models talk about mindfulness, and I think that is what I have learned over the past 2 weeks. By getting up 1 hour earlier, at what seems like an ungodly time, I find that I pay far more attention to time throughout the day. I have become very mindful of time, the value of it, the use of it, and finally what it means to me.
I have never been a great time “waster”, I don’t like just sitting still, and would much rather have things on the go rather than just kicking back and chilling. However now I am learning the value of both aspects of time management. I am learning about how sometimes it is really important to have time to just sit and be quiet, rather than have every minute managed and coordinated.
My experiment with time was accelerated on the weekend where I did not even wear a watch for the weekend. I knew I had a few appointments, but I relied on other time measuring tools to get me to the right place at the right time, but other than those appointments I did what I felt like doing, no matter the time constraints. I found myself doing lots of little 5-10 minute jobs that are very satisfying but I had not done before. I felt that it takes too long to set them up and tidy up afterwards. I figured that this weekend I had the time to do that set up and pack up, so I did the jobs, and it turns out it only took minutes to set up and tear down.
I also did some really big jobs! One on Saturday (changing curtain tracks in the living room) and one on Sunday (making pies). Both jobs took hours and hours and needed preparation (shopping), coordination (materials) and collaboration (working with my Husband’s schedule). But they too were worth the investment of the time. The jobs both got done and done well!
I also spent quite a long time sitting on the back deck just watching a Kookaburra who was watching me, we watched each other for ages, it was very restful just sitting and watching nature happen.
I am looking forward to this final week of the challenge, I am now confident that I can make the 21 early days (#21earlydays) but I am also very confident that I will continue to get up early in the future, the pay off for the past 2 weeks has been huge!
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