Schedules Are Servants, not Masters

Why is change so hard and routine so attractive?

During the dark months, I nailed down a perfect routine: 4 days of CrossFit, 2 days of yoga, Farmer’s Market on Saturday, kitchen WOD on weekend, etc.  It was a perfectly orchestrated plan, that doesn’t seem to be working now that the day light has extended itself to 8 pm.  I find it less of a comfort and more of a taskmaster. I am longing for more unstructured time, to just sit outside and do not much of anything.  

I’ve been fighting this feeling the past couple of weeks, trying to maintain my perfectly planned out schedule.  Then the other morning I woke up and thought what if I take the night off and don’t go to yoga. It immediately seemed like a good idea, so I went with it. I had a wonderful evening “off”. I did some cooking and read a book- stuff I never have time to do on a weeknight.

Part of me feels slightly guilty for missing yoga and I definitely miss the stretched out relaxing feeling from a practice. But I do have a greater sense of mental clarity and a lowered stress level.  I am holding myself to a plan that no longer serves my needs. The longer days seem to be encouraging lingering.  No more fighting it!  I am just doing whatever or nothing or maybe lots of stuff- it just depends.  Welcome unstructured time, sometimes I need you too.

In related news, I decided to stop posting on the Adventures in Yumminess blog. It started off as a fun way to encourage my culinary skills, but has been a total chore from some time now.  So I decided after 100 posts I would stop. Instead I am stopping at post 93, 7 short of my goal.  It is kinda killing me to leave it at this odd, almost there number.  But the energy it would take to get those last 7 posts in is simply not a good use of my time.  One hundred post is holding myself to a goal that no longer serves my needs. It feels like quitting and I am struggling to be okay with that.

The season has shifted and so has my energies.   My schedule needs to work for me, not me working to make my schedule happen. My lesson for this month: schedules and routines are tools not, not rules. Revise as needed. Breathing sigh of relief….and making peace with me new not-so-scheduled time.