Goodbye illusion of a perfect life, hello reality!









I know I'm not the only person that does this. The categorising of life, the pie charts we create in our minds that are supposed to be totally balanced, evenly separated into sections that are all beautifully colour coded. My sections include, but are not limited, to the following; Healthy living (nutrition, exercise etc), sleeping 8 hours a night, getting distinctions in all university courses as well as having my work selected to be showcased at creative exhibitions, looking after my physical health, keeping up with other commercial photographers in the industry with a certain amount of shoots per month etc, seeing friends and family, communicating long distance with all the friends and family that are far away, my spiritual life, my appearance and neatness, a tidy house and clean laundry...the list only goes on. Guess what, you probably already guessed...I have NEVER been able to manage it all. Divide that list in half, and then probably in half again, and that's probably about all I am getting done in an average week...or less. Let's be realistic here, how many of us are actually doing it all? Yet we are all striving to give off the appearance of having it all together. Weather you're a student, a wife/husband to someone, a mamma or dad, or anything else, we can't physically do it all.

I know that for years I have been beating myself up for not being able to live up to this illusion. As soon as I feel like I am making progress and getting some of the 'sections' or 'departments' under control, something untoward happens and then it all crumbles around my feet and I am back at square one, back and the bottom of the hill with even less energy to climb up it. Yet I have done this for years, I start to struggle back up the hill desperately trying to get to the top - the top is where the pie chart is all neatly in place where everything holds is equal weight again and I am living a successful balanced life finally. And just like that something else happens, like the car breaking down, my illness rears its ugly head, I don't get a decent night of sleep, someone needs to go to the emergency room at 1 AM, and before you know it, I have slid all the way back down to the bottom of the hill.

Why do we keep doing it to ourselves then? Striving for an illusion
of a lifestyle? Rather I want to work towards balance, but a balance with flexibility. There are going to be days/weeks or even months when the world throws things at us that we weren't expecting. Some times we may not see the inside of the gym for weeks on end, or eat takeout/pre cooked meals to keep us going, or not see and catch up with friends for a while. That is okay though, those friends who truly care will still be there, the gym isn't going anywhere (sadly) and some pre-cooked meals or crackers and cheese never killed anyone. So let's try allowing ourselves some freedom and being kinder on ourselves when times are hard rather that beating ourselves up. I think we will find that in allowing flexibility in this and accepting the fact that we're not super woman (or man),  accepting that we can't do it all, in that we will find freedom. So I challenge you (and myself) today to allow ourselves to fall down the hill and not try to gather everything up before making the climb back up, allow that freedom to manage only as much as you can, and prioritise, even if you reassess on a daily basis. That's okay. Embrace the freedom of it.




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