Tag Archives: habits

Trade offs

I don’t know too many people that have truly found balance in their lives. Time always seems to be in short supply, and there has always been more to do. Sometimes we need to make trade-offs, we need to prioritize what we really want to do, and be willing to give up on other things we don’t value as much.

I’m now approaching 2 years of keeping track of my fitness, reading and writing, meditation, and intermittent fasting tracking. It was another great year of meeting my healthy living goals… but it didn’t come without trade offs.

I got into archery a few years ago, but I haven’t shot an arrow in a year and a half, other than one visit to a friend up north, and we shot recurve, rather than my compound bow. I am pulling my bow out in a couple days, and while I’m excited to shoot again, I don’t have set plans to keep shooting after the holidays, because I’m not sure I can fit regular archery time into my schedule.

I have barely written on my Pair-A-Dimes blog, and did not start podcasting regularly as I hoped I would. But I’ve written here on my Daily-Ink every day since July, 2019. I’m wondering if I can give up some weekend time to podcast, because I really enjoy the learning conversations that I have.

Over the coming days, I’m going to reevaluate my healthy living goals and do another year-end reflection. However, I find myself wanting to add new goals and not take any old goals away. I find myself wanting to do more rather than making trade offs: Keeping all my previous goals AND write more, AND podcast, AND do archery, AND…

The reality is that I can’t do it all. There needs to be trade offs, there needs to be sacrifices, or my goals will be nothing more than wishful thinking… And I’ve made too much progress in reaching my goals the past two years to undermine the next year with too much on my plate.

What becomes routine

I have been writing, mediating, and exercising regularly for quite some time now. Writing and meditation are daily, while the workout is usually 5 days a week. I set my alarm for somewhere between 4:30 and 5:30 and I get up, peek at social media, then start writing.

I used to meditate first, then I realized that I wasn’t mediating as much as I was planning what I wanted to write. So I switched to writing first. Some week days I end up writing a bit more than planned and those days sometimes end up as my skipped workout days, or my workout becomes my 20 minute cardio and nothing else. I don’t ever let this happen 2 days in a row.

Recently though, it has been a bit of a scramble. I seem to be stuck going to bed later and waking up at the later end of my window. I then start my morning by checking out news and social media longer than I should before I begin writing. Today I realized that this has become part of my routine. It’s no longer a quick check to see what’s going on, it’s the first of four steps:

Procrastinate on social media, write, meditate, then workout.

This added step has made me more rushed in the morning. I’ve even skipped shaving a bit more regularly (easy to do when the only place you don’t wear a mask is inside your own office). The social media procrastination does, sometimes, inspire my writing. But more often it is just a waste of time. It’s interesting how a routine of focus and discipline can be slowly undermined by a bad habit. It’s easy to make distraction, procrastination, and entertainment part of a routine, without realizing how easily this can distract from the reason you developed that routine.

With just two more mornings of this routine before I start my two week holiday (when I won’t be getting up so early), I think I’m going to have to stick to a strict schedule to keep myself from wasting a large part of my days on a routine I usually keep to under two hours. And when I return in the new year I will need to be more disciplined about what my routine really entails.

Lazy habits form much easier than disciplined habits, and it becomes easy to make distraction part of a regular routine.

The act of writing

Twitter inspired my to write this morning. The first tweet is by Marcus Blair, but let me share some tweets by him before I get to the one that originally inspired me.

Marcus has become one of my favourite educators on Twitter. He shares tweets about what he does in the classroom and he reflects on his teaching and his interactions with his class. In a time when there is so much stress and anxiety, he shares tweets that I find uplifting, and that remind me why I wanted to get into education.

Here are 3 recent tweets by him:

The tweet that inspired me to write now was this one where Marcus reflected on his own writing:


I responded:


Then almost a couple hours later I read James Clear’s 3-2-1 weekly email and wrote this about one of the 3 quotes he shared:

The act of writing makes me a better writer. The commitment to this act every  single day is itself a reward, making me feel like I’ve accomplished something before I even start my work day.

Yes, some mornings it is really hard to get started. There have been days that I’ve spent more time thinking than writing. Yes, there have been days when I’ve had to rush or even postpone my morning workout because I was too slow to get my writing started, or too long winded to finish what I was writing in a timely manner. Yes, some things I’ve written should have been left unwritten. But sometimes… sometimes my writing speaks to me. Sometimes it is metaphorically a song I had to sing. Sometimes the act of writing is a form of expression that leaves me feeling like I’ve added something worth sharing with the world.

For those moments I write. Not for the actual contribution I’ve shared, but for the feeling I get sharing it. Writing is my artistic expression. My keyboard is my brush. Words are my medium. My blog is my canvas. And committing to writing daily makes me feel like an artist.

The power of audiobooks

Since downloading Audible, I’ve listened to so many books that I never would have gotten to. I’ve fallen back in love with fiction. I’ve ‘read’ some classics I’ve always wanted to. And I’ve enjoyed listening rather than looking at words in a book after spending a fair bit of time in my day reading words on a screen.

I used the term ‘read’ rather than ‘listened to’ above because I consider listening to a book the same as reading it. I have consumed the book for my enjoyment. I don’t think the format matters that much… other than the fact that had I not listened, I never would have gotten to read it.

I can’t read a paper book on my treadmill or row machine, and don’t enjoy trying to read one on exercise bike. I can’t read a paper book while I drive. I can’t read a paper book while cooking dinner. Audio books have opened up windows of reading time I would never had had otherwise.

I also listen to podcasts, but books have become my favourite form of audio. The performances are getting better too. Books are coming out with multiple voices, rather than just one, and some books just sound so good in the author’s voice, with emphasis put where the author intended it to be placed.

I’ve read over 50 audio books in the last 2 years. In the two years before I started reading audiobooks, I probably read 8-10 books. Audiobooks have made me a lover of reading again.

Self care

Apparently yesterday was Mental Health (awareness) Day. I didn’t realize until I saw a number of tweets come through my feed. What’s interesting is that two days ago, after coming home from a long week at school, I saw many tweets from educators talking about being exhausted, feeling overwhelmed, and essentially saying, ‘the struggle is real’!

I felt it too, as I shared in this stress-releasing tweet I shared on Thursday:


These are interesting and exhausting times, and overwhelm seems to be palpable to many. So now is a good time to remember the importance of self care. When we care for ourselves, we have more to offer others.

  • Exercise
  • Meditation
  • Walking (for pleasure, not to get somewhere)
  • Hobbies
  • A glass of wine
  • Binging on Netflix
  • Conversations with friends or distant family
  • A technology free dinner with family
  • A good book
  • Creating an upbeat playlist
  • Cuddling with a loved one
  • Ordering in a favourite meal
  • A long shower or bath
  • A funny podcast
  • An extra hour or two of sleep
  • Playing a mindless game
  • Puzzles, crosswords, Sudoko

What you probably don’t need is to spend more time on social media, unless you have a stream that’s intentionally funny or entertaining. You don’t need to think about the work you have to do all weekend, schedule a bit of time and that’s the time to think about it.

When there are many things beyond your control, when spare time seems nonexistent, that’s a hint to make time for yourself. You’ll feel better because of it. You’ll have more energy because of it. And most importantly, you deserve it.

Broken sleep cycle

I just had a long afternoon nap. Long enough that I’m going to struggle sleeping tonight. It’s a vicious cycle when my sleep patterns get messed up. It never starts intentionally, a late night where I can’t fall asleep is all it takes to start me off. Then suddenly everything goes out of whack.

This afternoon I set an alarm to stop me from sleeping too long, but I turned it off and didn’t get up. That’s not like me, and so it tells me that I needed it. But now what? What happens tonight when I try to get a decent night’s sleep?

I’m someone who used to do well on 5-6 hours a night, but as I’ve gotten older, I’ve needed more. I fought it for a while, but realized I was less productive and so let myself sleep longer. Over the summer I was getting closer to 7 hours and very frequently waking up before my alarm. Now the alarm is essential, and my time in bed is much longer than my time actually sleeping.

It’s hard to battle because part of it is insomnia that I seem to have no control over, and part of it is the patterns I end up following that promotes rather than reduces my insomnia… so I don’t help myself.

Workouts help, routines help, and discipline helps. I’m sharing this because I’ve learned that if I want to change something, making it public is more effective than trying to quietly convince myself that I’ll change. I need to share that I’m going to work at building consistency into my schedule, and therefore help rather than hinder my sleep struggles.

Changing routines on weekends, (like writing this so late, and still not having had my workout), doesn’t help. Late night scrolling on my phone when I can’t sleep doesn’t help. Long naps do not help. Sharing this with you now does. Wish me luck fighting this recent bout of insomnia.

When is your next workout?

Even without dealing with a pandemic, this is a crazy time of year for educators. I will avoid sharing what time I’m writing this, but let’s just say it has been a long day! I bet 2/3rds or more educators can’t believe it’s only Thursday, and not the weekend yet!

So with all the craziness of September, who has time for a workout?

You do!

Until January 2019, my pattern was to stop working out during my busy times at school, like September and report card time. Then I realized that fair weather fitness wasn’t fitness. I decided that if I wanted to be healthy, I had to be consistent. So I stopped letting ‘busy’ stop me from working out.

The result: more energy, and more to give! More vibrancy, and a great feeling that I’m actually caring for both my current and future self.

Busy times aren’t times to push heavy weights, run longer, or ride faster. Its dedicating small windows of time to self care. It’s about raising the heartbeat, walking when you’re too tired to run, and maintaining a level of fitness at a time when it’s easy to forget to take care of yourself.

If fitness isn’t a priority when you are ‘too busy’ then it’s not a priority. Period.

You deserve to treat yourself better than that. So, when is your next workout?

Turning off to find balance

It’s that time of year again when the ‘To Do’ list at work is growing. The last two days I’ve left work and then just kept working. I know that’s the time of year, but I also know it can keep going and that there is always more to do.

I try to use exercise and meditation to help me turn off, and I’ve moved these activities from morning to evening, but I’m not sure I like this strategy?

What do people do to ‘turn off’ work? What strategies allow a separation between work and home? I don’t mind taking the extra time at the start of the year, but I’ve had about 3 years of imbalance that have left me feeling like I am not doing this well.

Writing helps, it’s my way of unpacking ideas. What else do people do?

Covid dreams

I woke up this morning from a dream in which the entire focus was on getting the proper face protection to do the task I wanted to do. I can’t remember the task, only the concern for not being safe.

I often have dreams where the preparation for the task takes over the dream. This goes all the way back to being a pizza delivery driver in university. I’d dream of getting in my car to go to work and my car would only go in reverse. The whole dream would be about trying to get to work driving backwards.

Obviously these are stressful dreams. I can control stress in my waking life, can’t do it in my sleep. It’s not surprising that months into this pandemic, I’d have dreams related to the challenges we face. Going back to work last week has added to this.

Dealing with Covid-19 isn’t something normal. It’s a unique challenge that adds stress to our daily experience. Being around other people used to be easier. Understanding how to give others their personal space used to be easier. Supporting one another used to be easier.

Stress responses are not designed to be triggered again and again over long periods of time. While I was bent on the idea that this isn’t the ‘new normal’ and we need to remember that things will get better… the timeline for change is too long to not call this normal. We need to normalize mask wearing, social distancing, covering up coughs and sneezes, and staying home when we don’t feel well. We need to make this normal enough that it isn’t a stress, but just what we do.

I look forward to dreams where I’m wearing a mask, but the concern of it isn’t the focus of the dream.

Slowly getting back to my routine

Morning meditations, writing, and workouts have started back for me as I head into the routines of school days. While I’ve enjoyed the time to sleep in, and move my schedule around, I also missed the consistency of starting my day in the same way. What I haven’t yet done is get through the routine in a timely way. Yesterday, I started working right when I got up. Today I spent a fair bit of time distracted.

I know I’ll get ‘dialled in’ soon, but it has been a slow start for me. It’s weird how this is totally something I want to do, yet it’s still taking me time to get to it. What is it about our nature that we like routines yet we take so much time to get into them? Is it just me, or do others find the same?