Always do your best, but your best isn’t the same every day….

I woke up without an alarm.

I always wake up without an alarm.

Well… ever since I became a mom.

Before I was a much heavier sleeper. Anyone else?

When I was younger, before motherhood… I was able to push it, burn the candle at both ends and keep pushing, that I could push through lack of sleep, push through skipping meals…these last few years. I’ve noticed a real difference I cannot get the same results if I’m not practicing self care.

Now solid sleep is tough, and I make it tougher by not putting clear boundaries around my sleep. I have done so much work through repeated boundary lessons over the years, but mostly I’ve been trying to uphold boundaries to others mistreatment or taking advantage of me.
I question why I need to learn the same lessons over and over and why boundaries can’t be like a crock pot.
Set it and forget it…No? Are we also teaching our kids to respect the boundaries of others? Do we respect our children’s boundaries? Where is the balance of pushing them outside their comfort zones and respecting their boundaries?

Well, I realize it’s still really hard for me to uphold boundaries around my own habits to ensure my greater success, peace, and happiness in my own life…wlb… that’s always been tough if there is more to do you keep going. I think it’s time to practice what I preach… My Dad never stopped… slept at his work and barely held a life outside that. My father probably learned it from his father who kept machines in the living room, punch presses, drill presses etc… So the boys all knew how to operate these machines. I wonder what that felt like having those machines up and running buzzing away in the house. It gets the job done, and sometimes that’s what life is about.

Growing up my Dad’s machine shop was across the drive way or across the street, but I don’t remember it in the house I do remember one of his other side hustles, stuffing shingle samples, as a kid. Putting little squares of all the color shingles you could possibly choose. Into these little plastic sheaths that hung on a board to display them. My Dad ‘recruited’ a bunch of families to do this. I remember how empowered they felt and proud there was really no qualification they put the whole family to work happily stuffing away. I wonder if they listened to music or sang. This was 30 some years ago. I’m sure the process is automated by now.

Anyway…monkey mind.. boundaries….
When I determine I’m going to do something for my wellbeing…it often needs to be put aside because life happens or there are just other priorities.
That has been a repeated theme or a learned childhood behavior or a religious training
We would literally sing. ‘Jesus first, yourself last, and others in between’.
So I did that a lot in childhood… put everyone and everyone’s needs ahead of my own.

And it’s kinda like being a passenger in a car that blind people are driving. Can’t say I’d recommend it (no offense to blind people…I’m sure there are a lot of things you are great at, but driving passenger vehicles probably isn’t at the top of the list).

So last night I committed to going to bed early. After my brain dump of a blog post.
Did I still have online work I could do? Always.
Did I still feel like unwinding and watching something? Or maybe a podcast talking about brain chemistry or other personal development? Sure.

But I commited to my tomorow’s self to make it a better day. I loved the book Atomics habits. Habit stacking is modern day socery and I love it. I definitely fall in and out of remembering to do it. So it’s not quite a habit yet.
How do you stack habits? For instance when waking up in the morning and doing stretching and breathing (not a full yoga session). I decided to oil pull simultaneously, but then I had to sneeze shortly after…what a dilemma, haha.

Or another example would be when you are getting up to leave a room taking anything out of place with you to reset the room or when you leave the car collect the trash. All the while trying not to get too much in your head about it…till it becomes natural.

Waking up this morning my head felt so much cleaner.

Still a bit tired, but significantly better. I drank some coconut water. Said Good morning to Skyler, kissed his head. And put on wakeup music, and this time instead of trying to wake him up, for the next 30-45mins. ‘I left the wakeup music on and went about my routine. Oil pulling, breathing, and stretching on the patio over looking the garden and journaling.

My stress level has disappated. I also didn’t check my phone first thing in the morning like I usually do. I’m not a coffee drinker.

I know, that’s weird to a lot of people, but I’m sensitive to coffee and begin to feel paranoid when I drink coffee, not how I want to start my day. I enjoying feeling grounded. Today I feel much more clear headed and I’m so glad I honored myself by getting to sleep earlier. I wanted more time to have my me time or get more work done… would more hours in the day actually change those behaviors? Or would it all just get stretched out in the same ratios?

Skyler was still asleep.
I changed his morning music on my phone to trumpets. And gave him a few minutes. He slept through the trumpets.

I came in and restared the trumpets and woke him up again.

It seems to help him when he knows what time it is and today it took 45mins for him to wake up, snooze and wakup, get up. Then I got his cereal and he got ready for the day. I’m going to see how this works in the morning instead of myself waking him up multiple times, see if now that he’s older if morning music will ready him awake. I may have to put in my own recording.

We made it to school on time today!! Wahoo.

Small victories. I was much more peaceful today even if my kid does not have a hurry mode in the morning. We put on dance music and put some pep in our steps. And generally felt more hopeful. Really it’s amazing what’s better rest can do.

I aways say to my candidates before they interview, to set themselves up for success. Whether that means finding the right spot for a call, avoiding distractions, making sure they’ve eaten, slept well..etc.

On my ride back home. I noticed a familiar face standing at the bottom of the hill looking to hitch a ride up the hill to the bus stop by la bomba.

I wasn’t going all the way up the hill.
I live closer than that.

For a moment I thought, ‘does helping someone right now violate any of my personal boundaries’?
Going a little bit out of my way won’t make me much later, and what is only a slight inconvenience to me, makes a huge difference to him.

I think when some people set boundaries to protect their energy they suddenly set their boundaries everywhere and it’s hard to live that way, yet we can’t always flex our boundaries.

I had started to take a buti/booty work out class. Loved it, really intense great workout. And I really wanted to commit that block of time consistently as being mine. Something always came up…and not just work or kid related like playdates and meetings but actual full on injuries, even a broken rib. It always seems like there are commitments on a thursday that take priority. And everytime I drop that commitment I tried to make to myself…. my son wants to come right home after school he doesn’t want to wait for my own promises to myself. But maybe I haven’t said it to him quite that way. You see over here we seem to be breaking generational patterns and Skyler doesn’t have a problem asking for what he wants.

I hope he never loses that.

It took me so long to learn to use my voice.

It’s a rainy day today. So I opened all the windows. Rain is sooo cleansing.

It’s amazing what a difference a day can make. They say..er..Several books I’ve read mentioned a 1% improvement every day leads to 37% improvement in a years time. And I have worked on so many areas of myself but sometimes I waffle when trying to get habits to stick. I want to get good at so many things and think I just need to find an escape room, clear my calendar and learn guitar, and work on my spanish, practice art, learn more recipies… and and and… I think someone would eventually catch on and try and remove me from the escape room!

I believe some people call this vacation. And it only just occurred to me.. that I’ve never had a paid vacation. I’ll add that on my list of goals. There are perhaps a lot of people that work for themselves that don’t have paid vacation.

This is an area of my life I will certainly continue to put focused effort into. Getting freedom over my time and income that flows even when I’m not focused on working. I think this will also help with anxiety.

It’s a rainy day, which always makes me think about songs about rain. And kid friendly activities that don’t involve a screen. I was thinking Skyler and I could act out some skits and make some funny videos.
Although because of this rain, it has washed out a road to his friend’s house that lives further away, so we will be hosting a sleep over….wonder if I can convince his friend to play along?
I’m going to need other rainy day ideas.
So far I’ve brought a skate board into the house. I’m thinking of some sort of challenge where you have to lay on your back on the surf board.
If I think of more fun competitive kid challenges. I’ll post them here in an update.
~Cheryl