When You Realize You Can’t Do It All: A 3 Step Solution

In a world where lives are played out on a social stage, it might look like the phrase ‘you can’t do it all’ is a lie, but all you have to do is step backstage to see the truth.

On stage we see what the players want us to see. Backstage is where the truth hides.

The Lie Will Set Your Hair on Fire!

It’s tempting to try and live the onstage lie – and almost everyone tries at some point in their life. I did!

I was a homeschooling mom of 4, providing in-home childcare for 2-3 others, meal prepping, coupon clipping to the max (yes…I was one of those women with the meticulously organized coupon notebook), growing vegetable and herb gardens, canning anything you could put in a mason jar, launching a business, volunteering in the city choir, singing on the church praise team (never missing a rehearsal), volunteering to lead VBS productions, launching and leading a local homeschooling support chapter, etc…. I’m exhausted just remembering it! Oh…and striving daily to keep a neat and tidy house. Phew!

The moms of today look at the mom’s of ‘the old days’ and think we don’t have a clue about the demands of living up to expectations because we didn’t have social media.

Sure… the stage of social media wasn’t around yet, so we actually met up with people in real life! This was where the ‘on stage’ scenes played out…. where we created the comparison stories in our heads and determined we weren’t measuring up if we didn’t do all the things we saw everyone else doing. Backstage – behind the doors of private homes – was where the messy, the meltdowns, and the unhappy played out that we didn’t see. Just ask my 4 kids!

Hair on fire – the messy, the meltdowns, the unhappy.

The Truth Will Set Your Heart on Fire!

I don’t remember exactly what happened to bring me to a breaking point, but break I did. I do remember grabbing the car keys, telling my husband to watch the kids, and embarking on a long drive to nowhere. In that quiet time I was able to have a really good conversation with myself and I decided something or some THINGS had to change because the truth was – I couldn’t do it all.

Here’s the system that worked for me then and has never failed me since:

1) Pick the few things that are most important to you and you want to give them your best.

• These are the things that bring you and/or your family joy and doing them full out sets your heart on fire
• These things make a difference vs just nice to do
• These things may have urgency – the time to do them is now because the opportunity won’t be here later
  • But urgency doesn’t mean necessity! Time or season dependent things that don’t make a difference or bring joy are not necessarily a priority.

2) Give yourself permission to do a few other things messy.

• These things bring you joy but could be done ‘less than’
  • Less than perfect
  • Less than full out
  • Less consistently

3) Pin the rest.

• This isn’t a no-never decision. It’s a no-not-right-now decision.
  • It may bring you joy to do it but it didn’t make the step 1 or 2 list so it’s time to pause it….for now.
• These things won’t be terribly or even slightly missed by you or your family if you don’t do them.
• These things are likely things you’re doing to please others but if you didn’t do them…someone else would step in and fill the gap.

The Result

Once we decide to filter our priorities (aka – get to the breaking point that something has to give), we wonder why we didn’t do this long ago. That was my experience! Here’s what my results were when I first applied this process so many years ago:

• My 3 must do things were
  • Family
    • Specifically, raising my children with the experiences and education I was called to give them. No compromise.
  • Income
    • We were a family struggling to make ends meet. I needed to focus on finding a way to help without compromising family.
  • Meal Prepping and Planning
    • This helped with the income situation AND it was important to me to raise my family around the dinner table.
    • I did, however, adjust my 100% to focus on the most important things and let go of things like canning and aggressive couponing!
• Some of my messy things were:
  • Neat and tidy house at all times.
    • I gave myself permission to have a comfortable home but not a perfect home.
    • I didn’t have to let go of neat and tidy altogether. I found my comfortable messy. [Eventually – my attention to income allowed me to actually hire help with this!]
  • Church
    • This was not a statement of valuing God less. It was a realization that I could do the things that I valued most (nurturing intimacy with God and fellowship with others) and stop doing the things that I did to prove my value (over-volunteering!) Praise team was important and brought me joy – but volunteering for every VBS and church event wasn’t necessary.
• Some of my ‘pin it’ things were:
  • City Choir – I LOVED being in the choir, but at the end of the day, it wasn’t the end of the world to pin it for a while and join again later when priorities could shift
  • Leading the Homeschooling Chapter – While I loved being able to bring my organizational gifts to the group as a leader, truth was – others could step in and do it as well or better. I could still enjoy the fellowship of meetings, but I could step back from time consuming obligations.

To this day, when I’m feeling the overwhelm of hair fire living – I pause and do a quick 3 step evaluation. There’s always something that I see I can change to tamp out growing hair fires!

Thoughts?

So what are your thoughts? Does this make you pause and go “hmmmmmm???” Or does it make you panic and run?

I could share a lot more on this, providing checklists or guides. Would that be helpful?

Drop a comment and let me know!

Living with your heart on fire and keeping the fire out of your hair is not a special skill or ability that some have and some do not, but sometimes we need help stoking the right fire.

One of the things that sets my heart on fire is helping others sort and sift through their thoughts, find focus, and develop habits that will serve them well. {stoke a heart fire – not a hair fire!} Reach out if you could use a little 1:1 support, or if I could bring an empowering message of Heart Fire Living to your group, organization, or business.