Last week I decided to take a break. Not a holiday, or for a specific reason, I just decided to slow down and take some time to be with myself, pause and reflect.
Since March 2020 I’ve been on constant go mode, homeschooling and working and then catching up when the kids went back to school for pockets of time, limited childcare and living in each others pockets most of the time. So despite the media telling us that the lockdown has given so many of us time to slow down, reflect and sort our lives out, for me and the multitude of working parents out there, this last year has been anything but reflective.
So instead of ploughing on with it all and making up for lost time, I took an executive decision in my business to take my foot off the pedal, slow everything right down and spend some time with myself, taking things easy and creating some space to get clear about what I wanted to do next.
When life gets busy we often fall into the habit of continuing to stay busy, as if it’s an addiction. Sometimes we see it as a badge of honour or validation that we’re doing a good job. But in reality if we’re just busy all the time where is the space to pause, reflect, evaluate and create? Where is the space to just be?
Deciding to take a step back can feel dangerous, like the wheels will come off the minute we stop. Or it can feel lazy, as so many women have been conditioned to hold their world together and shoulder the lions share of household tasks. When you stop and decide to stop, because you know it’s actually the right thing to do and by doing it you will gain more, then that’s empowering.
Power comes from knowing what needs to be done, even if that’s doing nothing. Do, do, do only takes you so far.
Yes it might look like you’re being productive or it scores you points with your manager, but in reality where is it getting you if you’re too frazzled to think or the quality of the work you’re producing isn’t as good as it could be?
So as we go into the weekend and the world starts to open up again, before you get caught up in a crazy doing spree, try and carve out a little bit of time and take a Power Pause. Stop and reflect about where you actually want to be spending your time, what you want to be doing and how you want to do it, rather than continuing to rattle through the to do list.
Doing less can sometimes can give you more.
If you want to spend 10 minutes or so to have a mull over your career options and you’re wondering what to do next here’s a little mini visualisation to help you get some clarity.