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How to Stop Overcommitting {Episode 255}
247 Plays11 months ago
Do you have a problem with time committment? Are you perpetually overcommitting? Is it time to stop over committing? In this episode of Outnumbered the Podcast, Bonnie & Audrey share how to make your holidays more peaceful through less committments.
Mentioned in this episode:
Episode 223 - Arriving on Time
About Outnumbered the Podcast:
Two moms, parenting a combined total of 19 kids and finding joy in the chaos.
Join Audrey and Bonnie as they share real parenting tips for real people through humor, advice and compassion.
Whether it's tackling how to teach kids to work or discussing where to turn when you're all out of patience, these two experienced moms are here to offer authentic tips for raising children joyfully.
Join us:
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Transcript
Meet Audrey and Bonnie: Moms of 19
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Outnumbered the Podcast. I'm Audrey. And I'm Bonnie. We are experienced moms to a combined total of 19 children. In our weekly episodes, we explore relatable topics using our perspectives of humor and chaos. Tune in for advice and encouragement to gain more joy in your parenting journey.
Why Do We Overcommit During Holidays?
00:00:31
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to Outnumbered. We have a fun one for you today that is coming just in time for the season, the holiday season, and that is how to stop overcommitting. Tis the season for overcommitting, am I right?
00:00:43
Speaker
Yes, this is the time when people are stressed out for so many different reasons. And one of them is because they just have too much stuff going on. They feel like they can't. Well, we'll get into that in a little bit. I have something funny that my kid said the other day, my four year old, he's always coming up, of course, as the youngest of nine. He has a bigger vocabulary of words than he knows what it means. So the other day I was in the bathroom just off the kitchen and I heard him telling his, his older sister, 21, I heard her say something to him and
00:01:14
Speaker
I didn't hear what she said. It was, you know, through the door. I couldn't hear it. But he hollers back at the top of his lungs. That's it. I'm not snuggling you ever again. I changed my mind.
00:01:30
Speaker
Ooh, she did something bad. Ooh, yeah. She got the eternal unsnuggle banishment. Except he has a list, so he says snuggle. So, like, I'm not snuggling you ever again. Like, you can't take him seriously.
00:01:46
Speaker
Oh, that is the best. Why are four-year-olds so cute? Except my four-year-old is a little pill lately, and my 18-year-old was like, is he the worst four-year-old we've ever had? And I didn't say it, but I was like, actually, I think it was you. That may have just been because he was number one, and I was like, what am I going to do with this kid? Four. Anyway, so fun. So he was over-committing to under-commit on his snuggles or something, I don't know.
00:02:14
Speaker
Okay, but on that note, how many of us have over committed on consequences in the heat of the moment? Like, if you don't listen to me, you will never leave the house again. You will never go to grandma's ever again. Yeah, I tried on our outnumbered Instagram account, I basically use the stories to post funny memes and reels and things.
00:02:35
Speaker
So if you're looking for a little humor break, go check that out. But anyway, I posted this one the other day, repost this other one, this one the other day, and some dad was saying, oh, you don't think I can? And he picks up his phone and he goes, presses it like he's dialing somebody and he goes,
00:02:49
Speaker
Hello, Santa? Totally. We're going to take any consequence we can give, and very often we box ourselves into a corner. Dang it. Why did I say that?
What is Overcommitting?
00:03:01
Speaker
Okay, but today we're going to be talking about overcommitting on our time and our energy, especially when things get hectic, right? Holiday season, or maybe it's just a crazy season of life. Maybe you're feeling
00:03:12
Speaker
less competent than usual, maybe there's sickness or whatever the reason, very often we get ourselves in a little pickle where we feel like we have over committed. So today we're going to talk about multiple reasons why we tend to over commit and then solutions for each one and how we can avoid this in the future.
00:03:30
Speaker
Okay, and we're talking about, we're going to define overcommitting here as committing to anything that's not in alignment with our priorities or anything that leaves us exhausted or frustrated or resentful. Just all those bad things like leaves us feeling drained or
00:03:49
Speaker
Another thing here is that it's something that we have a choice whether we can do it or not. There's some commitments that leave us feeling exhausted, frustrated, resentful, drained, like a funeral or raising children that we don't have any choice. But we're talking about the ones where we can choose yes or no.
00:04:06
Speaker
Yeah, that's a good point. Technically, we do have a choice. We could just abandon our children, but we don't recommend that on this podcast. When we're talking about our values, we look at the bare basics, right? Way back when we did our survival episode, we talked about, what is the thing that I have to do? Well, I have to sleep and I have to eat and I have to feed my children.
00:04:25
Speaker
right? And I have to keep them alive. Like that's bare basics here, right? And so sometimes we have to go back to kind of that bare basics mentality when things get crazy. So let's talk about the first reason that it's kind of the elephant in the room for overcommitting. And I think if you are a woman, you probably relate to this on some level for some reason, it's so hard for us to not be people pleasers. So so many of us overcommit because we just want to make everybody happy. We can't say no because somebody needs something from us.
00:04:52
Speaker
or we've been asked to, you know, whatever, contribute in some capacity and we just can't say no because we want to make others happy. We think we can.
00:05:02
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of a woman, a common woman affliction, isn't it? We love to serve. It's in our nature. We often, we're trying to make somebody else happy. And usually it's at our own expense. I mean, this is so, so much the, what's the word, like the paradigm or something that like it's, it's in nursery tales. So mama bear, her porridge was, baby bears was just right. Right. And hers was too cold. So hello to all the mama bears out there whose porridge is too cold because. Yeah. We see you.
00:05:34
Speaker
Yes, that's so true. And I'm glad you brought that up, that it really is in our nature to be service-oriented, which is fantastic. That's why we're wonderful mothers, is because it fills something up in us to serve other people, unless it is draining our own cup and we can't show up for the people that matter most, right? So so many of us get caught up in this because we think we are required to do the right thing. And we forget often that other people actually don't know what the right decision for us is.
00:06:01
Speaker
Like somebody can ask us to pitch in for something, let's say a church, a church obligation or something. And we can think, yes, I'd love to help for this. And yet I know deep down that right now that's out of my wheelhouse. Right now that's going to take something away from me that I need to give to my children. And I have to be willing to say no, even though I think that might look like I'm making the wrong decision. In the end, you are the best one to decide what the right decision is for you.
00:06:24
Speaker
It's between you and God, nobody else. People can think that whatever they want to think about you, but you have to stay true to what you know is the right choice for you. Okay, so we talked about a commitment as being right if it's in alignment with our own values.
00:06:40
Speaker
We have to be pretty familiar with what our own values are, right? We have to consciously make, we talk about that all the time on this podcast. We're not, oftentimes we're not recommending a specific parenting decision. We're saying just be conscientious, be intentional about it is the word we use over and over again. We have to intentionally determine what our values are and in what order. And then when there's time and space left for other things, then we can decide which commitments that we can
00:07:06
Speaker
go with, but we like stop putting our own selves and commitments and values last. And you know, like if you've committed to exercising this year, that's a commitment to yourself. And you're probably going to put that last if somebody comes and asks you to, you know, attend this certain function or whatever.
00:07:25
Speaker
Yeah, such a good reminder that we have commitments everywhere. We technically just being a mom, there's commitments that you have to your children, right? To feed them, to clothe them, to pick up the home. But what are the commitments you've made to yourself? And you can't keep pushing those off just because somebody's always knocking on your door asking for a favor or because you see a need somewhere and you just can't help but do it, right?
00:07:47
Speaker
So, as we probably all know that saying no to something can bring up a lot of drama in our mind, right? We start spinning on all these thoughts or what are they going to think of me? Is this the right decision? She'll be mad or I want to be a good daughter, sister, neighbor, friend, whatever.
00:08:04
Speaker
All those thoughts need to be examined. Okay, so what if she is mad? If it's the decision that you know is right, you have to keep doing it right. What does it mean to be a good daughter, sister friend, right? Maybe it means sometimes saying no so that you can be a better mother because that comes first, right? So really watch those thoughts that come into your mind. There's going to be some things that come up that sound good, like, I just want to be a good daughter. But if it's not in keeping with the rest of what you got going on, you got to throw it out.
00:08:31
Speaker
Okay. All right. That's all about people pleasing. And now we're going to talk about number
The Pressures and Images We Uphold
00:08:36
Speaker
two. Sometimes we overcommit because we have this ideal that we're trying to keep up in our own mind or our own thoughts, or maybe one that's been kind of projected on us by other people, like especially those of us who are.
00:08:49
Speaker
mothers of large families. Well, if I don't have it all together, if I don't have this certain image that I project, then people are going to think bad of all large families. And I don't want to be the one responsible for that. You know, right. We have this idea of what our family is supposed to look like or we personally are supposed to be presenting.
00:09:05
Speaker
Yes, I love that. And you know what I've found interesting is that as soon as we think, as soon as we kind of accept the idea that someone has put an image on us, we are desperate to keep it up. So here's just kind of a silly example. I have a close friend from college. We talk all the time, usually on Marco Polo. And one time recently, she said something like, I can't believe how clean your house always is. Every time you do a Marco Polo, your house is clean. And I'm over here thinking,
00:09:29
Speaker
what in the world? Clearly, she's not getting a good representation of my home. Maybe I'm always in my bedroom, which I always try to keep cleaned up. But ever since then, I am panicked that I always have to do Marco Polo's in a clean room now because she thinks my house is clean. I got to keep up this image. I mean, she's one of my best friends. Do I care if she comes over and sees my dirty house? No, she knows. She has dirty house sometimes too. But
00:09:52
Speaker
In my mind now, I'm like, I got to live this up, even though it's not even true. Why do we do that to ourselves? We have this kind of expectation for ourself, especially if we think other people have it for us and we just have to live up to it. It's so silly. In reality, we know that absolutely no one on the planet is perfect, but Instagram has us all fooled, or Marco Polo thinking we see this tiny little snippet in somebody's life and we think, oh, look, they've got it all together.
00:10:17
Speaker
It's absolutely not true. Every one of us knows it. Every one of us knows it, and yet we just love to be fooled and get on there and go, wouldn't it be nice? Scroll, scroll. If my house looked like that, scroll, scroll. It's just not reality. Well, I'm going to be honest here. I would love it if my house was clean all the time, but the reality is that I have nine children, six of whom still live at home, and my house isn't clean.
00:10:42
Speaker
Like I went to check and see if lunch was cleaned up about an hour ago. For reference, it's two o'clock in the afternoon. Nobody done anything. Well, I can't tell you how often. I very often go into my office right after lunch and say, okay, in an hour or two, I'll come check jobs and I come out and there's like hands still sitting on the counter. I'm like, oh, that's safe. Thanks guys.
00:11:02
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. But, but I would love to have a clean house and someday I will have a perfectly clean house, but right now is not the time. So we need to ask ourselves, like, why is it important to us? Like, so just start digging into these thoughts, like.
00:11:16
Speaker
Why do we want to have a perfect image? Or why do we want to have a clean image? Or why do we want it to be seen in a certain way? It's probably because we're afraid of rejection if the people knew the real us, or if they would think less of us, or whatever. Dig into it and find out is it pride, or is it fear, or is it what? What is the emotion that's causing us to overcommit to so many things?
00:11:41
Speaker
Yeah, and on that vein, think about it. Let's go back to keeping my house clean so my friend can always see clean rooms. For me to keep doing that, the only reason I'm doing it is in order to try to control her thoughts, which is side note, completely impossible, and control what she thinks of me, also impossible. So if we can just step back from, she's going to think and believe anything she wants to about me and she gets to.
00:12:06
Speaker
And I get to think and believe anything I want to, and mine's going to be more based in reality because I live this life, but to just let go of allowing people to think and do and feel any way they want to towards you. And, side note, if they feel badly towards you, like there's resentment or they think it's disgusting the way you live your life and how your house looks like, that actually only affects them. It doesn't affect you unless you take that feeling on yourself.
00:12:33
Speaker
So I'm just going to let her think, you know, maybe she sees a sandwich that's been sitting out there for two hours and she thinks it's gross. Great. She can deal with those feelings all on her own. I don't have to take them on for me. I can just know that that's my reality and it's okay. Right? So interesting if we can just stop trying to control others. In my experience, I've actually noticed that the more
00:12:53
Speaker
I show up as myself and stop pretending to have it all together. The more I make friends and the more people resonate with me because they're like, I see in me what I see in you. Somebody who's just trying to handle all the chaos and take care of all these things that are piling up on them. Um, so sometimes I just need to tell myself, Hey, I think right now people just need to see the real me because they know they're all their faults. They need to know I have them as well.
00:13:19
Speaker
Yeah, going back to what people think about us. Interestingly enough, about a month ago, I overheard a conversation between two people about a third person. And this third person is somebody that I knew much better than either of those two people knew, the third person. And what they were saying about the third person was so interesting to me because it was completely inaccurate.
00:13:41
Speaker
about what they were saying. And I was thinking, wow, I wonder what it is. I was totally objective. I didn't jump in and defend this third person or whatever. I was just like, I wonder what it is in these two people discussing the third person that makes them think what they are about the third person. So if we can keep that in mind, that's really an interesting way to think about what other people are thinking instead of taking it all on ourselves. Oh, they think blah, blah, blah about me, so it must be true.
00:14:10
Speaker
In fact, that's something, a mantra that I use with my little kids all the time. They come to me, so-and-so called me a dumb idiot. Then my first response is, just because they said it, does it make it true? And the answer is, well, no. Then my next question always is, well, do you think it's true? Do you think you're a dumb idiot? No. And then my third question is, well, then what does that tell us about the third person?
00:14:37
Speaker
or your sibling that said this. And just a little exercise. I'm very adept at walking my kids through, but some reason when it comes to me and what other people think about me or my family or my home, or if I don't attend their event, I have a much harder time applying that little question sequence. Oh, I love that. I'm totally going to steal that. Yeah. Just because they say it doesn't make it true and a great reminder for myself.
00:15:03
Speaker
Okay, so then we can ask ourselves what would happen if we show up exactly how we are, whether that's messy, if we show up late or if we show up with our kids not all matching or whatever is this perfect thing in our head. What would that mean about us? Would we be any less valuable?
00:15:19
Speaker
Hint, no. But just put ourselves, sometimes it helps me to not go to this event in my mind and think, okay, now I'm not at this event and all these people are there and thinking about them. And is everybody standing around talking about, oh, Audra didn't show up? No, probably not. Right. You're at home having all this drama about, oh, what are they saying about me? And meanwhile, they're like, oh, you didn't come? I thought you were there.
00:15:47
Speaker
Totally. Oh, I thought I saw you. Okay, so while we're talking about perfect images, can we just address the elephant in another elephant in the room? And that is family pictures, because I'm sure right around this time, people are getting family pictures, maybe you're getting Christmas cards, and you're looking at everybody else's perfectly coiffed, dressed children in a perfect cornfield with the professional photographer. So unrealistic, right? So I we just got our family pictures back a little while ago. And
00:16:15
Speaker
It didn't go great. My baby has her thumb or a sucker in her mouth the whole time because she just did not want to be there. But what's funny is I love the perfect ones because it's just so fun to see, oh my gosh, we did it. We got everybody looking. Oh my goodness. Everybody's smiling like it's like this big accomplishment. But every time I share outtakes, every time I share one where we're all like sticking our tongues out at each other or somebody's pulling somebody's hair or just the funny ones that are kind of behind the scenes,
00:16:41
Speaker
All my friends and family are like, that's my favorite. I love that one because you see personality, because you see the mess ups, because you see the frustration. People just giggle because it's real life and everybody wants to know that they're not alone and that they're dealing with the same real life things that you are. I think that's so interesting how much more people love the real shots.
00:17:03
Speaker
Yes, that is so true. And if I know anything about photographers, they have probably photoshopped the family pictures so that, you know, swapped out a head for another head because somebody had their eyes closed. I mean, that's what good photographers do. So there is no real pictures out there anyway.
00:17:17
Speaker
That's true, we have one of our extended family and I don't know, I think at least half are photoshopped. It's like it's a beautiful picture but it is for sure not real. No way we could have had all those people looking. Okay, so let's talk about the third reason that we overcommit.
Why Does Everything Seem Appealing?
00:17:31
Speaker
And sometimes we overcommit with our daily activities the same way we do with our plate at Thanksgiving dinner. We just think we can handle more than we can.
00:17:39
Speaker
We're like, oh, that looks good. Oh yeah, I'll do that. That sounds fun. Sure. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And then you sit down, you make it halfway through and you go, oh, I'm going to be sick. And that's how life turns out sometimes. By the end of Wednesday, Thursday, I'm going, oh, I'm never going to get everything done that I needed to get done this week. Why did I do this? Oh my goodness. And then we start to kind of fall apart a little bit because we have overcommitted just because everything looks so good.
00:18:01
Speaker
Yeah. The pumpkin pie. The dessert. Well, we always have like a three hour buffer between dinner and dessert so you can digest a little bit. I know. This one Thanksgiving place that we went to, they went for a walk between dinner and dessert. I was like, this is so smart. Let it all settle in the crack so you can come back for pumpkin pie. Oh yeah. That reminds me of our episode that we did about arriving on time for large families.
00:18:28
Speaker
You have to add lots of buffer. Not how long is it going to take there, but how long is it going to take there plus 10 minutes per child in your family, right? If you have two appointments in one day, that's a lot. Don't volunteer to bring something, you know, decorate your son's classroom or bring a salad to the next event or whatever else you have going on. Just like, hold off. You can't be everything to everyone. So just like pace yourself.
00:18:54
Speaker
Yes, I personally do this all the time. And I've realized that sometimes it's just a matter of looking at my calendar a little bit more carefully. So let's say I'm at the orthodontist and they say, when do you want to book the next appointment? Instead of just zooming in on a day and picking it, I'll zoom out and look at the day before, look at the day after.
00:19:09
Speaker
Just acknowledge like okay, what's that week gonna look like because things pile up really quickly in my life Also pay attention to things like so when my husband leaves town, I now put it on every day of the day He's gonna be gone. So I don't forget in two months or remember that see that big block letters Luke is gone Don't over plan because you're gonna be solo parenting that week, right? So just
00:19:29
Speaker
pay attention to those things like just a simple example i generally do not schedule appointments on monday's mondays are just kind of crazy you're getting back into the week you're ordering groceries you're like picking up your house after the weekend i don't want extra stuff on that day or sometimes i will have specific work projects or organization projects that i have to block time off for and i actually do it on my calendar to make sure that i don't
00:19:49
Speaker
don't overcome it. But of course, on top of the schedule, there's also mental health stuff. Like I mentioned, a husband being gone or maybe you're going through a surgery or your kid is or something else that's going to be requiring more. Just pay a little bit better attention to what you've got coming up. Yeah. Monday, also for those of us who have religious obligations and large families, Monday is like the mountain of laundry day, right?
00:20:15
Speaker
If you don't get it on Monday, then it avalanches into Tuesday, not even exaggerating here. So then think about when you have an event and who might be there at that event and how emotionally drained you're going to be the next day. Do you need to like kind of have a day for recuperating that kind of thing?
00:20:31
Speaker
And then if you have things really tightly planned, ask yourself, well, what happens if you get sick or one of your kids gets sick or your car breaks down or another problem? Like my daughter and I have been talking about this a lot because she is working full time and going to college full time and studying for an exam, a big exam.
00:20:49
Speaker
And we call it like she's right at the edge, like she's pushing the edge and all these things she's taken on. And we talk about all the time, we'll make sure you're taking your vitamins and make sure you're getting enough sleep and make sure you're still exercising because if you get sick,
00:21:04
Speaker
not only one of these things is going to fall down, but all three of them are going to suffer that you're doing. So just good to think about, yes, this is great. I can meet all these commitments if everything goes as planned. But let me give you a tip here. Not everything is going to go as planned because you have a large family.
00:21:21
Speaker
Yes, exactly, exactly. Yeah, when you start telling yourself, okay, everything's going to go great as long as nothing goes wrong, then that is the universe saying something will go wrong. I don't know how many times you look at, oh, I saw a meme recently that was like adulthood is basically just saying after this week, things will slow down a little bit forever and ever until you die.
00:21:45
Speaker
But we actually have a little bit of control over that. We really can change things if we need to. So for those of us who might be productivity addicts or just have a lot on your plate period, like a million kids, this can be really difficult. I love to get things done. Like right before we started recording, I was supposed to be feeding my kids lunch and cleaning up after it, but I decided to organize a closet because I got the organizers in the mail from Amazon. I was like, now's a good time to put it together. No, it wasn't.
00:22:10
Speaker
But yeah, I did it. I have to just step back and say, how was the time for that? Slow down, put the brakes on a little bit, allow myself some breathing room for those unexpected things to happen. And if nothing unexpected happens, great. You got a little bit of relaxation time. You could sit down with a book. You can cuddle a kid, whatever.
00:22:28
Speaker
But especially around the holidays, if needed, okay, let's just say it is needed, schedule in buffer time. A couple hours to do nothing. A couple hours to relax. A couple hours to sit and look at your Christmas tree lights. I don't care. Allow yourself some space.
00:22:41
Speaker
One thing I do when I have a lot of commitments that I can't get out of or have refused to get out of is I will delegate, delegate, delegate to anybody and everybody that I can, my kids. And I realize that when I'm doing this, that I'm going to need to give them extra time off later. But often I'll say to them, I'm only going to do the things that only I can do. And so that means you're going to have to empty the dishwasher because you're able to do that. Because right now I can only do the things
00:23:07
Speaker
that only I can do. So you can't make this salad, but you can't empty the dishwasher to help. So that's how we're going to do this, right? So just kind of delegate is a little tip there. When and where you can. Oh, actually, I'm so glad you brought that up because when we do need to step back, there are a handful of things that only we can do. And that's a really important distinction. You don't really realize that until you have maybe big kid helpers or somebody to lean on. But then you have to realize, like, if you have a nursing baby, who can do that? You and you alone.
00:23:35
Speaker
Right? Who can tuck your kid in because you want to connect with them? Just you, right? Delegate all the rest. I love that concept. Yeah. You don't know how many times my husband would bring a crying baby to me and say, if I could nurse this baby to make it stop, I would, but I can't. Yeah. And of course, they always think that's the problem. Well, I'm pretty sure he's hungry. Well, eight, 30 minutes ago, but okay. Let's give it a shot.
00:23:57
Speaker
If it's a he, it is hungry. If it's one of my boys, it's only true. Human pacifier. Okay. Getting back on track here, consider a reset. How about if this holiday season or for a week, you just eliminated everything that was unnecessary for life for a while?
00:24:15
Speaker
Like just do a reset week. It would set you up so much better for the upcoming events or the upcoming holidays or whatever's upcoming in your life. And then slowly add back in things one at a time the next week. So I guess you got to get a two week reset so that you can be in a better place to start getting meeting commitments again. Like you can start from a place of rest instead of a place of being stressed out.
00:24:41
Speaker
Yeah. When I first started homeschooling, we were following the Thomas Jefferson education framework. And one thing that they teach in their framework is that they call it the six months now. And they say when you first start homeschooling or when things get out of control, you just choose a six month period to do nothing, nothing extra. I mean, obviously you're not doing nothing when you're homeschooling your children, but no extracurriculars, no parties, no, I mean, you can go on a date night with your husband, but no big
00:25:05
Speaker
things that are going to just suck the life and energy out of you, especially as a homeschooler, because it requires so much brain and emotional energy to do all this for your children. Just say no for a while. And we've done this a couple of times, usually not a full six months, but maybe a semester or something where we just say no to anything besides family time, homeschool time, church stuff. And it might sound a little bit like March of 2020, like many of us.
00:25:32
Speaker
had nothing going on during COVID, right? And many of us loved it. And three months later, we're like, how can we make this happen forever, right? Where we're home more together, less things intruding on our time. So that's absolutely within your power, absolutely within your power. And no one will die. And you'll probably all look back really fondly on it. Okay, don't allow your
00:25:54
Speaker
inclination to be service oriented or loving or well thought of, impede your mental health or how you care for your family or what your priorities are, putting
Strategies to Avoid Overcommitting
00:26:03
Speaker
those first. You have to put yourself and your family first because there are things that only you can do. And so you have to be in a good condition to do only those things. So just think about
00:26:14
Speaker
When you're asked to make a commitment, maybe your first step could be, we'll get back to you on that after we discuss it. And so then you don't have to do like an immediate maybe is easier, maybe for you than an immediate yes or no. And so then discuss it and reassess your priorities and all that. So immediately just say, Hey, that sounds nice. We'll discuss it and get back with you.
00:26:36
Speaker
Yes, I love that. That's a really non-confrontational way to just say, oh, what a great opportunity. Can I have a day to think about it? The other thing I'm sure we've all heard of is the old advice that if somebody asks you to do something and it's not a heck yes, then it's a no, right? So maybes or nos. My kids have figured that out, right? Oh, when she says maybe it means no, they all grumble when I say maybe to anything.
00:26:59
Speaker
But it's true because if it's not a heck yes, it's going to be a no, that's not not in my wheelhouse. And you know, along the lines of service, if you do have lots of opportunities to serve and yet you find yourself kind of being tapped out, maybe you come up with just one opportunity that you always say yes to.
00:27:15
Speaker
And the rest, no. So a simple example, there's not a lot I can do in this current phase of life that is big and extravagant when it comes to service. I can't plan a big party. I can't help out in a lot of ways that I might like to. But one thing I can do is I can bring dinner to new moms. And that's something I sign up for a lot. We usually have a sign up genius or something if there's a new baby in our congregation. And I say, I can do that. I'm making dinner anyway. I could just make more and go drop it off in bonus. I get to go see a baby. So that's one thing I very often say yes to.
00:27:43
Speaker
There are many, many, many more that I say no to because they're just too hard to fit into my life. But if you really want to serve, find a way you can and go all in on that unless you're already dying and then just say no for the time being and then revamp your priorities. Okay.
Embracing a Slower-Paced Life
00:28:01
Speaker
Guys, I want to give you a little perspective here. I have been a serial under-committer.
00:28:09
Speaker
for much of my time that I have been raising kids because I don't know why but I just want to be at home with my kids. So I'm like the boring person that I don't go and I'm not there. But I tell you what, it has made for an amazing family and I have been so less stressed out than I would be if I committed to all the things.
00:28:35
Speaker
Also, probably we live in a rural area and there aren't as many opportunities as there would be in another place that had more people and more events and all that. But I just want to give you perspective to say that you don't have to...
00:28:48
Speaker
You don't have to commit to all the things. Fear of missing out is something that people experience as well. F-M-O, F-M-O, is that right? FOMO. FOMO, F-O-M-O, sorry. FOMO, fear of missing out, something that a lot of people experience. But once you've missed out a couple of times and you see it's not really that big of a deal, then it's all right. I also just kind of have this standard rule that my kids aren't in
00:29:17
Speaker
events while we're doing school. So in the summer, yeah, great. Let's go places and do stuff. But in the winter when we're doing homeschooling, like that's my max. That's what I've committed to. And I'm going to do that well because I found out that if I commit to a bunch of things and I don't really do any of them very well. So just just a perspective, maybe.
00:29:36
Speaker
you won't die if you don't go to all the things or be in all the things or your kid isn't all the things. And I have found that it's made really one of our values was just to have a slower paced quieter life and family. And so that was like one of our main values. And so that made it easy to not overcome it.
00:29:55
Speaker
I love that you shared that and that's my ultimate example because conversely, I am an overcommitter to AT because I have, I wouldn't say FOMO. I just think that life is so amazing. There are so many opportunities and so many exciting things. Just I want to do them all. Let's bring them. Let's do them all, right? And then halfway through, I'm thinking, okay, maybe all was overcommitted. Maybe even like
00:30:17
Speaker
30% is a bit much, right? So if it were up to me and I had all the time in the world, we would do all the things. All the kids would do all the extracurriculars and we would go to parties and do fun things. And somewhere along the line, probably kid six or seven, I realized, oh, there is a limit to what I can do. And it has been a wonderful learning opportunity as I have shifted kind of more into this space that Audrey's talking about of
00:30:38
Speaker
Actually, the priority is to be here in my home. That my home is a special, I would even say sacred place where we get to feel love and comfort and we get to rally around and be safe from the world. And the more time we spend in it, the stronger it gets and how important it is for us to just come together every day and feel that protection, I guess. I don't know if that sounds silly, but
00:31:02
Speaker
I love being in my home. And now I get a little bit more time and energy to make it a wonderful, comfortable place. Not perfectly clean, as we mentioned, but comfortable and a place that kids love to be and friends of kids and our friends as well. But to just challenge yourself to say, what is the benefit to this and what is the potential drawback? And sometimes when we ask ourselves about the drawback, the benefit of taking your kid to soccer, great. He gets to run around and he gets opportunity to be on a team.
00:31:30
Speaker
The drawbacks could be less family time, less time to connect with your spouse or your other kids, less time to have dinner as a family. Is that really worth the trade-off? Not saying that soccer is bad. I'm just saying. Just think about the pros and the cons when you are feeling a little bit stretched and you might want to make some changes, which is a wonderful thing. All right, friends. That's all we have for you today in this episode. Go out, commit less, have a wonderful, peaceful holiday season, and we'll talk to you next week.
00:31:59
Speaker
Thanks for listening, friends. Click the link in the show notes to subscribe to our email and never miss another episode.
00:32:20
Speaker
It's almost like waiting for the next contraction when a thought disappears. Only less bad when it comes back. It's the waiting that's painful. It's true. It's true. It's like, oh, oh, here it comes. Oh, shoot. Okay. Okay. How? Oh, I got it. I'm having my contraction.