Adding, but not taking away

More of the above technique required

A lot of life seems to go like this - adding more new things to do, but not removing anything. So there is less and less time. Work counts as one of those things that ‘has to be added’, especially if you are self employed. Time for family, friends and leisure (in my case climbing) counts as one of those things that ‘has to be sacrificed’. Too many sacrifices in a row create a bit of a crisis. And for me, thats what’s happened now.

Over the past three or four years, I’ve worked more and more and more. And every piece of added work has made me less happy. Thats not to say I don’t enjoy the work. I enjoy all of the things I do. But not the balance of them. There’s just too much of one ingredient thats blotting out everything else. Bit of a mess.

So now I just cannot continue at this pace of getting up and working straight through to the wee hours every day of my life, trying to fit in training and life on the end. Along the slide of this slippery slope I’ve forgotten what options I have for replacing new activities for old, rather than just adding, and generally fitting everything in better.

Like any big and deep change I’m going to have to be pretty firm about it. I’m hoping it follows the pattern of other really important changes that you know are the right and necessary thing to do; the hardest thing to initiate the move and the easiest thing to finish it.