If it’s not serving you, let it go

This month we’re looking at what’s not working for us, so today I have a question for you – what’s no longer serving you?

Sometimes we keep on doing things simply because we’re in the habit of doing them and not because they actually serve us anymore.

Let me explain.

You go through a really busy period at work and work until 6pm every night. After that, it’s become a habit so you continue to do so even though there’s really no need. But this time spent is no longer serving you. You could be enjoying the extra time at home with your family, exercising, taking up a new hobby, etc.

Or you might have a bookshelf full of books you don’t like or need to have. You may have bought them because people on Instagram were talking about them but they’re not really your thing so you haven’t read them. These self-imposed expectations are no longer serving you.

One more…you have 5 sets of bed linen for your guest bedroom. You have guests twice a year for a week at a time, so you never even get past set 3 on the shelf. You feel like you should keep the linen because you bought some of those sheet sets at a sale and you haven’t really used them yet but… they’re not really your favourites. Those sheets staring at you from the shelf are no longer serving you.

Last year I decided to host what I called crafternoons – afternoons for groups of my girlfriends to craft. Craft was a very loose definition because photos, card-making, baking, knitting, colouring was all welcomed.

I hosted four of these but they never had more than 3 of us at any one time. They were enjoyable but they weren’t what I envisioned, especially because I’d invite about 10 ladies every time.

The crafternoons were no longer serving me so I let them go.

This is a small example but I felt such relief at the thought of moving onto something that might work better to get friends together, and that cleared the space for me to start a book club.

My challenge to you is to jot down 3 – 5 things in your life that are no longer serving you. And let them go.

They can be anything from kitchen utensils and nail polish, to bad habits and self-imposed expectations. Anything.

What’s no longer serving you? What do you need to let go of?

It’s not just about stationery

Some of you who follow the Organising Queen feed will have seen this post on Wednesday…

This is not about a pencil case.

Of course, there is the fact that I have to replace all my stuff but I have the money so that’s not an issue.

What really threw me are three things:

  1. the fact that it has not been found is actually almost impossible so I now think it was stolen, and this brings with it its own set of challenges. Do I work with colleagues who would steal someone’s things? Maybe I’m naive but we’re in financial services… honesty and integrity…..where is that?
  2. then almost no-one even seemed to care about the loss. I get that people don’t have the same attachment to things but when things like this happen to others, I care, and for me to get no care kind-of threw me. I really wasn’t myself for 2 days.
  3. my flash drive was in that pencil case. I’d backed it up thoroughly on 22 Dec, but I did lots of work in January which is all gone (created printables and such), and then lots of new budgets and stuff. I keep thinking of more and more things now missing which is how these things normally go.

Yesterday in church I realised that I need to move on from this. It is not going to matter in a year’s time so best I start taking steps to put it behind me.

I actually made a list in my bullet journal of documents I need to recreate/ update and folders I need to copy from my external hard drive. I felt some relief the minute I looked at that list because I realised it wasn’t that bad. I also prayed that that flash drive malfunctions for the person who has it.

And now the hard work starts. Redoing 3 months of my budget (while buying and selling a house)

Of course, I’m never walking with things in my arms again.

I’m on holiday at the moment and sadly, I will use up a good few hours to work on all these documents.

When did you last have a techno malfunction?

How would you have reacted in this situation?

Relieve your scrapbooking guilt

I see mothers all over the internet feeling guilty about how they’re always behind with their kids’ scrapbooks.

A large part of that reason is that all our expectations are too high.

If you are a scrapbooker, why do you do scrap? (is that the correct word?)

Is it to preserve a memory?

If that’s true, then relax your standards somewhat and just get the memories down.

If it’s to foster your creativity, then by all means get fancy but remember the reason you got into it in the first place.

I am not a scrapbooker by any means (I lack patience and “fiddliness”) but I do want to preserve some memories.

One of the things on my 37 things list is to do two crafty/creative projects a month.

I’ve done a couple of projects and thought I’d show you my first attempt – a pseudo-scrapbook :

For those of you who are TRULY crafty, don’t laugh – this is HUGE for me.

  • I bought a brag book.
  • I used some of the party printables for the front and back covers.
  • Printed TONS of pics from the party.
  • Arranged them in an order that made me happy.
  • Put in some of the leftover cupcake toppers and tented food tags.
  • Realised I still had space for about 6 pics.
  • Went back to the photo shop to print additional pics.
  • Rearranged a little bit more.
  • Called it a day.

Am VERY happy with the results.

I showed the people at work and (just goes to show what kind of people I work with) they were all SO enthusiastic and encouraging about my efforts that 3 of them want me to do their kids’ party.

Um, no thanks 🙂

If you’re stuck in scrapbooking guilt, just go get some brag book, put your pics in, journal on the opposite side of the book and call it a day.

I guarantee you’ll feel so much better.

What do you think of my little project?

 

PS would you like me to show you some more of my very low-maintenance attempts at making cute things?

 

 

Letting go – part 1

I am teaching myself to let go.

I recently read a fantastic book called Motherstyles (Janet Penley) and it correctly identified that for my Myers-Briggs personality style (ESTJ) one of my struggles is letting go.

The book talks specifically about parenting but I recognise it in so many areas of my life and this is something I feel that I need to do some self-coaching on.

But as with everything in life, I’m doing it in baby steps.

So first thing to let go of was an easy-ish one. My diary (planner).

red diary

I have a GORGEOUS deep red diary/ planner but I haven’t been using it regularly. The same thing happened last year – I thought it was the maternity leave/ baby thing but no. I forget to look in it half the time and then two weeks pass.

And what good is a diary if you don’t look at it?

No more.

So I let go.

  • Even though it cost a bit of money.
  • Even though I’d customised it perfectly.
  • Even though it’s bee-yoo-ti-ful. Don’t you agree?

And so on.

I was thinking about WHY I’m not using the beautiful diary and I realised I really, really, REALLY love a week-at-a-glance diary – that’s how I plan my life and that’s what works best for me.

week at a glance

I had a spare week-at-a-glance diary I got on a sale so I hauled it out and I am so much happier.

I planned out the rest of the month and it’s been so EASY doing it like this!

Small steps, people.

Yes, I’m sad not using the other but I cheer myself up because I’m teaching myself to let go 🙂

What are you working on? Please tell me I’m not the only one with issues.

Resources: How to set and achieve your goals

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