Give Yourself A Break

I love when themes keep popping up in my life. I believe it is a surefire way of God getting my attention.

This week alone, I’ve read about, written about and heard about: “giving myself a break.”

It can be easier to write about these things than to actually incorporate them into my life, but that is in essence very hypocritical…something I strive to release in my journey to be truly authentic.

So, I’m giving myself a break—more and more.

When I say break, it does mean relaxing, calming down, doing “nothing” and being okay with it throughout parts of my day. (My therapist once made a very, very good point: when you take time off and then berate yourself about what you should be doing, that is not relaxing! So then you end of feeling bad AND not getting anything accomplished)

But giving myself a break also means not beating myself up when I make a mistake. Things happen; I don’t always react like I want to. While I’m not advocating not taking responsibility for actions, I am reminding myself—and you—to be gentle with yourself. As another therapist said in an article I wrote, “we are humans…we need to leave room for error.” Awww, sounds like: take it easy, you’re not perfect!

And then, my dear husband chimed in with some sage words as I got frustrated with myself for getting frustrated with my 7-year-old. He reminded me that this parenting thing is not easy…and she’s 7. So instead of continuing to toss things around in my head and be frustrated, I gave myself a break.

I also gave myself permission to take the morning off when I was very tired…and you know what happened, I got some work done in my p.js (probably more than I did all week when I was more focused on my to-do list). There was something about giving myself a break and permission that actually energized me. Being “forced” to accomplish can produce the opposite results. I’m trying to learn this.

Are you being too hard on yourself today? Give yourself a break…and take a few minutes to Be!

Enjoy!

Take a break from multitasking!