Habits

My husband says I'm a creature of habit and he's right. I often do things on autopilot and so sometimes it's hard when the environment changes and I need to adapt my response. As the wise GR says, "Habits are good servants, but bad masters." While I definitely need to work on being more "in the moment" and adaptable than I am, I feel that right now, I want to focus on cultivating more good habits.

Some of my old favorite "good habits" such as keeping my wallet and keys in my purse at all times, carrying something to read for the commute, and using my cab time to connect with family simplify my life and add pleasure to my day. These are the newer habits that I'm trying to incorporate.

1. Observe the one-minute rule: I absolutely love the one minute rule (courtesy: The Happiness Project) which basically says that if you can do something in one minute...DO IT. Don't procrastinate just do it then and there. So for instance, I'd cut out the Portico bedsheets washing instructions some days back to make sure the bright sheets wouldn't bleed and the paper was just floating around. When I saw it today evening, I just snapped it with Evernote and got rid of the paper. A small action but a useful one!

2. Pack eats for the husband: My husband travels a lot and doesn't often have the time to have fixed meals during the day. So, recently, I started stashing Tiger biscuits (he's a baby, he loves 'em :)), Oreos, and some breakfast bars right in his laptop backpack so that he has some emergency supply when he needs it.

3. Plan ahead: I'm extremely possessive of my time and very irritable if it goes "waste." [To clarify, I do NOT define lazing around on the weekend as "wasting time;" that's usually  quality time or unwind time, both of which are super-critical for me!] So, I like to tackle my To-Do list as efficiently as possible so that I'm freeing myself to do things I find more fun, meaningful, interesting, and relaxing. Recently I've been trying to plan ahead to help me use my time smartly. So, we recently bought a nice bedsheet to give as a wedding gift to the hubby's cousin though the wedding is still a couple of months away; since we knew this was a to-do, we shopped for it while we were picking up our own home stuff at The Home Stop sale. The pros: we saved time and money, picked a really nice, thoughtful gift, and felt on top of things :)

So far, so good :) I'll be thinking about identifying more such habits and hopefully adopting them in my routine!

Time

One of the biggest things I’ve come to treasure since I started working four years ago is time. Like many others, I wonder why I whiled away my college years. Now that I’m out of the house for most of the day, it feels like there isn’t any time to do anything. I come home, eat dinner while watching Masterchef Australia (Yay!!), catch up with the husband on the phone since he’s traveling for work, talk to mommy who needs quality time (and who’s conversations I adore), talk to the MIL a bit, and there it is, I’m ready to crash for the day. I could get up earlier given that three days of the week I leave comfortably after ten to squeeze in some time, but that’s proven hard to do, given that I’m a night owl, more than a lark. But I have noticed that I get very irritable and generally depressed without some down time and happier when I’ve had some time to unwind. I read about a study that said humans have a limited amount of self-control that keeps getting exhausted with the demands of the day. I do feel that's true for me at least. So, by the time I read home, I'm more susceptible to getting irritable or quick to anger, than I am in office. This worries me because I want to give the best of me at home, not just at office. But since I'm an HSP (highly sensitive person), I can usually get agitated or disturbed at things that most people wouldn't mind—and even more so at the fag end of the day. For instance, I don't have the capacity to watch Dexter at night (and not much appetite otherwise as well). The final element to this whole "Time" question is my desire for time to pursue what I feel are my interests such as reading, and spend some time on areas in my life that I'd like to nurture such as writing and cooking and not just be defined by my work alone. I friend recently told me of a quote "From 18-32, focus on nurturing your inner child (instead of having children)."And it struck me as true, in that, I feel that I haven't nurtured the more "alternative" of my interests so far: writing, meditation, traveling, alternative healing. I recently came across the blog of Yashodhara Lal, a famous Indian blogger, who is a working mom of three kids under the age of five who’s also recently written a book. WOW! But, I have NO idea how she/women like her do it. I’m also not sure if such a tightly wound schedule (It has to be!!) is right for me. But I do know that I can get more out of life (spend quality ( and quantity :)) time with my husband, family, friends, travel) , squeeze some time to pursue my interests, and squeeze in some time to just vegetate. I’m not sure if I have any answers yet, but I know this is an area that matters a lot to me and my happiness.  Like the wise Gretchen Rubin says “If you feel happy, you make others happy. If you make others happy, you feel happy yourself.”