Tag: type a

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Fabulous living

Embracing Change

Hello all! 

Happy Wednesday! I hope you are all enjoying June and the summer season. I hope your days are filled with time by the pool, stopping and smelling the roses and late nights by the fire. That all sounds dreamy, but in reality, you may have children home from school with no schedule, or you may be working full time and life looks the same as it does in December.

I love the summer season and try to sneak in pockets for relaxing or doing something fun even in the midst of work and life and my daily routine.

Beautiful days on the water

Whether it’s a walk after work, dinner outside, or reading by the pool on a day off, I have been trying my best to find ways to enjoy the summer season when I can and break up my routine. 

Speaking of routines, that’s what today’s post is all about being flexible and adapting to change.

Last week, we talked about summer schedules and routines and rhythms. As you may have noticed, I love a good routine, but I need to get better at adapting and getting used to change, especially when my schedule gets thrown off. So today we are talking about change on a broader scale.

Change, we either embrace or we fear it, in some cases we may even try to deny it. (Hello, that’s me sometimes!)

I’ve never been one who adapts easily to change. I’m as Type A as they come, I crave a schedule, routine, and I’m very regimented. I admit to getting thrown of when my routine gets thrown off or I don’t accomplish everything I want to in a day or on my to-do list. I know no one is putting the pressure on me and I create the pressure, but I don’t always do well with leaving things not completed.

Although being organized and regimented are all good qualities to have, they have held me back from being flexible and sometimes adaptable to life and being spontaneous to activities and adventures. I may get stressed about being out late or not feeling a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day. For the last several years, I have kept putting “be flexible” on my new year’s resolutions or goals, and often times I try to be more flexible, but I slip back into old habits of being regimented.

This past year has brought some changes to my life, and more are on the way. They are all good things, but they are changes, nonetheless. I decided this year to embrace the change rather than fear it. It was a daunting goal and one I’m still trying to navigate. I have been listening to The Lazy Genius Podcast by Kendra Adachi and one of her pillars is starting small. I have really been working on starting small when it comes to decision making or when I get overwhelmed with change. Rather than try to solve all my problems, I focus on what I can control and make decisions about.

I have been trying to look at change as an exciting time, rather than a stressful time. I am looking at the positives of a new routine or seeing how I can grow as a person through change. Plus, so often we see the best changes in ourselves when we have to go through the uncomfortable moments in life. 

As practical way that I have been coping with change is by journaling. In addition to my daily journals, which I keep to look back on, I have been doing a lot of brain dumps. These aren’t your typical brain dumps where you write down everything you may have to do or want to accomplish, instead, I have been writing down all my stressors, fears, anxieties, and worries and getting them out of my mind. This helps a lot at night when my mind is racing. I write down every good or bad thing that’s on my mind and have found that even if I don’t solve anything, it helps to have it out of my mind and on paper. I often will throw out the paper, but it helps put things in perspective of what’s important and what things I can control.

Change is scary, stressful, overwhelming, but it can also be exciting and full of new beginnings. 

In this season of life, I’m choosing to embrace change and not fear it, I know it won’t be easy, but I am ready for the challenge and I’m excited to see how I grow along the way.

Categories
Let's Look

Let’s Look: Worst Habits

Hey everyone! Happy Wednesday! I hope you have been having a great week. Last weekend I ran my first 5K and I’ll be sharing more about what I learned about myself while training and how I prepared for it next week. Since it’s the second week of the month, I like to link up with Erika and Shay. for Let’s Look. Here’s some of the past things we looked at through the year. 

In July, we talked about new favorite summer finds, in June, we talked about best travel tips, in May, we talked about our morning routines, in April, we talked about pet peeves, in March, we talked about Amazon purchases, in February it was about our medicine cabinets.

Today, it’s all about worst habits which is similar to the biggest pet peeves prompt from April, but I decided to change it up and switch up my responses. When I first saw the prompt, I knew I could think of a list of bad habits or things that I’m not good at, which shows me how hard we can be on ourselves. 

Rather than give you a list of bad qualities, I decided to choose three bad habits I have and how I want to work on them. 

Here’s what I came up with:

Over planning– I am a Type A person through and through. I like lists, planners, a schedule and direction and I like it way in advance. But, as I have learned, life doesn’t work that way and you have to adapt and adjust, often or on the fly. Sometimes, I tend to over plan and then when things stray or change, I get thrown in a tail spin which is not good. I will also stress out about things that are out of my control. I will get anxious about something that is days, weeks or months away or may not even happen. I sometimes get so focused on it and get tunnel vision and then it may not even happen. I’m also really working on not overbooking things in advance and instead being more open and flexible to plans and things falling into place. It’s way easier said than done. I’m also working (which I have been for years) on being more spontaneous to making plans with friends and family. It hasn’t been easy but I’m doing my best. 

A look at my overly organized planner and to do lists.

Neat freak– I am a neat freak, control freak, everything has a home freak through and through. I love to clean, I love to make sure dishes are put away at the end of the day and all the laundry is folded and hampers are empty. I have been known to clean and put away dishes and cups when people are still using them. However, living with five other people, I know the house isn’t always in perfect condition. I try my best to let the little things go and give myself grace, but that doesn’t always happen. I love the sense of satisfaction of clean space which I alway try to leave room at home and desk at work in good shape whenever I leave, so when I come back, everything is fresh and clean. Growing up in a large family you get used to chaos, disorder and messes and it’s all a part about being in a family and I wouldn’t change it.

Getting sucked into “Sales and Free Items”– I enjoy shopping and I always love a good deal. However, I am guilty about buying things to get a sale or discount or to get something free when I don’t need it in the first place. For example, I will get emails like many other people about getting a free item/drink/side with a purchase and I will want to take advantage of the offer, because I would get something free too. However, do I need to buy something in the first place? Probably not. I fall victim to spending more sometimes to get a free item or free shipping when I probably didn’t need the item in the first place (I’m looking at you Bath and Body Works and Chipotle!) I will say that McDonald’s app and deals are ones that are consistent and worth the free items or discounts. However, most times, I realize I probably didn’t need to buy the item to get something free to begin with. I have gotten a lot better at simply deleting the email unless it’s something I absolutely need. However, I am guilty of spending when I don’t need to be spending haha!

An example of an email that I try to delete and not give into

I think as I have gotten older, I have seen these habits come out more, they aren’t necessarily bad, but when you take them to the extremes or become obsessed then you have to reign it in a bit. 

My biggest takeaways as I have grown up is that it’s all about moderation and not going to extremes of being a neat freak or over planned or stressing out about things out of your control, what it comes down to for me is about being more flexible and adaptable and less rigid. I’m a work in progress and I’m proud of that. I’m sure if you ask my friends and family about what my worst habits are, they can can give you a full list of other things, but these are big areas I that hope to work on as I grow older.

Now, that I have opened up, tell me, what are some of your bad habits? They can be big or small! Let me know in the comments below!