Sanity Rituals

Some of my favorite posts written by my friend Ginny are her "how I do what I do" posts. I'm not even sure that's what she calls them, but essentially her posts outline ways in which her truly awesome family handles busy-ness and chaos. In some ways, her way of doing things is truly unique and very inspiring. Alternately, my own family's way of doing things may not be unique or inspiring, but it helps us get through our day's activities.

I find that in order to find and keep my center, especially as I've embarked on increasingly busy school schedules, I've had to implement "sanity rituals". I'll outline a few of them in this post, but be forewarned that the main reason I'm able to "do what I do" is due to a tremendous amount of help, mainly from my husband, but also outside help, including babysitters, modern conveniences and the like. Since I have several friends and acquiantances who are mothers contemplating, preparing for, or actually doing work or school, I hope the post is marginally helpful or hopeful. Also keep in mind that my sanity rituals are somewhat but not entirely listed in order. A bit confusing, I know.

The ultimate sanity ritual for me is organization. Initially, this meant I was in trouble. I've never been a very organized person, but thankfully my LDS mission gave me some tools to help me out here. In fact, never since my mission had I been busy enough to plan out the next day, but once I started becoming insanely busy this semester, I picked up my planner again as a kind of reflex. Every night before bed I take a clean post-it note, place it on my current planner page and map the next day out. Next to the day I write something that helps me put things into perspective, always relating to the baby. Because I want her to be top priority, and because sometimes I'm tempted to put schoolwork first and get upset with her if she gets in the way, I usually will write something like "relax with baby", or "love on baby", or "have fun with baby".

Early in the semester I wrote out a detailed study schedule. I consult my study schedule while also keeping in mind special circumstances of that week and list in order of priority which classes I need to study or do homework for during quiet times or while Squirt is taking a nap or during class breaks. Under that, I write other priorities of the day, such as social events, meetings, people I need to email, or the gym. At the very bottom, I write what I'll be making for dinner the next day so I don't have to stress about that and I know exactly what I have to cook. Then I'm done!

I've learned to be mindful of the fact that sometimes putting something off takes more energy than just doing what I'm trying to avoid. Sometimes trying to take a nap takes more energy than just plugging along through my day, even when I'm tired. It's weird that it's that way for me, but I've learned to capitalize on it and make it work.

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Derrick will sometimes make fun of my devotion to my evening bath-time, but seriously, I really need my bath-time sometimes. I can shave my legs (ensuring a good night's sleep), read what I want, and be alone and quiet for a few moments.

Journal-writing has become much more therapeutic for me as of late. I think it had always stressed me out before because I had imagined my future posterity reading it; thus I had always kept it very clean and neat so they would know what a good person I was. This semester, I threw that bullcrap out the window. Hopefully, my posterity will be smart enough to deal with the fact that no one, not even their grandmother, is perfect. So I write what I need to get out. Testimonial challenges and spiritual transitions, things I said or did that I regret, things I feel bad about, swear words, goals, thoughts, ideas, dreams, beautiful moments with the baby, things we do as a family. I've turned my journal into a genuine catharsis and it's felt great.

I couldn't survive without my crockpot. The dinners that I write at the bottom of my post-it notes are, more often that not, crockpot dinners. How nice to throw everything in and never think about it again until it's time to eat. Also, cooking this way is very easy on gluten-free chefs like myself. I've yet to check out the 365 days of crockpot blog, but I will soon because I always have an eye out for easy recipes. A larger crockpot is at the very top of my Christmas Wish List. I guess that means I'm definitely not a kid anymore.

Sometimes I grimace, but I know myself well enough to know that I function under stress much more gracefully when I've been exercising.

The best part of my day is always when Derrick gets home. Our alone time is definitely my greatest sanity ritual, no matter what we do.

So...what are some of your sanity rituals?