Every month I find myself complaining that I don’t have enough time to take care of myself. Every weekend I make a promise to spend time on me… what that means is: no cleaning, no chores, no Facebook or twitter, no reading… just a little girl time for me.

In a perfect world, I would enjoy to be able to get a massage, manicure, pedicure, wax, etc weekely. However, I cannot only afford it, but also I can’t find the time to drop everything else I do on weekends (or week nights for that matter) to take care of me and do those things.

I watch Oprah shows about women who let themselves go over the years because of children and other things in their lives, and I always wonder how they got there. But I find myself doing things for everyone else, working from home, preparing food for Denis, Facebooking, and doing chores and no time to take care of me.

At the beginning of the year, I had decided to start doing more for me. I took a weight training class, went back to yoga, and started a Full Moon Liquid Fast. Well it didn’t work out. It made me more stressed than relaxed because I had to leave work on time (yes, I’m not those people who “clocks out” at 5pm, I’m a workaholic and so is Denis) and I still didn’t have time to remove my nail polish at the end of the week! How sad is that? So I decided to quit the classes and concentrate in one thing at the time. But I still didn’t know how to manage my home time.

If you think about it, this is how much time we really have:

Work – 8 hours (but if you are me or Denis 9 to 10 hours), sleep 8 hours (if you are lucky!), commute to work 1 to 2 hours round trip (1 hour for me), time getting ready in the morning – 2 hours (1 hour for me,  I’m quick!). If my math is correct, that leaves us with an average of 4 hours every night. That’s not counting making dinner and getting ready for the next day… and forget it if you have kids! I’m single and only have a cat so I’m lucky I get about 2 hours every night after making dinner and other chores… and that’s with a helpful partner!

A few weeks ago, Denis was listening to the WISH Summit and related some of the information to me, because I myself didn’t find time to listen to the talks. He heard from one of the speakers (sorry I can’t give proper credit, we don’t remember the speaker!) that women should schedule time in their routines or busy lives to themselves. That was my aha moment! So immediately I decided to block two hours a week to do my own version of spa time.

So after careful consideration on what day would work out best for me and moved things around, I squeezed myself in for two hours every Thursday night. So Thursday night came and went and I only managed to get 1 hour to myself. So today I was able to get another hour squeezed in. Got my nails done and other things that I don’t need to share here *wink*. But the point is that it was a great effort in my part to get it going.

I hope I can continue to do this every week and will soon become part of my routine and at least get my nails done! But I hope that by sharing this, you can also find a way to schedule yourself in for time for you alone.

Blessings…

Picture by Nick J Webb