Just as soon as I.....

Lately I’ve been thinking quite a bit about this concept. About living your life with a “just as soon as I…” mentality. We’ve all done it many times before…

Just as soon as soon as I get the laundry done, I’ll play with my children

Just as soon as life slows down, I’ll have a date night with my husband

Just as soon as I get the house decorated/organized/unpacked/clean, then I’ll start inviting people over

And the classic 

Just as soon as I loose weight I’ll be so happy/confident…. 

I once had a church bishop tell me about a couple that he knew. He said they were both in a rigorous medical school program and stopped coming to church. When they were contacted they talked about not being able to fit church into their busy schedules. They said that as soon as they graduated from school they would be coming back to church. Once that day came, they started working their jobs and they had another reason.  As you can imagine they had huge student loads. They said that they really needed to work on Sundays to make any headway on their load payments….and then it was a house payment and so on. Although this couple professed their testimonies of living the gospel of Christ and stated that church was a priority they never made it happen. They continued to live the “Just as soon as I….” life style.

I want to stop making choices consciously and subconsciously like this. I don’t want to have another day where I feel so busy and rushed and overwhelmed that before I know it, the day is over and I can’t remember what of worth or meaning I did that day.

My friend Kirsha said something to me the other day in Palo Alto. She said “everyone here is always soooo busy. It’s as if they measure their self worth by how crazy their schedules are. When the reality is, they’re doing it to themselves. I’m not busy, look at me; I can actually give you eye contact and focus on you for more than 20 seconds. It’s just the silly culture that keeps everyone constantly on their phone, scurrying about and essentially ignoring all the people around them that matter most”

 My new year’s resolution of 2010 was to spend 10 minutes of focused, uninterrupted quality time everyday with each member of my family. That’s 50 minutes a day. Now that shouldn’t be that hard should it. Well it was. It was shockingly hard to do. I was lucky if I did it more than once a week. How sad it that?

So it is with these thoughts in mind that I will refocus, on the thinks that matter most. No more “just as soon as I....” living

On the weight loss issue, I still need to lose the Hazel baby weight but I refuse to let it stop me from liking my body. Even when I was 115 lbs I remember thinking “I’ll be happy just as soon as my abs are more defined or I tone up my arms…” and so on and so on. If you’re not happy now, you’ll never be. Sure there’s always room for improvement but I don’t want to hold out for happiness and self acceptance. Dangling that carrot in front of myself that always moves an inch more out of the way every time I get close is just a recipe for unhappiness. Ramblings, thoughts, journal entries and silly realizations by Anne