At the beginning of this year I found myself in a very unfortunate situation that inspired a very positive outcome. I made a spontaneous new year’s resolution that I’ve kept the entire year – and it has been one of the most fun and lively years of my life. This was my resolution:
I am no longer doing things I don’t want to do.
One more time:
I am no longer doing things I don’t want to do.
Here’s how it works:
If there is something I want to do, I do it.
If there is something I don’t want to do, I don’t do it.
Now before you picture me lying in bed with a glass of wine while my six year old runs around the house with no dinner or clean underwear, you can relax.
I’m obviously talking about my Free Time.
We all have Free Time, some of us more than others – those blissful hours or minutes each day or week we get to spend however we like. Unfortunately for me, I found that for years I was spending much of my ‘free time’ not feeling so free – doing things that I felt obligated to say yes to, because I thought I was supposed to, or because I worried about hurting someone’s feelings.
A small miracle occurs when you turn the ship and decide that everything in your life (more or less) is going to be there because you want it to. Yes there are chores, work, etc. that can’t go away, but if you fill your Free Time with what you love, it makes everything, on the whole, seem much more balanced and manageable.
This might sound really basic or idealistic or impossible to some, but I’ve tried it the other way, and I can say without a doubt that doing what you like is much more fun.
Since I am no longer spending my weekends doing things I don’t want to do, there are big openings for me to do the things I LOVE. This past Saturday that meant a visit with my son to the magical garden at Venice High School here in LA (my husband spent his Free Time doing what he wanted to do – take a nap).
It was the Learning Garden’s Pesto Madness fundraiser. For $10 you got an all you could eat buffet of freshly made pasta, salads and homemade desserts; a pesto cooking demonstration with fresh basil from the garden; and a wonderful tour of the one-acre site by Master Gardener David King, who runs the entire operation and teaches a variety of classes there. All for a good cause.
It was a beautiful way to spend a couple of hours and a wonderful reminder that doing what you like is one of the nicest gifts you can give yourself, and in turn, those around you.
>
