#3 Ticking Time Bomb ...

Evaluate your time. How do you spend your day? What things do you do, from the time you wake up to the time you go to sleep? Make a list, and evaluate whether they’re in line with your priorities. If not, eliminate the things that aren’t, and focus on what’s important. Redesign your day.

Ugh.
Pass?
I really don't want to do this one.
OK, fine.  But I'm just going to rationalize my time wasting and procrastination, so blah.

#2 - Commitments ... or lack therefore

Idea #2 Evaluate your commitments. Look at everything you’ve got going on in your life. Everything, from work to home to civic to kids’ activities to hobbies to side businesses to other projects. Think about which of these really gives you value, which ones you love doing. Which of these are in line with the 4-5 most important things you listed above? Drop those that aren’t in line with those things. Article here.

After using the guide to outline my overall commitments, I've determined that my problem is that I actually lack commitments.

[covers head from various thrown objects]

Hear me out.

I used to be the queen of "there are twenty-four usable hours in everyday." Or maybe that was Corey Mason? (Holler to all y'all who picked up that reference.) At any rate, throughout high school and college, I did it all. Now, I'm not going to go completely off the deep end and suggest that this habit kept me entirely healthy, but it did keep me motivated....

Meg's College Life To-Do List

• maintain an average of 18 credits a semester and show up for every class (resulting in a 4.0, naturally)
• participate in a minimum of two shows (theatrical) at a time, one at school and a stage managing gig in Baltimore
• multitask by seeing live music at an establishment that serves alcohol and has a dance floor - minimum two nights a week
• work thirty hours a week at a fairly enjoyable job that I rock at in order to pay for the aforementioned extracurriculars and transportation to said activities

Fast Forward to 2010

In my second year of teaching, I've decided to forgo anything outside of my actual job description (see above theatrical participation, live music, dancing) as my job itself is a composite of a thousand individual commitments. Sure, it's just one job - be a good teacher (to include lesson planning, instruction, management, grading, rinse and repeat.) But, wake up call, this also comes along with the commitment - or rather, expectation - to...

• know everything there is to know about every individual child
• communicate professionally at any given time with parents, other teachers, kids, administrators
• take part (with spirit) in any activity regardless of day or time
• implement the newest theories (changing on average, every other month) effectively
  
• always be in a good mood
• like everyone under the age of 18
• love what you are teaching at all times

Don't get me wrong, this is in fact what a good teacher needs to do.  The question is, how does a good teacher maintain this practice, while still having the physical and emotional energy to live his or her life outside of work? 

So in one sense I'm over-committed, because my job requires so much. And yet, while I am wearing my teacher costume overtime, my Meg suit is left feeling bored and unfulfilled.

I suppose it isn't an issue of being over-committed, but rather committed in the wrong way.
Quality, not quantity, "they say."

Conclusion: Since I cannot eliminate the work commitments (while also keeping my job), I need to be sure to say "no" to any extras at work.  Any "extras" I do take on, should fall under a non-work category (i.e. relationship, friends, physical health, hobbies...) In the meantime, I must determine how I can be satisfied and fulfilled by my job itself...

Day 1 - What's Important?

#1. Make a list of your top 4-5 important things. What’s most important to you? What do you value most? What 4-5 things do you most want to do in your life? Simplifying starts with these priorities, as you are trying to make room in your life so you have more time for these things. Leo Babauta - Zen Habits

Oh, happy day! My first mini challenge involves list making - my favorite! Although, I must admit, making a list of to-dos that I'll never do, or essential items to pack on a week long camping adventure is a bit more my speed.

1. Right away - family. This includes both blood and soul; current and future.
My parents were not only highly successful parents, but are now my friends, who are actually a blast to have around for anything. My aunts and uncles are riots, and my grandparents are realistic, progressive, and highly in tune with my life.
With a fairly narrow, but incredibly close and ancient group of friends, they are deserving of nothing less than the title of family. We are no longer in seventh grade with our flip flopping of who we feel like being this week. We are committed, and therefore, like family, have no choice but to love each other and stick around.
I say "future" because my future family is equally as important. I suppose as a result of my own awesome family, nuclear and extended, my first desire is to continue the awesomeness with my own (gasp) offspring.

2. Travel/Experience
I love living in a familiar place, with my family a mere stone's throw way. But I was born with the travel bug...more like travel parasite. It doesn't just give me the occasional itch, but rather consumes my everyday thoughts until I am forced to create whatever plan the current budget will allow in order to purge the invader. Now I'm not talking about luxary hotels, big cities, world famous restaurants, or must see tourist visiting centers. More like anything that gives me a shot of perspective and refreshes my senses and thoughts. This is why I specified "Experience." Travel is the doing - you must physically travel in order to experience. Experience is ultimate goal. At times it is the mere act of taking the endless road trip that excites me, but it is what I take away that rejuvenates me. (Note conflict: uncontrollable desire to travel vs. paralyzing fear of flying. I have flown. I will fly. But the conflict is real.)

3. Environmental Sustainability/Conservation
I despise the smell of petrulli, wash my hair religiously, and watch football. I just want to clarify. However, when it comes to perspectives on the world - physically and socially - I suppose I could be classified as somewhat of a (gulp) "hippie" ... or at least a wanna-be. I won't even begin expressing all of my thoughts about our current warped view of needs vs. wants and what should and shouldn't be exploited by our ignorant human selves, because I'll end up with a dissertation, and apparently that is not the same thing as a blog. So I'm just going to leave it at: It is thirdly important to me that I be part of the necessary change (at minimum within my own family) in perspective and treatment of the earth and our cohabitation with it.

4. Mental Awareness to result in Physical Health ... and vice versa
I realize this is a bit of a cop out - combining two very general ideas into one, in order fill in my fourthly important thing - but this is really the most logical way for me to express one idea that I find highly important. (I also didn't want to waste a spot on just yoga, or workout, or eat right, or see more live music.) Those are just players in the overall game. It is highly important to me that I maintain some realism. Rather than falling into place with the other mental zombies, who turn their self awareness switches on and off depending on their daily routine, I want to always be on. And consequently, I want my daily routine to be supporting this mental self awareness. I want to always be myself and taking care of myself. I think it dangerous to save this only for the weekends, when we don't "have" to guzzle large amounts of caffeine to get through a day predetermined by someone else. The phrases "just get me to the weekend" and "just get me to summer break" make me cringe.

Yay! Some clear road signs for my journey.

The Challenge

As a textbook Virgo 1, this lack of direction is unsettling. The fact that I can not innately envision the end result of life's next chapter is restricting my ability to plan for said outcome, and therefore giving me nothing tangible to work with and making me feel like a crazy person.

In an attempt to relieve some of this desire to control and micromanage, I've decided to simplify, in hopes that by clearing up the clutter in my life I will clear up my mind and gain some perspective on this little "crisis" of mine.

I have been intrigued by Leo Babauta's 72 Ideas to Simply Your Life list for a while now. I've gone so far as to tell myself that one day I would print it out and give a few of them a try. Well in today's world, or at least in my today's world, "telling myself" that I will do something "one day" is nothing more than a well intended thought. I need to motivate myself into action, so I've given myself a challenge.

The Challenge:
Implement the 72 ideas into my life by the New Year (2011). Completing 1-2 a day. I challenge anyone and everyone to complete this challenge along with me and share your thoughts, reactions, struggles, and successes here.

Tomorrow: Idea #1 (Make a list of your top 4 - 5 important things)

As a list loving Virgo, this may just be the beginning of my list completion journey...

In The Beginning

I never imagined myself feeling compelled to become a "blogger." I have yet to master (or feel the desire to master) this Twitter business, and although it remains on my New Years Resolutions list year after year, I still cannot maintain a personal journal beyond a week or so.

So why have I decided to take the leap into publicly dishing my drama to the critical social media eye? Crisis. Quarter-life crisis to be exact. I figure if I'm going to go through the draining process of truly taking a look at my life, or rather deciding what I want my life to look like, I might as well have something to show for it. If nothing else, a record of this internal monologue.

I'm not exactly sure where it came from. In fact, I'm not exactly sure anything "comes from" anywhere. It seems, rather, that life is pretty random when it decides to align all factors perfectly to create a personal cosmic explosion, sending all original plans (that were so nicely set in stone) into millions of fragments, on a direct course into ... my life.

OK, I'm getting a bit angsty here - time to turn down the Saves the Day and clarify some things.

I am happy.
For the most part I'm very happy. I have my perfect partner - with a great movie script worthy love story to boot; my family is hugely important and supportive and I actually enjoying being with my parents; my friends are motivating and inspiring and, after 13 years, have a pretty clear understanding of what they are getting themselves into with me; my coworkers make work enjoyable and my boss is actually a human being; I'm healthy, paying my bills, have a dog, and like where I live.

I just feel that my life is at a crossroads - left is the easy way out where life looks like the a-typical, safe, routine monotony of coffee in rush hour, a mediocre salary with benefits, and 48 hour weekends to look forward to. Right is the unknown - but has to be better than left.

So for right now, I'm bushwhacking down the middle.