Do you ever feel like you’ve been sprinkled by the rule fairies?  It’s that feeling of being boxed in by all the things I should be doing and all the expectations I should be meeting. Or when I’m working on one thing, but don’t have any peace because I’m thinking about all the other things I should be doing instead.

For me, this feeling occurs as a result of primarily two situations, both of which I create:  1) when I’ve said “Yes” and I really wanted to say “No” and 2) when I’ve procrastinated on something to the point of it becoming urgent either because I didn’t really want to do it in the first place (see Situation #1) or didn’t prioritize the things to which I did say “Yes”.

So I end up feeling overcommitted and resentful because I feel like I’m doing what’s important to everyone else and nothing that’s important to me.  It’s like indentured servitude for which I’ve volunteered!  I get caught in this endless loop of missing the opportunity to do better because I’m trying so hard not to do worse.  Yuk!

But I know a solution!  When I am working a plan based on the inner guidance I have available to me, actively setting priorities, conscientiously evaluating opportunities to determine if they are right for me at the moment they are presented, and have some semblance of when enough is enough, I feel healthy and balanced and grateful and vibrant and engaged in life.  Yeah!

Then, amazingly enough, I have time for things that aren’t ever in the plan.  Like when that friend calls and wants to do a last-minute lunch because she’s in town, or my grandmother calls because she is lonely and just needs to talk about nothing, or when I unexpectedly run into someone I know and feel free to chat a while, or the trip to the store took way longer than I thought.  When I’m already in the loop of “Yeah”, these kind of “life things” don’t have the power to throw me into the loop of “Yuk”.  Yeah!