My wife delivered one of her ‘inspiring’ comments the other day.
“Your ideas come thick and fast like a loaf of bread. Lots of slices but no fillings. Where is your content?”
As usual when I get a ‘nice pick me up line’ I was full of annoyance and frustration happiness and inspiration ;-)
She was half right. Slices galore yes, but too many fillings to choose from. It’s like being given the keys to the deli counter and told to make just one sandwich.
If we have this in many areas of our life, including school runs, homework, clients or customers to see, social media posts to write, websites to develop, business meetings to attend, accounts to complete, etc, etc it can often be very stressful. It isn’t long before it leads to overwhelm.
So many parts of our mind are focused on so many things, we can lose our direction and actually achieve very little. Lots of slices, but no finished sandwiches.
We soon get distracted and take on something else as a nice diversion. A little swipe through Facebook, a scan of the news headlines, start a little job in the garden, etc. The children’s chocolate snack bars look nice or those crisps for TV night.
We are hungry but without anything ready to eat. Browsing or snacking, but not satisfied.
This in turn starts leading to the feeling of being ‘one sandwich short of a picnic’!
So, what next? Two steps….
What isn’t ours? Our natural tendency to be helpful and caring often leads us to take on stuff that isn’t ours. Some of those fillings are not ours to choose or use. If it’s in the fridge with someone else’s name on it, leave it there.
What has to be done now?. When we focus on what actually has to be done right now, it is amazing how easy it can be to start and finish it. Which filling is going to go out of date first? If it has a long date on it, why are we opening it now? Put it back and use up the stuff with todays date on it.
When we have finished these steps we have a plan. A meal plan or menu to work on. With a clear focus and direction it isn’t long before we are on track again. Before too long our picnic is complete, we know where we are going to have it, and most importantly, we are calm and relaxed to enjoy it.
