All Time Is My Time

September 22, 2020

All Time Is My Time

In the usual back-to-school spirit I have been trying to settle on a daily routine to keep motivated and sane while I am still working from home. I had been in a rut of waking up late, working later and then staying up later still to have enough ‘me time’ and I could feel my anxiety levels creeping upwards.

I was mapping out a new schedule when I looked my Sundays thinking “ok so then Sunday night to Monday night is my time” On Sundays I like to have an indulgent shower, maybe watch a movie with my housemates. Then Monday evening I like to spend cooking and after that have some time alone.

But I had this feeling of exhaustion looking at the days after that. I thought, wait, really? I have ‘my time’ on Sundays to Mondays and then the rest of the week is, for who? For whom am I spending this time if not for me? There was this shadow of guilt over all my other free evenings, and it was saying that “any free time should be spent with or in the service of other people”

Earlier that day I had been sat relaxing in lovely September sunlight, reading and eating my breakfast when a message popped up on my iPad and I felt annoyed. At myself. That I had not woken up earlier so that I could have gotten all my ‘selfish’ morning routines out of the way before everyone else was up and before a time when I felt guilty for not being free to immediately give them attention.

I understand that I am very lucky to be able to claim that all time is my time as I’m sure some people will look at even my Sunday-Monday amount as a luxury beyond luxury. I know there will be times in my life when I may need to be on call for a spouse, child, parent, but right now I am an unmarried, childless young person. I have no one who is dependent on me and I am living in a year of a global pandemic where the obligations to be anywhere at a specific time are low.

Planning my routine was frustrating me because it was built around making sure that I would be free for other people, that I could be ‘on call’. I didn’t want my daily routine to be based on others and to have to schedule the activities I liked in the time when I imagined that they were least likely to need or want me.

I still get a certain amount of fulfilment from helping other people, however, if I wait to feel that everyone else is sorted, that they have fulfilled their potential and have no further needs, “Are you good, can I leave you alone for a bit? Ok great.” If I wait until then to live my life, I will be waiting for a long, long time.

I want to wake up early because I want to. Or not. I want to read in the morning or go for a walk because I want to, or not. I used to wake up and squeeze all the things I liked doing and wanted to accomplish into two hours so that I didn’t feel resentful giving time to other people later on or feel annoyed to miss out on activities (even if I really would rather be doing other things). It also meant that I didn’t have to ask people for ‘me time’ when it was less convenient for them.

As I wrote this down I thought what an interesting phrase “ask for time”. Who am I asking? All time is my time, all choices on how I am spending my time are my choices to make.

Reading a book for work, I came across an exercise. The goal of the exercise was to realise how much time you were spending on various activities by drawing a pie chart. Now the thing about a pie chart is, you can cut it up however you like, you could have a quarter taken up by sleeping, some taken up by travel, work, cleaning, friends, family. But, however you divide it up, it is always a full circle.

I want to recommend that you do the same exercise, picturing a pie, or a cake of some kind in your head, one that you really love. And when you have cut up all the pieces, leave unshaded those that are for yourself, your own needs, things that give you energy and fulfil you and then shade in those which are based on ‘shoulds’, which are time spent on or for others. Now imagine that the unshaded part of that delicious pie or cake is what you are left with. You could have taken the whole thing but what have you allowed yourself?

This helped me to realised that I hold the knife to divide up my time. No one can steal time from me, I have plated it up and given it away. Some days, I am perfectly within my rights to sit down and eat the whole darn thing as though I were Boris Bogtrotter in Matilda. And all the ‘shoulds’ and judgements and people asking for my time can stand there like Miss Trunchbull and watch as I have my cake and eat it.

All Time Is My Time.

Phrases and metaphors we use to talk about time:

I asked for time…

I spend time…

I have the time to…

Spare time

Free time

Wasting time

Time passed

Out of time

Just in time

Use this time (wisely)