Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's tip is to ask yourself whether your routines are routine. If they are not, figure out why not, and adjust as needed, or at least update your perception of your life. I often hear from listeners about their struggles with time management. Recently, one person said she wanted her routines to actually be routine.
I get that so many people have visions of their routines, but a little time tracking reveals that the routine is the exception rather than the default. Sometimes people construct whole narratives about their lives based on routines that are not actually routine. I have written a lot about morning routines over the years, and I eventually started asking people how often their beautiful routines actually happened. Sometimes it was every day, but often it wasn't, even if the person would have
told you the routine was a daily thing. This can go in the other direction too, by the way, a person can construct a woe is Me narrative of always spending their Saturdays on chores, and then I get a time log with a Saturday spent with friends and the person tells me this never happens, except it did. I'm sure you have some of these routines that are not actually routine in your life. You theoretically run every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday before work, but the last time this happened
was a couple of weeks ago. Or maybe your weekly meal prep routine involves planning the menu, grocery shopping, and chopping veggies on Sunday afternoons, but that only happens when you don't have anything else to do on Sundays, and you almost always do have other plans. You call your grandmother every Sunday on the way home from church, except for those Sundays when you don't go to church, which
turns out to be most of them. If you realize that some of your routines aren't routine, this doesn't need to be a gotcha moment. I think it is simply interesting data about your life and your interests and your priorities. It might be helpful to figure out why the routine isn't routine. It could be that you don't truly care about the routine. You may feel like other people meal plan, so you decide that you too should develop a Sunday
meal planning routine. But the truth is that your family likes simple meals and you can get home at five point thirty and easily get dinner on the table by six. You like to do other stuff on the weekends. If that is the case, then feel free to let this routine go. Or perhaps your routines aren't aligned with your priorities.
You might think it would be wise to aim for routine of unloading the dishwasher and starting a load of laundry while your kids are eating breakfast before school, but your top priority is being present and connected with your kids. You may find that you consistently sit down to have a more connected conversation. I don't think that's actually a problem. Instead, figure out some other time when you can unload the dishwasher and start the laundry. Sometimes the problem is that
the routine is too ambitious. You may be trying to fit more into some part of your day than can actually fit, which is why the routine isn't routine. Perhaps you can pare down your routine to what is most important. If you don't have time to write a full three morning pages your journal in the morning, you could elect to just write a paragraph, and perhaps you would find that more sustainable. If your routines aren't routine, that is fine.
Some things don't deserve to be routine. Sometimes routines can be simpler. Sometimes you just need to change your story. But it is good to be aware so we can make rational choices about life, rather than thinking something should happen more often, or thinking that it does happen more often than it actually does. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.