Are There Enough Hours in the Day?

I say NO. I never have enough hours in the day to complete everything I want. I wish I had enough time to even do more; I am trying to minimize and streamline my life so I can fit more in, but it's hard. There is simply too little time for everything I want to accomplish.

Because I always feel rushed, I decided to take a look at my time.

A day consists of             24 hours

I sleep and wake up after 9 hours
I spend about                    2 hours on grooming and exercise
I spend  another                2 hours on food preparation and eating
I blog and research for      3 hours
I watch TV, read, or do  
puzzles for                        4 hours
                                        20 hours total



That leaves me 4 hours to do "other stuff".

How in the world did I maintain a job for all those years? It seems that I always had time to do everything I wanted and still had time to spare. What is the difference? In the above tally, I did not even include grocery shopping, cleaning or doing laundry. Then, there are all my projects and groups I belong to -- ceramics, stain glass, writing groups, DAR, genealogy -- and socializing, writing, painting my furniture. researching where to travel to next....the list is endless.

So, there are not enough hours in my day. What do I do? It depends on what my priority is. When I am writing a story and really into it, not the research or characterizations or outlining, but the actual writing, most of the above tally is cut to the core, and I have about 6-8 hours a day for the research and writing. At that moment, writing is the only thing important to me, not eating or reading or TV or mind puzzles. I do know I need my sleep, and I must exercise during the day, and I must be well groomed because it just makes me feel better. People know not to call during that time, and my life is lived in the characters and the story. And then I ascend from my cocoon and walk and laugh among the living again.

The rest -- the ceramics, stain glass, painting furniture -- is on a priority basis. At this moment I am finishing up the ceramics bowls and the stain glass car because they are Christmas presents. I now know I will not have time to make a tic-tac-toe board I wanted to make, but next year. Next year. It will go on my list of to-dos.

The others are clubs that meet once or twice a month, so that is no big thing. Wish I had the time to get more involved, but not now. It will go on my list of to-dos.

Travel is stopping my every day life and, well, living somewhere else for a week or two or three. And socializing are plays and parties and theatre and are sporadic.

If I could just have another 8 hours in the day, you know, the hours I spend sleeping, I would have plenty of time to do even more....or, would I? I doubt it. There will never be enough hours in my day to do everything I want to do. I would rather have it like that, though, than watching the clock tick seconds into minutes.

Until tomorrow...have a great day...