guest blogger series-amanda

Hello Birds On a Wire readers! I'm Amanda from Project Simple Life. When Johanna posted about her seeking balance series, I was eager to participate. Not only did I want to read what other people had to say about this complicated subject, I wanted to challenge myself to think about how I seek balance.

When I think about balance, I don't consider myself an expert at all. If you read my blog, you'll find a girl who is" newly married, college student seeking an early childhood education bachelor's degree who's trying to cook, clean, take care of her husband, blog, work, and do homework. With all that on her plate, she still tries to see her friends and catch up on episodes of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Yeah. It can be a little exhausting at times.
There is one thing for me to remind myself: I don't have it all together and I don't need to have all the answers. Sometimes, I don't post for weeks. Sometimes, my husband and I don't see each other until 11:30 at night. That's when I realize it's time to make a list and tackle each item one at a time. For me, it's about listing each item and prioritizing when I should do each task.


I was once in a class in which the teacher did a demonstration that illustrated his point about the importance of prioritizing. He took out a big jar and started putting large rocks in it. The rocks were the tasks that needed to get done each day (schoolwork, cooking, laundry, work). After the rocks went in, he sprinkled pebbles in. The pebbles were tasks that you are allowed to do on your free time after the important tasks are done (checking Facebook, painting my nails, browsing the Web, and for me--blogging). I don't have any business or money attached to my blog, so it's easier for me than others when I need to take a mini-break and get things done (usually homework). Blogging is my treat. For example, I tell myself that if I fold the laundry and clean the bathroom sink then I can read Google Reader. I know that I don't always fill my jar with the rocks first; a lot of the time it's an all-pebble kind of day. The key for me is to recognize that, not feel guilty about that, and figure out how to fix the problem that wasting time caused (for me, that's a lot of to-do lists).

Along with recognizing each task has a different weight in my life, I have realized the art of delegating. When my husband Chad and I have housekeeping to do, we both do it. We don't expect the other person to have a specific job. He does the laundry sometimes, and I do the cooking sometimes. I have only been married a short time, and in the first couple months, I thought I had it down. I thought I could do all the things I saw my mom doing everyday and still go to school and do my other job. It took one meltdown for me to sit Chad down and tell him that I feel frustrated that I can't do it all and that I feel like I'm failing him. No one can do everything and I shouldn't feel like I have to. By delegating, I'm able to free up a little time and have learned that other people can do the job. It doesn't always have to be me doing everything. Chad helped me realize that I'm not a failure by asking for help--I am just human. Balance takes time and I have accepted that I am still learning about how to make it work in my life.