Belle just took me for our 4th or 5th, maybe 6th, walk. It isn't often she has me home for the whole day and she is taking full advantage of it, all in the pretense of seeing something suspicious through the window that we have to go check on, and then doing perimeter checks around the house that have even lead us down to the pond a couple of times.
Today is an absolutely gorgeous day - blue skies, no humidity, temps in the 70's - so I can't say I mind the breaks from my home office and computer. At least twice she has sprawled on the huge dog bed we have on the porch and I have just sat near her on a bench, working via my phone, both of us enjoying the fresh air and the quiet.
However, there is only so much I can do on my phone. When one urgent bark occurred minutes after we came in from a pretty good walk, and I had just gotten a fresh cup of coffee, I started to say "I don't have time to go out again right now!"
Instead, remembering she is now 14 3/4 years old, and that I am lucky she is even still with us, I said "I don't have time NOT to do this right now." And out we went for another excursion.
As I was walking behind her along the trail, I thought of how that applies to so many things... spending time with friends, playing with my grandkids, checking on my elderly neighbor, visiting my sister...
Even blogging.
So here I am, stealing a few minutes away to work on a blog post I started writing over a year ago - in my head. It has been hard to justify the time this takes away from my real estate business, so it has steadily fallen to the bottom of my priority list, because in reality, it rarely just takes a few minutes.
I recently listened to a podcast about business planning, and they mentioned "White Space" where you just dump it all out and see what you have. It helps you see what is worth keeping, what needs to go, what needs to change, and where you have gaps. And I was also reminded during that podcast of a book I read a while back by Keith Cunningham - The Road Less Stupid. He is a huge proponent of Thinking Time.
My mom told me that when I was about 3 years old, I told her "I think a lot." And that is true. Too often I have overthought things!
I realize my blog is my personal white space, a blank canvas that triggers thoughts and makes me sort through them. And there are a lot of gaps since the last time I wrote a post. Whether anyone else reads it or not, it has served as a place to preserve my memories and stories and photos, and sort my thoughts, for over a decade. And I have been letting time whiz right by me without much more than a post on Instagram or Facebook.
So I'll steal a quote from my last post and remind myself that this Thinking Time and White Space are very important for my business life as well as my personal life.
You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage - pleasantly, smilingly, nonapologetically - to say 'no' to other things. And the way to do that is by having a bigger 'yes' burning inside.
~ Stephen R. Covey
