Hi friends! Happy Tuesday! Sometimes it feels a little like I'm the dishwasher rack when it just won't stay on the track, but hey, I'm still getting the dishes clean even if I'm a little lopsided and that's what counts! Last week I shared about the acknowledge, accept, adjust filter and how I'm utilizing that with all things in our daily lives. This week, I want to dive a bit deeper into how I use the acknowledge, accept, adjust filter in reworking our schedule. I hope that this can serve as an encouragement to you as we all are constantly inundated with changing seasons & schedules.
Toward the end of last year, I shared several blogs detailing my deep love for all things Google when it comes to scheduling, my cleaning routine and the various things that I had found useful to me during that season. While there are foundations that have absolutely held there are many elements that have changed. Heck, even a couple months after I shared my cleaning routine, I had to adjust it to accommodate a change in our trash pickup in our neighborhood, as well as different pieces that weren't quite working. This is going to happen! Obviously with a new job comes adjustment, some of which I changed before he started, but it wasn't until we spent the last month in the change that I realized there was still more work to be done. What was working for me last year, (or even a month ago) in part, still works - it just needs a little filtering.
Acknowledge
The most notable change with Jesse's new job was that he went from a Monday - Friday 8am to 5pm that very rarely veered from that. During busy seasons he may need to go in early or stay late, and there were certainly times that he would have to work on a Saturday as well. But all things considered, it was easy to work around those things because he held normal hours 98% of the time. Now, he is working Wednesday - Saturday, 2am - 2pm. Yes... 2 in the MORNING.
The time change has been amplified further by the location change. His previous job was 22.8 miles from home. His new job is now 49.7 miles from home. He more than doubled the distance to his new job, which has had a couple different impacts on all of us. The first is that he used to have about an hour drive time round trip with his old job. He now has at least 2 hours, if not closer to 3 depending on the weather. This takes the 12 hour work day and makes it somewhere between 14 and 15 hours. Another major impact of the location change is that he used to work down the street from the company that I work for as an independent contractor. Because I work from home, I only need to go in to switch out work items and pick up a check a couple times a week. He was able to do this for me quite often. It helped my schedule massively because I didn't have to worry about taking the extra time out of the kid's and my days.
The impact that this has had on the family has been quite jarring for all of us. We are a very close family team that has always prided in spending a lot of time together. With Jesse working these hours it has changed his waking hours as well as the days off where he gets to be with all of us. Because he is getting up much earlier than he was before, he has to go to bed earlier. Tuesday - Saturday he is going to bed anywhere between 5 and 6pm, only a couple hours after he gets home. His new days off are Sunday - Tuesday, which allows for only one day off with Luke, because of Luke's school schedule. Where Jesse and I were getting to spend our evenings together every night after the kids went to bed, we are now only getting to spend two nights a week together. Because Lynae is home all the time, she is still getting to see Jesse and spend time with him, however he's less engaging during the week as he is typically exhausted when he gets home. It's all been very unusual for us and the change has led to much need for adjustment in our daily lives.
Accept
What I've noticed over the last month is that when we all feel like we're trudging through molasses and having a hard time finding our footing, we start to regret our decisions. At the end of the day, I think that the changes that we are experiencing are exactly where we are supposed to be. God has been in this since the beginning and I don't think that either Jesse or I can deny that. It's been very apparent that this was the move we needed to make. It's just a matter of adjusting and finding ways to be more intentional with the time that we do have and not getting hung up on the time that we have lost. While there is certainly time to mourn and feel sad about the change, I think that there are ways to connect, we just have to find them.
Adjust
While I was doing the summit I mentioned in the last blog, I wrote out the changes that were going to be made to our daily schedule when Jesse's new job started, added in Luke's school schedule, and spent some time just envisioning how we could make it all work. What would it look like? What needed to be done in order to better accommodate family time? I decided then that I would adjust my cleaning/chore schedule again to free up Sunday so that we would all be able to spend time together as a family. We started going to Sunday service at church instead of Saturday evening service, which also took time out of Sunday, so I wanted to be sure that we had a day open that allowed for more connection points.
At that time, I hadn't factored in a few key components. The first being my work schedule or the changes that would need to be made in order to pickup and dropoff my work because at the beginning of January, my work had slowed WAY down. It wasn't at the forefront of my mind, because at that time it didn't need to be. I hadn't factored in Jesse's exhaustion level on Saturday evening. I hadn't factored in Luke's need for one on one time with his dad. I hadn't factored in the fact that Jesse and I had been utilizing evenings and weekends to connect and were no longer able to do that. All of these oversights have led to our schedule needing to be reworked AGAIN.
Over the last couple of days, I've been making changes that I think will allow us to better utilize our time together. There is no way to know if this is going to be the change that is needed, but we will continue to trial the adjustments and see what is going to be best for all of us. This is where filtering has been so incredibly important for us because it gives us the space to have things NOT work out the first, second or even third time. It gives us the opportunity to assess daily and not get caught up in things needing to look a certain way. In a lot of ways it provides us with the option of a plan B, where expecting things to go well once they are "committed" to a schedule sets you up for feeling defeated or discouraged.
If I can leave you with anything, it's that change is absolutely hard. It's much easier to stay within the confines of comfortable. But it's in the midst of complete disarray, upsetting the routine and reworking the schedule for the 60th time in a month that the fruit begins to grow. There is much to be gleaned from having things go well AND from things going terribly. Trust the process, give yourself grace, and allow change to fill your life with positivity. Our family team has faced a lot of hurdles over the last month, and yet we all figure out how to work through it all together. Being open to flexibility and knowing that whether we find success on the other side of the door, or we find a 6 ft. drop into the dark - we'll learn, lock arms, and grow through it. Regardless, there is joy to be found!
Thanks for spending some time with me today! I look forward to chatting with you again soon. Next week is Valentine's Day and for those of you that don't know Jesse and I, we started dating on Valentine's Day in 2015. I'm looking forward to sharing about the last 7 years and a few thoughts on relationships.
Until next time,
Xx,
Alex
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