Keeping it Simple! The #horsetimechallenge

It’s not uncommon to find yourself in the place where everything feels like it’s getting on top of you. I’ve been talking about this a lot over the past week (you can check out my blog on Emotional Busy-ness here and a Facebook post I wrote yesterday on being “Procrasto-busy”), motivated by personal experience and also a series of conversations I’ve been having with people who feel exactly the same way. The thing is, periodically checking it to see where you are unnecessarily complicating life is a really important habit to get into. Often times, things work until they don’t, and if we don’t create space to look back and see what’s working and what’s not, it’s easy to continue on a path that no longer serves us for no other reason other than habit.

Although it may seem like a stretch, all of this impacts our riding. A full head or a full schedule either robs you of the ability to be present or prevents you from making time for your horsing pursuits in the first place; no necessarily a big deal short term, but the cumulative effects can be immobilizing and depressing!

This week in JoyRide, my membership program, I issued a “Simplification Challenge”! How can you make things easier on yourself, I asked them. What do you need to cut out, change up or introduce to experience more of what you want and less of what you don’t want?

A friend emailed me and said she was really keen to go through this process but felt stuck on where to start, and if you feel the same, here are some questions to trot through your brain space to get you started (JoyRiders, I’m going to make a template for you of these and post it on the member’s site later!).

What makes you happy?

Yup, seems obvious, but how often to you ask yourself this question? I noted down all the things that made me happy and then looked at how many of those things I was including in my day. Your list will naturally be really specific to you but mine included working with my horses, yoga, meditation and spending time with my family. When I intentionally weave these things into my week, I feel balanced and taken care of, but when I start to miss some or all of them out on a regular basis, things start to go a bit skew whiff.

How can you include more of what makes you happy in your day?

Taking time for the things that are important to us is something that needs to be intentionally cultivated. Time will not make itself available to you. If you are waiting for space to “open up” (when this thing is done, when the kids are at this point, the list goes on!), there will be always something ready to fill the gap. The rule of thumb: Get in there! You need to carve time out for yourself and honour that time with the same sense of commitment you would do to something else that feels non-negotiable.

What’s draining you right now?

If you feel a bit blah, or you feel like your energy is being drained but you’re not sure exactly why (or you know exactly why but aren’t doing anything to change it!) look at what could or might be causing that. Are you saying yes to things you want to say no too? Are your boundaries shaky or non-existent so that you find yourself being pulled in twenty different directions at once.

Step One: Get Clear

Step Two: Identify the energy leaks

Step Three: Take action to repair, change or adjust them

Looking at all of the above, what can you cut out, simplify or change in some way to streamline your days?

Get ruthless on protecting your own energy and resources. If it feels selfish, consider this. If you involve yourself in something, you want to be able to give yourself to that 100%. Saying yes but meaning no is unfair to you and unfair to the person or thing you are saying yes to. We want action on decisions that we not only pay lip service too, but that our hearts are behind.

The other thing… if you don’t look after yourself, you aren’t operating in a sustainable way. Sure, sometimes, we need to go above and beyond to get things done, but for the majority of what we do, we need to make sure that our modus operandi is a sustainable one.

How am I going to act on this?

No use writing it down if you don’t act on it! How are you going to take your discoveries and implement them? What can you do now to get started?

If you want to join the me this week, I’m going to be running a #horsetimechallenge over on Instagram. Post how you are going to simplify your life (and make more horse time), use the hash tag and we can follow along and share in the awesomeness!

Can’t wait to hear how you get on!

xx Jane