This was the first time I had one clear goal to work towards –
To be a planned, patient and present mother to my beautiful kids.
While I had undertaken much research before I decided to settle with a single focus goal, I have been completely surprised at how well this works.
Underneath my goal I created a list of strategies to help me achieve it. The table below includes a small explanation as to why the strategy is important and how I am progressing at the half way mark.
In short two things have had the biggest impact on me working towards being the planned, patient and present mother to my beautiful kids:
- More sleep – I am not sure at all how I survived on so little sleep last year. I can now however see with hindsight the consequences of not getting enough sleep. I had less patience, I complained more and I was less productive. I am now giving sleep the priority it deserves.
- Practising gratitude – I wrote a full post about how this has helped me back in April which you can read here, but for someone who was a big cynic on the whole gratitude thing, I am now a complete convert. There have been days when I have struggled to list three things I am grateful for. I struggled because my mindset was negative, on any given day I have so much to be grateful for. Sometimes I just need a reminder of this. A visit to the Royal Children’s Hospital, an honest look at my home, looking at how my husband contributes to the family workload, how independent the kids are and many other small things, make me realise just how much I have in my life and need to be grateful for it.
| Strategy | Rationale | Performance |
|---|---|---|
| Be in bed before 10pm each night | If I am tired, I lose my patience and when very tired I tend to vague out and am not fully present with the kids. | This has been by far my biggest area of improvement. I am consistently in bed before 10pm and almost at least once a week can be found in bed around 9pm. It makes such a huge difference to my levels of patience with the kids. |
| Eat and a varied wholefood diet | I need to eat well to maintain my health and energy levels. | I eat well, but variety is the issue and would say I am in a little bit of rut with variety, so need to work on this. |
| Maintian a regular fitness and exercise routine | Exercising is where I get some time on my own and this helps me come back to the family feeling mentally refreshed. | Even though an injury has seen me unable to run or do any lower limb loading for the last 6 weeks, I have still exercised 6 times a week. |
| Practice gratitude daily | I want to work on improving my overall attitude as this affects how I interact with the kids. I have much to be grateful and need to remind myself of this. | I could count on one hand the number of times I have missed making daily gratitude entries. This has been the second biggest factor in achieving my goal so far this year. |
| Pause and think before I speak | I talk fast and a lot. Sometimes less would be better and more thought put into my words so they have a positive impact on my kids. | Definitely an improvement from the start of the year, but work still required. |
| Make only positive statements (no complaining) | Towards the end of 2014 I found I was complaining a lot. I want to turn that around. This doesn't mean I accept poor behaviour or mess or have to love everything my kids do, but I need to find better ways to express how I feel about it. | Was doing really well until June. Not running, end of term, cold weather and some complaining has crept back in, so need to refocus here. |
| Expect good things from my children | You find what you look for. If I am waiting for my kids to do the wrong thing or say the wrong thing, then that is most likely what I will find. While they will never be perfect, I need to not be focusing on their mistakes and misdemeanours. | As above. |