New Year Resolutions pt3 Organisation

 Today is February 1st, I am not sure where January went. It feels a bit daft to be talking about New Year Resolution still, but I am only at number 3! They may have to change to resolution of the year

Well it’s that time of year again where we all think this will be the year we make changes and get more out off life and become happy. In reality, not much changes and by the end of the year we feel bad for not having achieved anything that feels worthwhile.

Apparently the top 10 New Year resolutions are ;

1. Exercise more
2. Lose weight
3. Get organized
4. Learn a new skill or hobby 
5. Live life to the fullest
6. Save more money / spend less money
7. Quit smoking
8. Spend more time with family and friends
9. Travel more
10. Read more

I would like to do most these too, except for losing weight and quitting smoking, they are all big things, but we believe that they will make us more happy. Many people will have already given up, or like me won’t even have started yet as life gets in the way and most of the things we want are too vague and we feel overwhelmed by it or just realise it is not realistic. Then of course we get annoyed and feel like we have failed.

I have decided to write a post about each resolution, I would love to say I will do one a day, but know that is far beyond me, one a week would take us to the end of March!! So will just have to see how it goes and how much I ramble on or get distracted by other things.

I always find this time of year hard and would love to be able to do so much. I always feel that I haven’t achieved anything and am in the same place I was a year ago, only change is I am a year older!!

No.3 Get Organised

I try to be organised, every day starts with good intentions, but by about 9am they have usually gone out the window! On Monday I had 4 tasks I wanted to get done that day, today is Wednesday and I am just starting on task 2. Today is a national teachers strike and my daughter is at home trying to study for GCSE’s. Lack of normal routine always make me feel less organised and I am trying to think about so many things at once, my head feels in a jumble, so I feel disorganised. I am trying to write this whilst trying to decide what vegetables to order for next week and juggling messages from several people talking about different things, deleting words typed by the cat and then getting distracted by a rainbow!

I have always been useless with time management and unless I do something straight away I end up with long lists of this to do. Emily has just come down to print a revision timetable, I hope she is better than me at sticking to it. It’s difficult to plan a timetable when you have no idea how much energy or concentration you will have and how much rest you will need each day. i factor in rest, but then always seem to need to add more. Tasks take longer to achieve and frequent mistakes prolong everything and don’t help with motivation. I feel awful nagging Emily to work, when I am getting very little done and I feel like a bad example to her and also feel so sorry for the kids as the strike is affecting them badly and is not their fault. I really don’t understand strikes, the people that suffer are the ones most in need, the poor kids are expected to do well in exams, but the teachers don’t want to help them and then when the kids do badly it will affect them for the rest of their lives it’s really not on. I just find it so upsetting, but neither the teachers or the government will back down, we might as well just shut the country down again. I am sure many people will disagree with me, but seeing my daughter struggling due to having missed so much school due to Covid and now as the exams approach there is more disruption yet they are still supposed to meet high expectations. The people who are striking already have jobs, yes the pay might not be great and working conditions hard, but our kids are the next generation of workers and they need to be able to pass exams in order to get jobs, employers and further education won’t make allowances for all the lost teaching time.

I easily get overwhelmed so if something goes wrong or someone messages me or talks to me, I feel I can’t cope. If I am crafting I get stuff out that I need but then find it overwhelming and keep losing sight of things and use my energy looking for stuff. My craft stuff is reasonably well organised, but I can never find what I want or find I don’t have what I want. Even having a small amount of stuff out feels really chaotic to me and makes me lose focus on what I am trying to do. Getting things out and putting away takes energy that I don’t always have.

I often need help with things that go wrong or I can’t remember how to do something I have done loads of times before. Asking for help makes me feel even more disorganised, yet it’s not my fault.

I have so many things I want to do or have part done, the list is endless and this again makes me feel overwhelmed and I end up doing something totally different to get away from it.

The rest of the family are not interested in planning ahead and leave things till the last minute, I find this really hard as I need to know what needs doing and can’t cope with a mad rush to get something done a the last minute, like deciding what we are eating just before it needs to be cooked or trying to spread things out to make it easier but then it not being done until its a mad rush to meet a deadline. If we are going somewhere I like to allow plenty of time, but being reliant on others means it’s usually last minute and then I feel we are rushing and feel disorganised even though it is not my fault.

What can I do? I don’t know the answer to this, making lists can be helpful, but also makes me feel overwhelmed Having a plan is the same if I don’t get to do what was planned or have to change plans I feel useless. I can’t do anything about my energy levels or poor concentration. I can’t choose when people might message me or want something. I can’t change things that go wrong or don’t work out as I thought they would.

I will continue to try and get more organised and plan my time better and try not to feel so out of control and disorganised by things that are not my fault.

Postscript

After attending Emily’s parents evening last night I have to say my attitude to the teachers has changed, they all took time to come and see us in a quiet room so that I could hear and were all very supportive of Emily. It was very helpful.  It has been such a difficult few years for staff and kids, but they are all so passionate and want the best for the kids in still such difficult times.  I have to admit I was angry about school being closed for the strike, it is such bad timing for the exam students and felt like the staff were trying to make life even harder for the kids.  Seeing them last night I realise that this is not the case, strike timing is still bad, but I guess there is never a good time. They have to do this times several hundred too, yet it still felt like a personal meeting. It is a hard year for exams as the kids have still missed so much yet the exams are not making any allowances this time. I expect there will be a great fuss if results are down, but it will hardly be a surprise. Emily wants to go on to do A levels and certainly has the ability so fingers crossed she gets the results she needs, she has worked very hard. There were lots of tips about being organised and offers of personal support. Emily’s last exam is on my birthday so we have a great evening out planned, hope we can both stay awake!! There is a lot of pressure on the kids to do well and be up to the expected standard despite so much missed time and unsupported learning and there will be many who don’t get the results they want or need, but there are always other avenues to explore, so fingers crossed for everyone things will work out one way or another.