Whoa. Writing all those “Week in the Life” posts was intense – they take a lot of time to write and prep photos for, let alone remember all the stuff I did during the day. The smarter move would have been to do a “day in the life,” see if I liked that, then bump up into a week.
Playing with Photoshop AI with our nephews
The other smart move would have been to not pick such a stupid busy week with so much running around and very little downtime. Sigh.
I didn’t love doing it, but I’m glad I tried it out! I actually learned a lot about myself, mostly that:
- I’m doing an incredibly atrocious job of having real downtime. I fill my downtime between activities with tasks and it leaves me exhausted and cranky. I do this because I hope getting more done during the day will leave me time at the end of the day to relax, but it rarely works out like that. I only seem to relax when I leave the house and spend time with other people. When I do this (don’t take real downtime):
- Small unimportant inconveniences set me off.
- I just want to be left alone.
- I don’t feel very talkative.
- I should NOT have scheduled the cats to have to go to the vet every Friday for 5 weeks. That was nuts. I won’t make that mistake again.
- Having Tywin in the house was really stressing me out and I didn’t realize by how much until he went back outside (then the guilt about that set in).
- My Garmin thinks very little of me.
- Posting to my rock Instagram at night instead of in the morning may make me feel less overwhelmed.
And I already knew that:
- I dislike having lots of appointments, or stacked appointments. I stack them thinking it will be more efficient (see above about trying to do more so I can do less later) then end up making myself irate.
- I don’t like logging what I eat.
- Forcing myself to document things takes away the fun.
- It’s not appropriate for me to share much about work (my full time job) on here.
I loved:
- How supportive you all were with reading those long posts, thank you!
- How many people could relate to my rants about certain trivial things. That made me feel better about it. Thank you!
Will I do a whole week again? I am leaning toward no but never say never!
Will I keep working in therapy on trying to be more relaxed and less panicked about my to do list? Yes.
I believe they were a ton of work, but I really enjoyed reading them. The anthropology major in me loves seeing how different people lead their lives. I always feel like I’m so busy and hate that feeling, but it’s nice to know I’m not alone!
I am glad you enjoyed them! I love seeing how people lead their lives too – it’s really telling on what we prioritize, isn’t it?
You are definitely not alone! I bet most people feel that way!
I admire you being able to do it for a whole week. I think I *might* try to do it, but maybe during a random week in February or March when things are more “normal” than they are right now. There are so many pros to doing it during the festive season, though! Having a detailed record of that is kind of fun. I don’t know. I’m just proud of you for finishing it!
Aww, thanks so much! And I get what you’re saying – I would think it would be less stressful during a “normal” week, but it’s kind of fun to document the holiday chaos. Kind of 😉
So yes – it definitely takes a lot of time! I ended up feeling better about my humdrum, monotonous life so I’m trying to figure out how to make myself more aware of the good stuff in the moment – without writing a blog post everyday lol.
But yes you are a busy lady and your Garmin is a jerk!
Ooo, let me know what you decide to do. Almost like a “small things” gratitude journal!
Thanks again for inspiring me to write the series!
I have to be honest, I did not make it through all of your posts (busy week here too!) but it sounds like the effort was worth it in the sense it made you aware of certain important things and is giving you the opportunity to think about how you could shift some things in your life for the better. So even though it was a challenge, you got something important out of it, which is great!
I never make it through a full week of someone else either, so no worries there! I try my best then end up skimming. It’s A LOT to read, and I actually prefer to write (and read) shorter posts! Anyway, but yes, I definitely got something out of it!
I hope this week is quieter for you!
I finally got caught up on your posts 9this week had been nuts.) You definitely picked a hard week to do “week in a life!” Ending on Christmas Eve, with a birthday thrown in there too, must have been rough. i’m always afraid to do a “week in the life” series because I think it will be boring- but it’s always interesting to read other people’s (why is that???) Anyway, I enjoyed it and it sounds like you got something out of it as well.
Thanks for making it through! I think most bloggers would enjoy a peek into each other’s lives if you ever feel like doing it!
Holy cow, I don’t think I could ever do this, let alone during such a crazy week.
My life is insanely boring – really, truly, insanely boring – so I don’t plan to do one anytime soon! Maybe – and it’s a big maybe – a day in the life.
I loved reading along, although I did occasionally “split” the reading so that I could take a bit of a break and get through some other blogs, LOL.
Your boring might be interesting to someone else!
And props to you for getting through these at all. They are WAY too long.
Ooh, this makes me think I should do some sort of tips and tricks about how to make it through week in the life, since I’ve done them for years and years.
They are a LOT of work (I like what Birchie did – starting to post hers a few days afterward, aka her Monday post went up on a Wednesday or Thursday rather than Tuesday. Gives you a bit of a buffer!) and I try to pick a week where I have SOME plans, but not too many. I don’t want it to be TOO boring, lol. I also try to limit photos/not write down exact times because that seems to make things feel more stressful.
I find it fun to document my week but I know it’s a lot!
Oh yes you should! That would help! I feel like the times actually made it easier for me because I usually grabbed them from whatever photo I took! And it gave me some structure. But yeah, I need to find a way to make them way shorter if I ever do it again cause SNOOOOOOZE.