My Road to Recovery

Hi, my name is Nealie and I’m a Busy Bee…

You might also refer to me as an overachiever, commitaholic, workaholic, taskateer, or many other adjectives used for those of us who do too much and are stretched too thin.

I am chronically tardy (have been all my life) and came home the other day with one question on my mind: “Why is there never enough time to do what I want to do?”  My boyfriend, who is brimming with insight, suggested that I needed to be more mindful of my time.  “What does that mean?” I asked, “Give me an example of something I am mindful of…”  He pointed out that I am mindful of my food and exercise (which makes sense given that I have a Masters in Nutrition and on my way to becoming a Registered Dietitian).  I track my food and exercise daily, so what if I began to track my time?

Now I’ve purchased organizers, read books, adopted strategies – all to be cast aside as one more task on my plate.  But I am ready to recognize my behavior as an addiction, something that I will always live with, and always work toward recovering from.  This is a behavior that has affected my reputation, has interrupted friendships, and has caused me to actually hide commitments from others.

My plan: to keep a daily log (blog) of my time and activities, my efforts to reduce obligations, prioritize my commitments, and excel at these tasks which I maintain as priorities.  Keeping a blog as I travel down this road is the result of another insightful suggestion from my boyfriend, who recently commented on his efforts to “live a transparent life.”  Prior to this point I have not been transparent in regards to my obligations and therefore am sharing this for the world to see.  Maybe you’ll have a comment to share, a suggestion to make; maybe it will inspire you to reevaluate your own activities; or maybe you don’t care.  Either way, I welcome the company and let me begin each day by saying:

Hi, my name is Nealie and I’m a Busy Bee…