.

How to make time for happiness when you have a

busy day…

By: Rachel Rofe

Question:

Why do we want more pleasure?

First thing, a lot of us are just going, going, going, and

thinking that the more we work the more productive

we're going to be. Productivity is such a buzz word

and yes, like I'm into productivity too, but the reality is

we're going to be more productive when we stop to

take care of ourselves. And you've probably noticed

that yourself. I was actually just reading an article.

There was a guy who spent a year doing productivity

experiments and every month for a year he went and

he did some other productivity experiment. So one

thing was meditating for five hours every day.

One thing was the Pomodoro Technique and he tried

all these different things. And when he wrapped up the

year, he had a top-ten list of his top ten lessons from

that year, and one of them was that working too much

actually shatters your productivity. It burns you out.

The first thing that I would even say to people who are

just go, go, go all the time is challenge the notion that

working all the time is actually helpful. I know you may

say, “Well, I have deadlines, I have things to do,” but

I've found, and many people have found, that when

you give yourself less time to do things, but it's more

focused time, magically that stuff gets done way

faster. So if you haven't yet listened to the podcast

with Becca P. Australia about play, that might be

something that would help you.

And then the other thing is with self care, pleasure,

there are all kinds of side benefits to taking care of

yourself. It's going to help you feel more creative.

You're going to be able to show up better for other

people. So you'll be able to be a better family

member, and partner, and if you work be able to be a

better worker, a business owner, whatever it is.

It's going to be a lot healthier for you. So when you're

constantly in a state of stress your body is in a fight

or flight mode. So that might mean that you gain

weight, you're adrenals burn out, you're exhausted all

the time, you're cranky. And overall you're just going

to be happier.

And then, of course, there's the litmus test of just

when you're on your death bed do you want to live

with regrets. Do you want to look back and say, “I was

really productive and I got a lot done.” Or do you want

to say that you took advantage of the things that life

had to offer.

So those are just a couple of things to kind of frame

why taking care of yourself is so important. I can go on

and on and on about them, but I want to make this an

episode that's kind of short and easy to digest.

One of the things about pleasure is that the truth is

that it's a muscle. It's just something that you need to

build. So if you could even just take 15 minutes

every day to build up that muscle it's going to

increase the quality of your life in a major way.

Now, I also just want to call a spade a spade here, and

be honest that it's lazy, actually it’s really lazy to not

take the time to take care of yourself, because it's

easier to just go through and be in a go, go, go mode

when you're in that state of constantly go it takes

conscious work to stop and be able to slow down. So if

you can just either see this as that, if you don't identify

yourself as a lazy person, maybe that will help just

that mindset shift of realizing that it's going to take a

little bit of work for you to take care of yourself. But it's

amazing how good you'll feel when you're done.

Couple of different things that you can do

to incorporate pleasure into your day.

Even if it's just 15 minutes every morning and you wake

up before the other people in your house, do something

that sets your tone for the day. Now, I talk a lot about

morning routines because they're amazing. They’re

amazing. They will help give you a sense of

groundedness, if you have a lot of chaos in your life. They

give your day a structure. They give your day a

framework, so if you start the morning doing something

that you enjoy, it’s just going to have you feel a little bit

more… just happier and just like the day is set off a lot

better versus let's say waking up and chasing the kids, or

looking at your email or whatever it is.

And another reason why I like a morning routine so much

is even if everything else goes crazy and you have zero

time later on for anything else, you have no time for

pleasure, at least you know when you get up in the

morning it's done. So in the first 15 minutes, or however

much time you can give yourself, 15 minutes, I’m saying

is a minimum. If you can give yourself an hour, great,

awesome. Ask yourself whatever is going to bring you the

most pleasure in that moment.

Maybe it's going to be read a gossip magazine with a

mug of tea. Maybe it's meditate, maybe it's take a

bath, or go for a walk, or going on a dance break.

Have a dance break. Just ask yourself what would feel the

best to you besides going back to bed and then just do it.

There's an awesome book called “The Morning

Miracle” by Hal Elrod. That will give you some great

ideas, too. And I know a lot of people have been doing

that morning routine that he recommends and just

waking up so happy.

I also actually have a book coming out about just five

minute different things that you can do in the morning

that will really help your day get set up for success. If you

go to RachelRofe.com/booklist it might be there by the

time you listen to this.

Just like you would make sure to fit in a meeting for your

work schedule, schedule massages, schedule classes you

want to take, schedule time to connect with people. You

can schedule these, like I want to have a half hour call

with my best friend, or anything that brings you joy. Just

treat it like a work obligation and make sure that you

make time to do it.

One of the things that we do in the Facebook group is

choose a word every day, just kind of like your guiding

word. It gives your brain a place to go when you're

default might be negative. What I mean is let's say you

have a super stressful day and you're in a constant state

of reaction. If you choose a word that's going to guide you

for the day; and let's say ease, which was my word

yesterday. Then you start looking at things in a way

where you say, “How can I choose ease in this moment?”

Or, “How can I make this situation be full of ease?” I know

this might sound crazy, but it just really… it asks yourself

the right question so that instead of being in that default

negative state you just start to switch things around for

yourself, and you start to take control of your happiness.

What I've found is that when you're going all the time,

you're very much in your head and when you stop and

take a few deep breaths, it just has a really nice way of

reminding you of the truth, which is that everything is

fine. You know, you practice and you're in control.

Especially if you're focused on being more productive. You

might be listening to audio books when you're driving, or

doing different things, like if you have a few extra

minutes instead of doing something for yourself you

might go and catch up on emails. So instead of trying to

maximize every last second, do something for you.

Instead of listening to the audio book, play songs that you

can sing and dance to in your car. Instead of taking a few

minutes to catch up on email, maybe go take a walk.

So, for example, if you have kids, and you feel like, “Well,

that slows me down a lot.” There are things that you can

do that are going to bring you pleasure, you and your

kids. It all comes down to just asking yourself what would

bring all of us, what would make us all have fun, so

maybe that's something like blowing bubbles together, or

you dance together, color together, finger paint, play with

squirt guns outside, make snow angels if it's snowing, fly

kites, act silly. Whatever will bring you happiness, just do

it.

It's an idea where you basically have a go-to pleasure

basket full of things that bring you pleasure and make

you happy. Some of the things that you might put in the

basket that you can go to any time you just want a boost,

it might be you have bubbles in there; either bubble bath

or bubbles to blow. An iPod full of songs that you like,

essential oils that you like, a guilty pleasure book or a

magazine, some delicious dark chocolate, or milk

chocolate if that's what you want. A hand massager, a tea

bag, a comedy DVD, nail polish, coloring book, a yoyo,

candle, a book of yoga stretches, journal, thank-you

cards, those punching balloons that you can blow up and

play with. Just anything that's going to make you happy

so that you have things on hand whenever you want to

increase the joy in your life.

Danielle LaPorte has this amazing book, The Desire Map,

and she talks about having your core desire feelings. In

there she talks about… talk about the ways that you want

to be feeling most of the time, or really all the time. And

it's kind of like I said choose a word for the day. If you

have a few core words all the time, make decisions based

on those feelings. A lot of us tend to be over givers, but

when we're clear in how we want to feel all the time and

then we make decisions in line with how we want to feel,

it's going to help us live lives that feel better to us. It will

make it easier to say no because, for example, if one of

your feelings that you want to feel is ease, and you have

people asking you to do all these favors, and you realize

that you're not in service of yourself if you say yes, then

it all starts to just slowly help you realize, “Actually, no,

that's not something I want to do. That's not going to

serve me, it's not going to serve my feelings that I really

want to create in my life.” So that would definitely be

something that's really helpful.

Let's say after eight o'clock or nine o'clock, it's non-

negotiable, you're just going to do things that bring you

enjoyment, period. So that's something else that you can

do. I know that one's harder one, but it's really, really

helpful, it's better for your health, too, to just be able to

wind down. Your sleep is going to be better and you'll

wake up more motivated every morning, too.

Again, I just wanted to give you a bunch of different

ideas. If multiple ones, or even just one popped out at

you, try that and see how it works. And then you can

either fit more in our try a new one whatever.

If you'd like to hear the whole interview

(and more just like this)head to:

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