I am all of the above.

I haven’t always been this way. In fact, I used to be pretty bloody good at switching off. Properly switching off I mean; shutting the laptop and turning down the volume on my phone. Pre-motherhood I thought a busy day was a 10 hour shift reporting on breaking news stories, with a rushed tea and only seven hours sleep rather than eight. Back in those days, I could quite easily walk through the door at the end of a long day and not think twice about soaking in a bath or watching a film.

Partly, I think the rise of social media is to blame. But I also think my own busy life doesn’t help. I spend so much of my time multi-tasking, communicating and juggling different roles, that when I actually get to sit down and stop…. I can’t.

I read this post by Alison at Not Another Mummy Blog the other day and found myself nodding my head in agreement. Alison admitted she’s not very good at “switching off” and often finds herself turning to blogging or tweeting etc when she should be lazing in the bath or watching telly.

Like Alison, I find it hard to stop. There’s always one more thing to do, one more piece of work to finish, one more chore to complete. When I eventually do sit down, I’m so out of practice at relaxing that I tend to sit there a big ball of twitchy nervousness. In an attempt to still my mind I do the worst thing possible – check my phone. And then my brain’s full of the chatter of Twitter or Facebook… and I’m even more wired than when I first sat down!

I was telling all this to a good friend of mine recently. And because she is such a good friend, a couple of weeks later she sent a book to me in the post. It came (unannounced) with a note, telling me to read it and make sure I started to be a bit kinder to myself. “Even if you let yourself have just one lie-in, then my work is done”, wrote my friend. (I have bloody brilliant friends.)

And I have been reading it. And I have been taking note. How To Be Idle is not for the faint-hearted. It encourages pulling sick days and ignoring deadlines. It’s probably not a book the boss would want you to start following to the letter. But it also makes a very good point: we are so busy these days, caught up in chasing material items and doing what we think we should be doing, that we don’t spend enough time thinking.

I can’t remember the last time I just sat down and mindlessly did a bit of knitting for a while. Or watched a film without feeling the need to check my emails at the same time. Or went for a walk (without my phone and the urge to capture it on Instagram) with absolutely no purpose.

Excuse me while I go all deep on you – but these things are all important for the soul. Taking time out, whether it’s lying in bed and looking at the ceiling, baking a cake just because you fancy it, pottering in the garden or meandering through a park for a little stroll, are all valid activities. I feel ten times better when I do something indulgent and lazy. I work ten times better afterwards, I am more focused, productive and organised.

So I’m making a pledge to myself to be more idle. Even if it’s just one evening in the week where I turn off my computer and fire down the phone. Rather than doing something I feel I ought to be doing, I’m going to do something I want to be doing.

Care to join me?

The post The art of doing nothing appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

A little while ago, she started sending me postcards with little life lessons on the back. The theme is “Bringing Home The Bacon”, so each note focuses on something work / life balance orientated. It’s her way of sitting down for a cup of tea with me at the end of a long day, even though she now lives four hours away.

When I was little, Mum worked full-time. She’d strap me onto the back of her bike, cycle across Bristol and teach a full day at school, before collecting me and cycling home. This was pretty much the case until my sister came along when I was four. Then Mum worked part-time for a while before returning to full-time work a couple of years later.

She has always worked incredibly hard and it’s only just in the last year or so – since retiring – that she’s enjoyed a proper break. She’ll cringe when she reads this, but she’s an example to me. When I feel dead on my feet, exhausted with the working mum juggle, I imagine her cycling up a steep hill in the pouring rain, with me wrapped up warm on the back – and I grit my teeth. If she can do it, so can I.

The thing is, being a teacher, my mum had lots of holidays. School holidays were our time together as a family to totally relax and enjoy each other’s company. Dad was a teacher too, so we’d go away for the entire summer and forget about normal life. Many memories were made on these trips. That was Mum’s way of keeping her work / life balance in check. Plus, she refused to do emails post-8pm.

Now, as I attempt to juggle the role of mum, wife, presenter, journalist, writer, blogger, general dogsbody, my mum is on hand to help with these little pearls of wisdom in her regular postcards.

There was this one, reminding me to be careful driving to work on icy roads…

Or this one, advising me to cut corners with the chores and enlist the help of dogs or toddlers…

Or this one, which is pretty self-explanatory really…

But my favourite so far has to be this one…

When I opened it, my mum’s distinctive handwriting was inside, with this message:

“Avoid focusing on the negative; the colours are grey and depressing. Try to keep positive and find colour and humour in the little every day things.”

Like I said, my mum is wise.

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