 It's funny observing what slips to the back burner when life gets super busy... like writing my blog posts! In the end of August, I passed my NASM - Certified Personal Trainer exam and since then I've worked 12 hour days, 6 days a week, balancing personal training sessions and new member consultations on top of my other weekly jobs in teaching yoga/groupX, assisting a college dance production course, taking a physiology college course, athletic training, and various marketing/modeling gigs. Plus, I still schedule in my weekly workouts for my own fitness routine, which includes 4 lifting days (that include cardio), a 90-min boxing/core class, and 1-2 yoga classes (that I don't teach).
I've been working at this balancing act for the last 4-5 weeks, and I've learned some valuable lessons so far: 1) It's okay to say "No" - Many opportunities have come up as a result of being present at my current activities, and I've had to learn to say no to them to not overwork myself or compromise the quality of work at my current jobs. I had a mentor at one point who encouraged me to always say "Yes" because you never know where it will take you, and while that was extremely valuable to me at that time of my life, I've now said "Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes,..." (etc.), that I actually have the luxury to be able to say "No, but thank you" or "No, but some things open up in my schedule again in January, so let's resurface this discussion then." I call it a luxury because it comes with both a sense of empowerment to be able to design my future and gratitude for the fact that people are offering me the position over another option/person, which is both a kind thought and a sign that my work speaks for itself. 2) Be selfish with your time - There are 168 hours in a week. Reduce 72 hours of work time, 12 hours of workouts, and 42 hours of minimum sleep time. I have a remaining 42 hours/week to take care of life's needs (food, shower, laundry, etc.) and balance some social time and relaxation time. Fortunately, I get a huge social element through work; I feel blessed to work with positive people (coworkers and clients), which I truly believe is a result of the fitness industry. No matter where you are in your fitness journey, you are taking steps towards living a healthy life. However, it is nice to have social time outside of work, especially time spent with family and close relationships. Also, my sleep/recovery time are essential for maintaining my mind-body balance, emotional health, and positive perspective. Therefore, I've learned to be selfish with my time. When a client can only make a 7am appointment, and I could show up to the gym an hour earlier and handle it (like I've done a handful of times), but I closed the night before at 11pm and I have to compromise my sleep to fit his/her schedule, then it's not realistic. Everything will work out in due time, but I've got to take care of my well-being so that I can keep experiencing time! 3) Don't use your iPhone in the morning - My phone is my alarm clock, so naturally, the first thing I do in the morning is turn off my alarm. The next thing I see is the surge of notifications that popped up while I was sleeping, and I immediately get lost in emails, social media, and scheduling. As a result, everything in my morning routine gets delayed, and when you work 12 hour days, there's a lot to prep for! I need to pack my bags for all daily activities, pack my lunch, eat breakfast, take care of basic hygiene needs, and beat the morning traffic to wherever my first job is! I don't have time for social media distractions! So, put the phone away. That adorable puppy playing with the baby kangaroo may be stimulating to watch, but it's just not worth my time. 4) Have an outlet (or two+) - I purposely have a gym membership at a gym I don't work at because it's important to be able to "turn off" the emails/tasks. (It really does make a mental difference when I'm lifting on my personal time and a member comes up to me and asks me to change the TV for them.) I started taking cardio kickboxing and boxing/core classes because throwing punches is such a stress reliever while being conducive to my fitness goals. I include yoga/stretching/sauna time in my scheduled lifting time because relaxing and restoring is essential to my muscle recovery. I've started declining Sunday morning yoga sub opportunities and postponing emails because Sunday is my one day off a week; I use this day to sleep, cheat on my diet, and watch football. On weeks where I have taught a yoga class, or squeezed in a client, I can feel a huge difference in my sleep for the entire week. I've tried to make it work, but it really just reinforces my other lessons on being selfish with my time and saying no. 5) Handle stress immediately / Live in the present - I've got way too much on my plate to fall behind, so it requires constant scheduling and time management. As a result, I get fleeting moments of feeling overwhelmed. The more I dwell on these feelings, the more stress I experience. Stress becomes a vicious cycle: stress --> anxiety --> distraction from tasks --> inevitable thoughts of failure --> tears --> emotional illness --> physical illness --> stress. I experienced this cycle for a greater portion of my college years, and I picked up a ton of different tools on escaping it. Over the last couple of years, I've honed in on my favorites (meditation, perspective-flipping, exercise, and list writing). This last month has helped me in utilizing these tools at optimal times so that the minute the cycle begins, I can Alt-F4 it.
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