The Prioritization Equation

Let’s Talk About Priorities…

Prioritization. This topic has been weighing on me pretty constantly lately – admittedly out of sheer necessity. As the roles I play in my life increase in number and importance, the pressure of maximizing my time and making the right choices about how to spend my time become increasingly heavy.

This is, obviously, not a unique circumstance for a new parent, a working parent, a working person… really anyone. We all have finite time and infinite possibilities for the use of that time. It can be daunting. I’ve always been “busy.” I like to stay “busy.” I like to fill my time with meaningful pursuits, people that make me laugh and think, and activities that enrich my life. I like for my house to be tidy. I like for my family to eat homemade meals. I like to exercise (most of the time). I like to sleep (as often as possible these days). But as my list of “must do’s” grows exponentially with a growing human to care for and a growing company to run, my list of “like to do’s” must, by necessity, be reduced.

I’ll spell out an example of how I am thinking critically about this in my life. I had a brief but serious conversation with my husband last night about sleep. In order to get my daughter to daycare and myself to work on time, I’ve been trying to wake up at 5:30 every morning. I also made a commitment last year (once the baby started sleeping through the night) to start prioritizing eight hours of sleep for my health and sanity – it has made a HUGE difference for me. Simple math indicates that bedtime should be 9:30 pm. This feels pretty outrageous to me, but I am trying… and most weeknights I am in bed by 10 or 10:30. This isn’t without consequence though. My husband usually gets home from work around 6:30 pm, we eat dinner as a family, and then I get back to work while he does the dishes, and bath time & bedtime for our daughter. He is usually done with this routine around 8 or 8:30 pm, giving us one hour per night together, which is often spent with each of us on our respective laptops wrapping up work for the day or pursuing hobbies – either separately or together.

Last night’s conversation occurred because we are on night three of trying to watch a movie together. It sounds so silly, but this is the second movie recently that took us multiple installations to finish. We decided to watch these – both Oscar nominated – films without multi-tasking so we could really enjoy them and be present in the moment together, as close to “date night” as we can get. Because of this, the increments of time we can dedicate between our other obligations, commitments and pursuits maxes out at about an hour. When I told him last night that I had 40 minutes only before I needed to go up to bed, he said “OK,” but with a smirk and a little laugh.

Immediately, I felt defensive. But I took a breath, decided consciously not to overreact, and instead used it as an opportunity to reflect on my recent choices and priorities. I’m committed to getting enough sleep so that I can be my best. I’m committed to waking up early and having a (relatively) calm and organized morning to start my day on the right foot and get both my daughter and myself to our respective locations on time. I’m committed to putting my all into my business whenever I am not with my family or friends. I’ve made these things priorities in my life.

But does this mean I’m not prioritizing my marriage? Does only 40 minutes to watch a movie on a Monday night mean I’m a bad wife? My husband needs longer to wind down than I do. He also fares MUCH better on less sleep (he is rarely the diva that I can be when sleep-deprived, or hangry for that matter). Matt assures me that this isn’t true, and that our priorities are aligned, but sometimes I still feel guilt.

Money is another huge factor in the “Prioritization Equation.” Clearly, we all must figure out how to prioritize our money similar to how we deal with our finite time. But there’s a more direct connection as well, since spending money on specific things can free up your time, and similarly, electing to do something yourself can save you money. As you might imagine, when I chose to leave my cushy corporate job to run a start-up, our household income took a nosedive. Many tearful conversations, countless spreadsheet tabs, and nights of soul searching contributed to deciding whether I could take the leap, and whether we wanted to, given the trade-offs. I can confidently say on this side of the decision, that it was the right one, but that doesn’t make it easy.

Matt and I have completely changed our lifestyle. We meet weekly to review our finances. We budget down to the dollar. We cancelled our cable, our housekeeper, and our gym memberships. We meal plan and do one big grocery trip every weekend. We don’t buy things that we don’t actually need. We shop around for the best prices for the things we do. We do takeout instead of delivery, and usually only once/week. Instead of fancy cocktails at a bar, we pregame our date nights at home like we’re in college (this one is actually a fun tradeoff J .) Our travel schedule is more locally focused than usual, although traveling is DEFINITELY a priority for both of us, and adventure is something we will always build into our lives. We say no to a lot of invitations. For those of you who know us well, this life looks a lot different than the life we have lived together up until this point.

One of my favorite mantras is “discomfort breeds innovation,” and boy, have we needed to get creative to live within this new financial reality. My weekday workout is now a forty-minute trek to walk my daughter to daycare, plus another forty-five minutes to get to my office… rain, shine, or freezing February morning. It doesn’t make sense to get a second car that would stretch our budget and be used primarily just to shuttle back and forth to the preschool which is less than three miles from our home.

These changes in my life and my lifestyle have allowed me to realize how inefficient I’ve been with my time in the past. I look back on my naïve, pre-kid self, who rarely made time for adequate sleep because she was just “too busy.” I oscillate between feeling jealous of her and mad at her… “Do more! You don’t even realize what you have! THE FREEDOM!” But, just like everything else, it’s all relative. You can’t accurately imagine how you will manage your time once you have kids, before you actually have them. You feel busy because you ARE busy, but – if you’re anything like me – you fail to realize that most of it is of your own design. I thought I was the busiest. I thought that made me the important-est (which is a word I just made up but like very, very much).

In my new reality, every minute is accounted for, plus a load of surplus “to-do’s” that don’t make the cut. Sometimes the laundry doesn’t get done, or I don’t get to call a friend like I was planning. I definitely don’t get to thank you notes as often as I intend. And my previously very long, very hot showers have become quite abbreviated (to my dismay). I’m actively trying to give myself enough grace to work through this equation and these factors in order to feel content and proud at the end of every day. In order to do this, I’ve had to adjust the correlation I’ve historically drawn between productivity and self-worth. It’s not an easy shift to make, but it’s essential to my mental health, and my ability to focus on my purpose and what really matters in my life today.

But there is no “sacrifice” here, just choice. I don’t believe in making unnecessary sacrifices or contributing to the narrative of the martyrdom of motherhood. No matter our stage of life, our actions communicate to the world what matters most to each of us: through how we spend our money, through how we spend our time. It is both a zero-sum equation, and our own personal economy of sorts, a “careful management of available resources.” We owe it to ourselves to take inventory often, to ensure true alignment between our values and our “spending.” So right now, I’m going to go play with my daughter, uninterrupted, for a full hour. No buzzing phone, no guilt, no sacrifices. Her laughter is my priority right now, and I will use as many minutes as I can, just making her giggle.