Quality Time v. Quantity Time

What does quality time with your kids look like?

If you're a working mom with limited time (i.e. can't win the quantity side of the debate), you want the time that you do have when you're with your kids to be quality.

You want to "make it count".

Maybe to you, that's...

• sitting on the floor playing with trucks or building with Legos or Duplos.

• Maybe it's reading books or coloring/crafting.

• Or maybe it's going to the playground, tossing a ball back and forth, or drawing with chalk.

Regardless of the activity, quality time is about doing something together - being together.

But is it still quality time if your mind's not in it?

If you're playing with trucks but thinking about that stack of paperwork you've been meaning to get through for weeks?

If you're coloring but thinking about that project at work and how you could have handled it differently?

If you're reading aloud but instead of paying attention to the story you're wondering how you're going to muster the energy to clean up the kitchen before bed.

To anyone watching (and even to yourself), you're being with your kids. You're spending quality time together... But are you??

What if instead of defining quality time by just being together, doing something that your little one wants to do, you measured quality time by your presence.

Not physically, but mentally.

Think of it as an act of meditation.

Meditation is where you try to calm and clear your mind, and if you become aware of any thoughts, you try to release them.

So if you're coloring, and you catch yourself creating a mental packing list for your upcoming vacation, let it go.

If you're building Legos and find yourself mentally reviewing an upcoming report or work presentation, set it aside.

Your goal is to clear your mind of anything distracting. Of anything that's not your kid and the activity you're doing together.

That's quality time.

It won't be easy. Especially if your mind is BUSY.

The best thing for a busy mind is reassurance. Reassure it that everything will get taken care of in its own time - just not now.

And then work on creating a place to store all those thoughts, ideas, projects, and worries so you don't have to constantly think about them and then plan for how and when you're going to take care of them.

With a place and a plan, you can trust that they'll get done and that thinking about them now, while you're playing and spending quality time with your kids, isn't necessary.

This time is for being present. For making the most of the time you have together.

For making it quality time.

Slowing down your busy mind is the first thing we tackle when we coach together 1:1.

You'll create a place and a plan for all of your goals, tasks, projects, and worries so that your mind can slow down. So you can take in the way your little one plays at this stage before it's over.

And soon you'll be the one wishing you could read just one more book, color one more page, and play for just 5 more minutes because that quality time feels so good.
 

Here's to your calm and present being,

Katelyn