Feel Better in 10 Minutes: Self-Care for Working Moms Who Don't Have Time for It

Calling all overwhelmed working moms! Do you find yourself rolling your eyes when people talk about taking time for yourself? Sounds nice, but who can carve out an hour or two when the to-do list never ends and you're not sleeping enough as it is ?

Then this episode is for you! I am sharing 25 of my favorite simple self-care practices that take take 10 minutes or less.  These quick practices are designed to fit into your hectic schedule.  There's something here for everyone, whether you are in the mood for a quiet solo activity, social connection, exercise, or even cleaning. I'll delve into how to infuse these small pockets of happiness into your everyday life. Many of the suggestions on this list have been proven to improve your mental health - even if you only engage in them for a few minutes.

Often we let ourselves get caught up in this idealized image of the perfect self-care ritual- which is great, if you can make that happen. But for many of us, that's not realistic. And focusing on the time we DON'T have prevents us from making the most of the moments we DO have. We are "letting the perfect be the enemy of the good." But if we can allow ourselves to let go of perfection and do what we can when we can, we can actually see better results.

So...take a listen and together, let's rewrite the rules and prioritize self-care.

Mentioned in this Episode:
Insight Timer Free Meditation App 
List of  My Favorite Free & Short Insight Timer meditations. 

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Need help applying this to your life? Ready for more strategies like this, but personalized to YOU? Set up your free consult and let’s talk about your unique situation and how coaching can help:
https://getcoached.jennyhobbsmd.com/consult
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Everything on this podcast and website is for informational purposes only and should not be used as medical advice. Views are our own, and do not necessarily represent those of our past or present employers or colleagues.

Transcript

Kevin: 0:09

Welcome to Rethink your Rules with Jenny Hobbs MD. A fresh perspective on relationships, success and happiness for high achieving moms.

Jenny: 0:24

Hey, there it's Jenny. Welcome back to another episode of Rethink your Rules. First off, let me say if my voice sounds a little strange, I've been really sick, so I put off recording this to the last possible minute, but I may still have a little bit of a cough and I may sound a little congested, so apologies, please bear with me. Secondly, I want to say that I have been thinking about this episode for a couple of months now and I'm so excited to finally be recording it. I want to talk to those of you who are so busy and overwhelmed that the thought of taking time to do half the things I talk about on this podcast sounds completely impossible and farfetched, and I've been thinking about you a lot. If this sounds familiar to you or sounds relatable, I've been thinking about you a lot ever since a conference I attended in August. It was a well-being conference and one of the speakers posed the question what would you do if you had a few hours to yourself each week? And it's a really nice discussion. A lot of people were thinking about things that they missed doing before they became physicians, with kids and all these things, but I also heard people saying I have no idea where to even begin thinking about what I would do as a couple of hours a week to myself, because that idea is so preposterous and so, far from where I am, I have no time to myself, much less time to think about what I would do if I did have the time. And so, after having had some of those conversations and chatting with some of those women, I came away with this idea where I want to share ideas for things that you can do to take care of yourself and feel better, even if you only have 10 minutes or less, and I came up with a list of 25 things you can do that are great self-care activities that will have a nice impact on your life, that only take 10 minutes. And I really think this is important because so often those of us in the coaching space share these great ideas, but they do feel overwhelming. We're not really meeting you where you're at, when you're rushing around with little babies and working full time and all those things.

Jenny: 2:32

And I also think this is really important to counteract our human brain tendency to engage in all or nothing thinking. And so this perfectionist thinking well, since I can't take an hour to go to the spa or do this big self-care thing, I might as well just not do it at all. We tell ourselves that it has to be perfect and then, because it can't be perfect, we just give up. And it's just a human brain thing. It's one of the things we do when we're stressed, and so we want to counteract that. And so today I want to counteract that by giving you 25 very simple, actual things that you can do in under 10 minutes. That will improve your life, will improve how you feel, will help you start to prioritize yourself, and these things will snowball and build on themselves. So don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Just give it a try.

Jenny: 3:25

Notice that your brain is going to tell you. If you try one of these things for 10 minutes, your brain's going to tell you oh, you need to do a little bit more, or try to fit in two of them, or try to be more productive with it, or you need to have all the right stuff in place before you try this thing that Jenny talked about. But I really want you to put that voice aside and just say no, I'm not going to be a perfectionist about this, I'm going to overthink this and over complicate it and put it off. I'm just going to set the timer for 10 minutes or put my phone on silent for 10 minutes and do one of these things, and the next time I have 10 minutes I'll do it again and it'll be trial and error and it'll be great and it might be messy sometimes and that's okay, all right. That mindset is really, really important. Okay, so here's your list of 25 things, and I'm going to try to talk quickly because one of my goals is to make this podcast very short. I don't know at this point if I'm going to make it under 10 minutes, but I want this podcast to be something short that you can listen to. It could be even one of these 10 minute things. Okay, all right. So 25 things you can do to take care of yourself in 10 minutes or less, all right.

Jenny: 4:23

Number one is to meditate. Now we always talk about meditating. I will once again put in the show notes my guide to my favorite short meditations from Insight Timer that are free, so you can download that and you can go to Insight Timer and check those out. Some of them are as short as two minutes. If you have another meditation app, who like, go for it. There are free meditations all over the place on YouTube. I'm not going to list off all the apps in the interest of time.

Jenny: 4:52

Another thing you can do even without a meditation app is there are books that I've found that have just short little guided meditations, or little cards that are, like you know, give you a question to think about while you meditate for a few minutes. You can find those probably at a thrift store, or maybe you know my kids have meditation cards. Maybe your kids have some. Use one of those. Nobody cares if you're using a meds and adult.

Jenny: 5:14

Another thing that's really helpful is a very simple breathing exercise where you breathe in for the count of four, you hold your breath for a count of seven and then you let it out for a count of eight. It's called four, seven, eight breathing and it's one of the most popular ratios of breathing exercises and can be really, really calming. And so you could literally put on a 10 minute timer or five minute timer or whatever and just do four, seven, eight breathing. And remember, with meditation, the point is not to be perfect. Your brain's going to wander, your mind's going to wander, that's totally fine. It's just the act of doing that for yourself and getting grounded for a few minutes. All right, that's number one.

Jenny: 5:51

Number two is to rest, and when I say rest, what I mean is take 10 minutes, set a timer, lay down on your bed, close your eyes and do nothing. Do not multitask, do not be watching Netflix, do not be sending messages or listening to music, listening to a podcast, whatever. What's interesting is that in our modern culture, most of us never truly rest like this. We tend to be doing a guided meditation or reading something or listening to something. We very, very rarely just let our brain rest for a period of time, and one of the authors I read talked about the fact that when you actually do truly rest and just sit there with your eyes closed and do nothing, it doesn't take as long as you expect to see the benefits, to feel refreshed and rejuvenated and less burned out. It's that we never do it. We're always doing something else. So give it a try. Just lay down, close your eyes for 10 minutes. If you fall asleep, great, great, your alarm will go off in 10 minutes. But if not, just maybe notice how that feels. So just lay down and relax. Another thing you can do is lay down when you're doing this and put your feet up on the wall and you've been laying on the floor with your feet up and that can be, additionally, really calming. So that's number two, true rest.

Jenny: 7:07

Number three go for a walk. So, and if you do go for a walk, you can listen to something, or you can also just focus on noticing your feet on the ground or as you're going, you can notice and name to yourself things that you like the color of this tree or this thing or whatever to really be present. Just getting outside and walking always clears my head and gets my perspective back. Or you can sit in the sun. You know, if the weather's not good, you can sit by a window where there's sun or just go outside in your backyard. But really getting outside for a few minutes, I always think it's not going to make a difference. And then I go and do it and I'm amazed Every time I'm doing this podcast for you and I will tell you, I have days still where I think that's not going to change anything. I just got to put my head down and get the work done. Go outside, whole perspective change. So give it a try.

Jenny: 8:00

Number four so some of these you're going to expect, right? So you can do yoga. You can do a workout or just some stretching. So quick ideas If you go to YouTube, you Google 10 minute yoga, you will find tons of options for free. As some of you know, I have been a Beachbody coach in the past. It's now called Bodhi B-O-D-I. If you have a subscription to that. There's lots of short workout videos on there that are under 10 minutes. Or if you're like me and you've had back pain and your physical therapist gave you stretches and you never do them, you could just do your stretches for 10 minutes. So many options there.

Jenny: 8:33

Number five music. Okay, music is one of my favorite things to do with this time. So you can just play a song that you like, that pumps you up, that you want to dance to. If you have kids around, have them do a dance party with you. Just pick something that you love. You could also, if you're feeling really overwhelmed with emotion or sad, maybe play a song that you know really helps you to fully experience that emotion. And sometimes you just need to have a good cry. And for me there's this song from Hamilton after his son dies. It's Quiet Uptown and I don't know what it is about that song, but it can always, when I'm feeling really emotional about something, even completely unrelated, I listen to it. It helps me have that cry. It feels really, really therapeutic. Same thing with Taylor Swift's 10 minute all too well song. That's one of my favorites. To just sit for 10 minutes and listen to that 10 minute version of all too well, it's a great breakup song. I mean, I haven't had a breakup in many, many years, but it just evokes so much emotion. One of the things you can do if you decide to do this music thing is really quickly, while you're sitting there for your 10 minutes, make a playlist, just start a playlist, call it your mojo mix or your self care mix or your chill mix or your sad or whatever. And each time you do this you can add more to it. And then sometimes I just have certain playlists that I just play on repeat that are my favorites for those moments, and so you're kind of setting yourself up for success in the future by making it easier with those playlists. Another let's see what we have. That was number five.

Jenny: 10:11

Number six is you can do an at-home little spa treatment. So I don't know about you, but I have a million of those little like I don't know lotion sets or face mask sets or self-care things that people have given me for various holidays and gifts and things right. So if you have that little part of your bathroom, grab one of them, do one of the face masks, do a quick little pedicure, soak your feet for a few minutes, put some lotion on right, maybe take a nice lotion that someone's giving you and do a self-massage. You can give yourself a hand massage. You can give yourself a neck massage. There's videos showing how to do this or just do what feels good. Another great thing to do with this is it could be hard to take a full, long, luxurious bath for 10 minutes by the time you fill it up and everything. But a shower is a great option. Pile your hair on top of your head, take a shower. If you look on Amazon, you can get these things called shower steamers which you can put under the draining water in the shower and they're kind of like a bath bomb for your shower and they let off some nice essential oils and it feels very spa-like. So why not use all those things that you have around the house If you don't have a face mask or something like that. You can grab one when you're at the store the next time or simply take a nice warm washcloth and steam your face and relax that way.

Jenny: 11:37

Number seven. So number seven is you can spend those 10 minutes finding a sensory experience that you enjoy, and by this I mostly mean touch. So one of the things that I've noticed is that, like if I have a really soft blanket, it just makes me feel so much calmer, or sometimes for some people it's a weighted blanket. I've also noticed my kids have all these sensory toys and I don't know if you've ever sort of played with them. When you're playing with your kids, but you might notice some of them you kind of like again, no one's watching you. Who cares if you're acting like a child, like we're all kids at heart and our poor little burned out, primitive brains can use a little TLC, right. So maybe you find you really like how squishies feel. Maybe you like how slime feels. I know people will find that really really calming. Maybe there's other sensory toys that you like. I play with my hair. There's one of my kids have that kind of feels like hair that I kind of like. But again, for me it's often these really soft blankets that are a sensory experience that just makes me so calm and happy, and so I literally will just make a point of sitting with my blanket and maybe combining it with one of these other things like a book or a face mask or whatever.

Jenny: 12:50

Another sensory experience that many people like is candles. So light a candle who cares if it's the middle of the day and it seems weird, just light it. Again, these are things people get as gifts and we often sit around and never actually use them, and part of this, too, is trial and error. So as you're doing this sensory thing, you might say, gosh, I don't know what Jenny's talking about. Like today, she sounds like a baby with her blanket. That's not for me. Totally fine. But just notice what works for you. Maybe it's dimming the lights a little bit, maybe it's playing, like turning on the candle and combining it with a certain kind of music. Maybe you like a nice fan because you run hot. Maybe you like sitting by the fire because it warms you up. Notice what works best for your body and seek that out. Sometimes, honestly, for me, I realize, oh gosh, I need to go upstairs and just change my clothes. I'm not comfortable with these clothes and I go and do that and it makes a huge difference.

Jenny: 13:46

Number eight so this is kind of sensory too, but I wanted to set it as its own thing, which is to eat something or drink something mindfully. Okay. So, whether for you it's a favorite tea, a piece of dark chocolate, reese's trees which are coming in stock now, which are my favorite Reese's, anything Reese's, but especially the ones with all the peanut butter inside Maybe it's a fresh fruit, maybe it's coffee, maybe in some cases this might be wine, or maybe you make a delicious salad. Whatever it is, you spend the time to mindfully prepare it and then sit and savor each bite, just enjoying the experience, noticing with your hands around the cup how it feels warm or cool, right, noticing the smell, tasting the chocolate, eating it slowly. It's really interesting. But things like holding something warm or cold and noticing it can be very grounding and calming for your body. And again, this is an opportunity. If people are giving you gifts, try them out. We have these things sitting around our houses at least I do and we don't use them Like. Why not use them in these 10 minutes? Treat yourself. Treat yourself like from a that show. Parks and Rec.

Jenny: 15:03

Okay, number nine pet an animal. So I have dogs, so this one is super easy for me to do. And again, I've been surprised how, if I sit down and I put my dog on my lap, I have one dog that always wants to be on my lap. So I have my soft blanket I mentioned. I've got my dog and I very mindfully pet him. He's so soft, it's so calming, it brings my, it really calms my body down. I think they've done studies on this with peoples, dogs and cats. This is why they have therapy animals. So just sit down, put your phone away, put everything away and just be with your pet and be thankful for how they love you and they're unconditionally there for you and they're soft, and give them a snuggle. If you don't have your own pet, you could also use those 10 minutes to go visit a neighbor's pet that you. You know, somebody that you walk by when you walk on your way to work. Maybe their dog's in the yard, or maybe you can call a friend and see if it's okay with you if you take their dog for a walk or something like that. Get creative with it.

Jenny: 16:05

Number 10. Read one chapter of a book. So this is one of my favorites and specifically read something you want to read. I don't care if it's a romance novel or something you know totally silly, a graphic novel, a comic. Sometimes we get so caught in having to read something that's checking something off a list, whether it's a journal article or a self-help book or an educational thing or the next greatest novel. That's actually really depressing and ruining our day. Or we think again it has to be all or nothing Like well, I have no time to read, so I'm not going to try it all. Well, sit down and let yourself read one chapter of a book, just because you like it. Read a book that you loved when you were a kid. Pull it off the shelf. You know your Anna Green Gables or whatever. It's really satisfying and I think for many of us, as we went through our training, we lost track of reading fiction for fun, and so I think that is a great way to spend a 10 minutes.

Jenny: 17:05

Number 11. Watch 10 Minutes of Comedy, something that makes you laugh, so you can check out a stand-up comic. Now, sometimes those run a little longer than 10 minutes. It would be hard to turn those off, but there's lots of them on the various streaming services and on YouTube. I know a friend of mine had downloaded one of Tig Notaro's comedy routines and she had it on her audio I think it's on Spotify or something and she loved listening to that. Some are cleaner than others, so keep an eye for that. You can also, you know, find a comedy podcast that you enjoy and listen to 10 Minutes of that. You can watch a show that you've always loved. That's really funny to you, like you know Friends or Seinfeld or whatever your favorite is, and go watch 10 Minutes of a Highlight of that. Or you can go to, you know, youtube and find some of your favorite scenes from a movie and laugh at that. Laughter is a great way to spend this time. Number 12 is listen to 10 Minutes of a Podcast, and that could be, again, a funny podcast. It could be something educational or inspiring. It could be my podcast. And, again, you don't have to listen to all 20, 40 minutes of somebody's podcast. You can listen to 10 Minutes of it and then turn it off and go about your day.

Jenny: 18:24

Don't feel like you have to complete something in order for it to be effective. Number 13, be a kid for 10 minutes. So I like to think of this like channeling what you would have done. You know, you were like third or fourth grade. You were home from school, no homework to do, nobody needed anything from you and you could just. You had an hour or two to kill and you could do whatever you wanted. What did you do? Do that, don't make it mean anything. Don't try to check off something. Don't do it because you should do it, don't do it because you're good at it. Do what brings you joy.

Jenny: 18:56

Now, this might be hard because you might not have thought about this very much. So if that's the case, one thing you could do with this first 10 minutes is just spend five minutes picturing yourself at that age, that carefree age. Or maybe picture yourself, you know, on vacation at the beach, running around, feeling carefree. But channel that and start remembering that girl, remembering what she used to do. Another thing you can do is you can just go ahead and try some things out. If you have kids, you know, grab a coloring book, grab some paints, try out what are there. You know, sometimes I do one of the video games my kids likes and like and try it out. If it's something I might like, then they do one of their puzzle things, get creative with it. You're not gonna like everything, but you might surprise yourself. Sometimes I've really surprised myself with the things that I found relaxing and fun, that my kids have introduced me to or reintroduced me to. Sometimes that is going back to, you know, reading a book. If that's what you always did, it's very comforting to do the things that brought us joy when we were in grade school age, especially when we're going through a hard time. And then another thing that kind of goes along with this is you know, go upstairs in your bathroom, lock the door and play with your makeup. Right, now, maybe we didn't do that when we were in third or fourth grade as much, but definitely by the time we were in junior high. Right, maybe you played with makeup or you did some. Played with your outfits. Have a fun time with it, alright.

Jenny: 20:16

Number 14 is to journal. Now, not everyone is into journaling, but if you enjoy that, open up a notebook. Again, most of us have lots of these random notebooks around the people. Give us, pick one that looks pretty, grab a pen and start writing. You can write about any of a number of the things I've mentioned here. Right, journaling about ideas for things you might want to do with these 10 minutes, or, you know, stuff you did when you were a kid or things like that. I'll mention some more ideas for journaling as we go through here. Another thing you could do if you're not much of a writer and you're a verbal processor like me is, you know, leave yourself a voice message on one of the various apps. There's lots of them where you can do that for yourself, including iMessage, but maybe you just want to talk to yourself and process something verbally. That can be really therapeutic to get it out that way. Number 15. So this would be something you could journal about, or you could just do this as something.

Jenny: 21:11

Write a list of 10 things that you like about yourself True things that you generally like. They don't even have to be things that everyone else likes. But just be honest with yourself, like me, I've said before, there's some things I like about myself that not everyone likes. Right, and that's okay. If you are a person who really struggles to find things that you like about yourself and I get that it can be hard to start with five things or write some things you like about yourself and then think back to the last time someone gave you a really genuine compliment and you felt happy and proud and glowing inside. Write that down. You can, by the way, say that to yourself. You can take their compliment that they gave you and adopt it and you can also relive that compliment and relive that feeling and that feeling will last longer because you're doing that. Okay, it actually. You can kind of train your brain to live in that space more often. You can also relive an achievement is something that you did that you're proud of. So it may not be oh I'm. I love this quality about myself. That may be harder, but think of like I'm really proud that I did this or this or this. And bonus, once you have this list of five or 10 things written out, or more, if you can do more, that's even better. I had one coach that maybe do 25 things, but then you can pick another time when you have five or 10 minutes, you can go back to this list and reread it and review it, and the more you do that, the more you keep those things front and center. And again, this is a way of combating your brain's negativity bias, where it wants to give you all the things that are wrong with you. So you got to kind of actively work against that and this really helps with that.

Jenny: 22:49

Number 16, text someone or email someone a genuine compliment this is a proven habit that, if you do it regularly, will make you a happier person is to just think of someone in your life and message them and tell them you appreciate them or something you like about them, and make it genuine and specific. It's super fun. It gets you out of your own head, reconnects you with people in a quick way. Number 17, voice message or call a friend. Now, sometimes we think, gosh, I don't know that much time. They're not going to be wanting to talk to me, they're busy. But it's so refreshing in this day and age if someone calls and chats with you and you can even call them and say, hey, I only have a few minutes but I just want to check in because I miss hearing your voice. Or you can voice text them. So instead of like actually doing the phone call, you can record a voice message that they can listen to later. I did this with a lot of my friends as a way to keep in touch and it's super fun and relaxing. Or text a couple of people and say, hey, I want to connect once a good time that we can chat, right, so you can use those 10 minutes to just like reconnect, rekindle some of your social connections that you don't often get to.

Jenny: 24:00

Number 18, speaking of connection, give someone a genuine full hug for 20 seconds. Okay, it's not just like a little side hug, pound back, et cetera, it's a real full hug. This is one of the things they talk about in the book Burnout by the Nagasaki sisters, which is pretty interesting, by the way, if you want to check it out. But they talk about how giving someone a true hug for 20 full seconds is a way to complete our body's stress cycle and every day we have a lot of stress that's building up and we often don't slow down to finish that off. So find your spouse, find your kid, whoever, give them big, big hug 20 seconds. It might feel awkward, that's okay, stick with it.

Jenny: 24:39

Number 19, this one also can involve your family, your kids, specifically Spend time with your kids, and by that I mean put your phone on silent, put it away for 10 minutes and get down and be with your kids. You can do child blood, child directed play, which is something that some therapists have families do when they have a hard time, where you literally are just like, what are you guys playing? And you follow their lead. Whatever they're doing, just play along. It's only 10 minutes. I know it feels like an hour sometimes when you're with your kids, but that means so much to them. And I've talked before about the show Bluey, which my kids absolutely love. It's each episode is just like eight minutes. So my kids love it when I just sit down and they pick out a Bluey and I snuggle up and watch it with them and I'm in it 100%. A lot of kids shows actually are only eight to 10 minutes. So why not just show genuine interest and check it out with them? Another thing you can do is with my family. There's certain like there's fail army videos which are funny where people are falling. We all crack up and laugh at those for 10 minutes together. Or there's funny pet videos. My son absolutely loves those. We have certain channels on YouTube or pages on Instagram accounts on Instagram that we'll just check out for 10 minutes together. Super easy way to stay connected and to tell your kids that you care about them Number 20.

Jenny: 25:57

Okay, the next few are kind of productivity related. So I want to give you a little caveat here when I list these things. It could be very easy to do these actions from a place of hustle and I need to get more things done and I need to be productive and that's not the energy that you want to be doing these things from. For this 10 minutes Remember this 10 minutes is about taking care of you. But there are moments where the best thing you can do to take care of yourself is do a quick productivity task to kind of lighten your load. Okay. You need to be honest with yourself and recognize when you're doing it to just keep moving and taking care of everyone else and all the things that need to be done, versus when you're doing it to actually lighten your load and feel better and for your best self. Okay.

Jenny: 26:49

But number 20. Brain dump. So take a big piece of paper and nap by 11 and just write down every single thing that is in your mind that you need to do, every decision, everything you're worried about, every possible thing. It is so powerful to get it out of your head because sometimes we're thinking like as it's rattling around in our brain, we're like afraid we're going to forget it so it keeps coming back to the surface, and so write it all down on a piece of paper. That's all I want you to do. Sometimes it takes me 10 minutes or more to write it all down, so just write it all down. This does not mean you're going to now organize it all, get it all done. This 10 minutes is just to get it on a piece of paper and then put it somewhere in your purse or something, so you know you're not going to forget what you need to do. But then again, the point of this is to lighten your load, lighten your brain, so you can focus on the next thing you need to do and not be stressing about that list.

Jenny: 27:38

Okay, number 21. Delete one thing. Say no to one thing. So this can be after you have that list made, or it can just be like okay, I'm totally overwhelmed, I have all this stuff on my plate for the next two days. I'm going to suck it up In this 10 minutes. I'm going to pick one thing I'm not doing and I'm going to shoot the email off, make the phone call whatever and cancel. Say no. Thank you so much for considering me. I can't do this right now. I'm so sorry. Avoid the temptation to give them a reason. Just say no, honor yourself and move on. Okay, delete one thing. You will feel so much better. Say no to one thing.

Jenny: 28:18

Number 22. Delegate or ask for help with one thing. Similar idea Put something on that list that your husband could do a great job of your mom, your nanny, your teacher, your child and I like to often phrase this as asking for help, especially with my husband, like, hey, I'm super overwhelmed. Is there any way that you could help out by picking this thing up at the pharmacy? Or is there any way that you could take care of figuring out a treat to bring to this event next weekend? Is there any way you could take the kids to whatever? Okay, so don't be afraid to ask from them. And in the moment you might feel bad, you might feel guilty. I shouldn't need this. Just pick one thing. It's 10 minutes, okay, it'll be over before you know it and then, after those minutes, you'll feel so much better. Okay, and number 23,.

Jenny: 29:09

As long as I make one decision, so one decision that's been weighing on you, that you've been circling around thinking, oh, I just need to research that a little bit more. I need to figure out what I'm going to do for the theme for that party. I need to figure out what I'm going to wear to that. I need to figure out where I'm going to get this ticket from or whatever. I need to compare prices of the best type of you know whatever service provider to use for that. Take those 10 minutes, be like I am going to give myself 10 minutes to do whatever I need to do to make this decision and decide, and then I'm sticking with it and not turning back. That is a gift to yourself. Every one of those decisions is like a rock that you're carrying around on the back as a backpack, a metaphorical backpack, and it's weighing you down. Okay, and frankly, half the time we think more time is going to give us all this great info that's going to help us make a better decision and it just isn't Okay. So just make the decision and move on Along those lines.

Jenny: 30:03

Making a decision can sometimes be a decision to super simplify something. So every year I always hand make this you know meal for everybody. And then you know your husband is like dude, if I was doing it, I would just order it from this place. Right, and you're kind of struggling, but I really like making it. I really want to make it. I always do. I always decide to do it the simplest way possible no guilt, no shame. Do it the way your husband said the simpler and move on.

Jenny: 30:27

Okay, number 24, tidy one small space Okay. So again, this is not to like get in the weeds and start cleaning up your whole house. This is avoiding the all-enough thinking. This is okay. My desktop, like my literal desktop, is a mess. I'm going to put some music on and I'm in a star and get rid of all this clutter, right. Or my computer desktop is a mess, so I'm going to clear that out and put it into folders and delete what doesn't belong there. Maybe you're going to take a drawer that's been driving you crazy, right, the one where you leave all the miscellaneous stuff, pull it all out and reorganize it throughout things you don't like.

Jenny: 31:04

Whatever One small space you can do in a short period of time. You can also do this with your tech. So, like your phone, maybe go through and turn off a bunch of your notifications to declutter that. You can go through your email and just unsubscribe from a bunch of clutter and stuff that you're never going to read, delete a bunch of emails you're never going to go through and again, set a timer for 10 minutes. This could go on forever. You don't have to finish it, just do something for those 10 minutes. That helps you feel in control.

Jenny: 31:32

My one of my coaches talks about the idea of when you're worrying about a problem, it's actually kind of nice to like give yourself a few minutes to worry while you organize something physically. So, as you're organizing, that's like your dedicated worry time to think about this problem and in a way, it's like because you're putting the physical space into order. It kind of helps you feel like you have a little more control over the thing that feels out of control, you know, cognitively. So that's something you can also try. If you're feeling really distracted and you can't sit and meditate or some of these other things, maybe you can tidy a space for those 10 minutes and let yourself sort of mull over the thing that's bothering you and you can buy something for yourself just because pop on Amazon or your favorite you know small boutique, jewelry maker or clothing place or whatever and buy something, just because maybe from this long list of things that I mentioned, you thought of some items you'd like to have around. That would be helpful for these 10 minute little breaks you're going to give yourself. Maybe you want to order some tea, or a face mask, or a book, or a blanket or a candle Pop on. Pick one thing, enjoy for 10 minutes, buying it.

Jenny: 32:49

Don't feel guilty, don't feel like you have to justify it to yourself, just do it. Far too many women are working these amazing jobs, so dedicated to their families and making great, wise, smart decisions, and feeling bad about buying something for themselves just because and again, I'm not trying to advocate for overspending, carrying around credit card debt, consumerism, buffering away all of your problems by shopping online which is definitely a problem, right, just like many of the things I've mentioned here, like video games and wine and all this stuff some of these things can be done to extremes and can be done in an unhealthy way. Shopping, of course, is the same. However, if you know that this isn't something that's a major problem for you and you are treating yourself to something small that you want that will not break your budget, I want you to do that for 10 minutes. Enjoy the process, have fun with it and don't feel guilty.

Jenny: 33:49

Okay, well, as usual, I editorialized too much and that was 30 minutes. So that will be three of your 10 minute self care blocks if you decide to do the podcast that way, or maybe just one community if yours is longer like mine. But I hope that the time I spent on this is worth it to you because it gives you ideas of how much you can do with just 10 minutes to begin taking back a tiny bit of control and self care from your crazy busy life. Try it out. Don't let the enemy the perfect be the enemy of the good. Don't engage in this all or nothing thinking. Take a little bit at a time, trial and error, learn as you go, see what works for you. I promise you you'll be surprised at how these little moments of empowerment begin to add up in snowball and it starts to really change your entire perspective on life.

Jenny: 34:45

It's all about doing a little bit at a time, over and over. And if you have a friend who is also super busy and maybe doesn't even have time to listen to my podcast all the time, which I would totally understand maybe send them this one episode and say, hey, but you might find some of these ideas helpful. Maybe offer to keep each other accountable, and each of you choose one thing to do from this list this week and then report back to each other how it went. Something like that. I would certainly appreciate it if you share with anyone you think might find it useful, and I'm sure your friends would also love to know that you are thinking of them as well. All right With that, I will call it a night and I will be back next week with more good stuff.

Kevin: 35:32

Thanks for listening to Rethink your Rules with Jenny Hobbs MD. Would you like to learn more about how to apply this to your own life through personalized coaching with Jenny? Visit us on the web at JennyHobbsMDcom to schedule a free consultation. If you found value in what you heard today, please consider subscribing to the podcast and giving us a five star rating so we can reach even more women like you.