- Getting fresh air and exercise with your family is an enjoyable, effective way to reconnect.Biking with the family image by skidme from Fotolia.com
Enriching your life by devoting designated slots of time to your family, home and personal life will help you and your family to thrive. Chaotic lifestyles tend to cause stress and tension in households where there never seems to be enough time to take care of vital areas in our life. Deciding what priorities are important to help your life flow better is a task no one should put off if your hectic lifestyle leaves you feeling harried most of the time. - With busy, jampacked schedules, modern families often only have time to converse during carpooling or while chauffeuring children to ballgames or piano lessons. Dedicate a night during the middle of the week as family night. Activities can be as simple as making homemade pizzas together or having a family Bible devotion time. Getting outdoors and rollerblading, hiking or playing a game of touch football is also an entertaining idea. (See Ref. 1; suggestion 9) When weather conditions place you inside just bring out an old favorite game that your family can play together or work on a large puzzle as a group. Making family night a priority and establishing firm rules of no TV or phones during those few hours will let everyone know that re-establishing contact with family members is a vital task in which you all need to take part.
- Taking care of your family is fulfilling and necessary but it is also necessary to restore yourself. Spend an evening during the week doing something that you enjoy to rejuvenate and restore your spirit. It can be reading a book by your favorite author, giving yourself a manicure and pedicure, or playing your banjo. Focusing on a task that you love will make you a better parent or spouse the rest of the week, because you will not be left feeling there is never enough time to pamper yourself or enrich your mind.
- Designate a time each week for the members of your family to organize the home. Reducing clutter will benefit everyone in the long run. Not having to stress by frantically searching for an item that you need right away is only one benefit. (See Ref. 2) Getting rid of the clutter will make your home appear cleaner and will make everyone feel less crowded. It is freeing to need an item and to discover it in the location where you stored it. Set aside one or two hours each week for everyone to make piles of things to give away, throw away or store. Once you reap the benefits of an organized home, you will never go back to your cluttered habits.
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