How We Spend Our Hours Is How We Spend Our Lives, or, 55 Days on Skis and Counting

This weekend, I hit 55 days on skis this season. It wasn't a great season - we had a rough early season, a great March, and then the snow stopped coming. Also, it was the best possible season - I had time to ski and I prioritized it! 

I know 55 days is far from a record season for die-hards. But for me, it symbolizes a new level of freedom and independence in my schedule. As soon as I stopped working, my husband asked me, "You're getting an Ikon pass, right?" And I hemmed and hawed because it was a lot of money and I was worried I wouldn't use it enough to "make it worth it" (whatever that meant to me). And, bless him, he looked at me and said, "No, this is the year, you're getting an Ikon pass."

It was hard for me to make the call to invest in joy and put the money and time into something that has little pragmatic return beyond just being fun. I've spent a lot of time training myself to search for the highest level of practical outcome from my activities. 

Now I have the delight of being able to prioritize joy. To me, joy looks like 55 days on skis. It looks like time with friends. It looks like time on my bike. It looks like cooking (occasionally), working in the garden, and hanging out with my kids. 

I still have lots of responsibilities: school, internship, family, MTB coaching, taking folks on orphanage work trips to Mexico, and general adulting. Responsibility is cool. And prioritizing joy is cool, too. I can choose both.

Time Without Someone Else's Voice

Last week, I wrote about how not selling my time has changed my perspective on my priorities. Another thing I've been thinking about a lot is how noisy my life is. And I've been working hard to quiet my life down. 

Years ago, I read Digital Minimalism. One question that the author, Cal Newport, asks is: How much time do you spend without someone else's voice talking in your ear? This question stopped me in my tracks because my life is *noisy.* A lot of that noise is borne out of a desire for efficiency - listening to a book while folding laundry, taking a call while on a walk, talking to a friend on the phone while driving. Those aren't bad activities, but they left me with very little time when I was listening to my voice and my voice only. 

So I've been trying to embrace a little more quiet in my life; a little more time with nobody's voice in my ear. This could be driving without taking a call, exercising without watching TV, or walking without listening to a podcast or book. For me, it often looks like leaving my phone at home when I take the dogs for a walk or starting skiing or bike riding without listening to music (and adding music when and if I feel like I've had the quiet time I need). 

My question is, how much time do you spend without someone else's voice in your ear? And if you're unhappy with the answer, how could you spend a few moments each day with just your voice?