Weekly Recap #15: "New Year, New Schedule"
2 weeks into 2018, 50 more to go! The past week my wife, Sara, & I have been trying out a new schedule and it seemed to work out well, so we're going to try it again this week. It's funny how our new schedule has evolved, but helping each other get more "me time" & rest is basically the main factors that have affected the need for this change.
For those that know me, it's common knowledge that surviving on little sleep has been my super power for years, but I feel like that power has really faded the past few months & I know part of it has to do with me needing to get back in shape. I feel so much more natural energy the more active I am, but in order to get more active it's going to involve me being more disciplined & a lot more planning with my wife. We're definitely taking steps toward improvement on this, & as stated in previous blog posts, having a synched iCalender on our phones is a HUGE help, but now setting a time Sunday night after our kids go to bed for a pre-week-game-plan-time seems to be the next step.
It's so crazy to do life together with someone & it's crazy how much being married is actually a small business partnership as well. Then you add kids to the mix & you add a whole new layer to this friendship/business partnership/survival skills relationship that you never expected. There are so many phases of life you go through, & each phase brings new challenges, new things you never thought you would have to deal with or phrases that you never thought you would say, "hey, don't do that, you're getting poop on your brother!" (Is this real life?). Being able to talk about these challenges & figure out how best to strategize & make a game plan to conquer the challenges is definitely not something we think about having to do when you're dating & falling in love & no real 💩 has actually hit the fan yet (when you have kids, this can literally happen if you're not careful).
In my conversations with fellow dads this week, I had the opportunity to chat with my childhood friend, Terry, & we made some fun parellels about being a member of a family & being in a band. When you play live music you know that each room you're playing in can affect the overall sound you produce. The best musicians know how to adjust their playing styles according to the room they're playing in and/or the people they're playing with. And as a member of a family you have to learn to adapt to various situations as well.
If you choose not to adapt to the room, the music may sound too loud. If all the members of the band don't play to the same beat, the music just sounds off. If someone in the band is trying to hard to be noticed & keeps soloing or playing louder than everyone, it can be distracting. As a parent, it's our job to be the conductor or the drummer that sets the beat for our family, & we ultimately control the pace for our family's musical sound & style.
Our other responsibility/role as a parent is to be the audio engineer. While we're raising our kids it's our job to help them know when they're playing too loud, & help fine tune their levels. A great audio engineer typically knows the band better than they know themselves, and a good band knows they can trust his/her advice.
So what's your family's musical style? Have you found your rhythm? Are there helpful routines/tools/advice/apps that you've found that give you a better chance at accomplishing tasks & goals? As our family grows I see all these new challenges approaching & it definitely keeps us on our toes. I hope that I can continue to grow as a father and engineer our family's music well & that they can trust me to conduct them.
