Reframing My Experience of Time (as a Working Mother)
This year especially, as we’ve transitioned the kids to learning from home (and in combination with changes to my work-from-home business), I’ve noticed this sense of “never-enoughness” with my time:
I didn’t spend enough conscious time with the kids.
I didn’t have enough time for myself.
I didn’t get enough time for the work I wanted to do.
And when will I make enough time for my partner?
Spend enough. Have enough. Get enough. Make enough.
Is this all about scarcity of time? Is this all about how time becomes currency? And, is it possible to reframe my experience of time?
When I started working from home (and around the same time I became a mother), I thought a lot of my problems could be solved through “time management.”
And I’m not alone. Oliver Burkeman has written an entire book (called Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals) about this cultural misunderstanding of time.
That’s kind of what I learned in school, too: employers want you to go to college to demonstrate that you can handle a massive number of tasks with limited time. (Ironically, or not, I did not learn this in college; instead I learned how to sacrifice FUN for WORK.)
Maybe, though, the solution is less about how I “manage” time and more about how I experience it.
This year especially, as we’ve transitioned the kids to learning from home (and in combination with changes to my work-from-home business), I’ve noticed this sense of “never-enoughness” with my time:
I didn’t spend enough conscious time with the kids.
I didn’t have enough time for myself.
I didn’t get enough time for the work I wanted to do.
And when will I make enough time for my partner?
Spend enough. Have enough. Get enough. Make enough.
Is this all about scarcity of time? Is this all about how time becomes currency? And, is it possible to reframe my experience of time?
Because cultural understandings of time will take awhile to change. But I can invite change within my own experience right now.
What happens when I consider that -
early morning chores don’t require me to quickly rush through; maybe it’s an opportunity to work (slowly) together with my kids
washing dishes after every meal isn’t a waste of my energy; maybe it’s an opportunity to let my mind wander for awhile
helping my youngest put on her winter gear several times an hour isn’t (only) time-consuming; maybe it’s, for some reason, the opening she needs to share with me her most thoughtful thoughts
The learned-feminist in me questions (1) why I’ve chosen these examples, all stereotypically the work of the “traditional” woman or mother, and (2) why I should have to reframe these experiences at all.
Have I devalued these moments of my day because they’re mundane? Or have I devalued these moments (and myself) because that’s what I’ve learned through cultural-conditioning?
(Probably both.)
And sure, sometimes I will hate these tasks and despise the number of responsibilities I hold as a mother - despite my attempt to reframe any of it. But I don’t think it’s possible (or even necessary) to examine and reframe every moment of my day, always.
It’s this contrast between the frustrated mundane and the sacred mundane that happens within my lived experience that illuminates what really matters.
(In this case, my presence within the experience.)
This week, partly because I’ve pulled apart these big questions about how I experience time within everyday life, I’m paying close attention to the little moments - especially the ones that feel “not enough.”
Is it possible that the short-and-sweet conversations before breakfast, when everyone is a little bit groggy and hungry for pancakes, is enough? Is it possible that the conversation-cut-short with my husband, about which New Girl character is the best, is enough? Is it possible that the half-yoga-practice between activities, or the few moments I can enjoy a still-hot cup of coffee, are enough?
I think so. (I hope so.) When the frustrated mundane becomes sacred.
xx, alycia buenger
Reframing the Demands of Motherhood
Instead of embracing LIFE, I make sure I don’t enjoy things “too much,” just in case I have to quickly prepare for losing everything and enveloping myself inside grief.
And god, it’s exhausting.
I understand (intellectually) that it’s not about “losing” so much as “cycling through” what naturally comes from LIFE: change, transition, then death. I understand (intellectually) that we cannot have life without these things.
I just didn’t realize how desperately afraid of death (and life) I’ve become.
And who would have thought that I’d travel 200 miles to realize all this? To realize, too, that I have everything I want and need within the life I’m already living.
In November, I traveled from Northwest Ohio to Grand Rapids, Michigan, to explore a potential next step for our family: a move out-of-state. Since the miscarriage (and really, even before that) I’ve felt deeply unsettled and desperate to move towns.
And this is what used to help: alone time away from “the usual.”
I especially wanted to get away from what-felt-like suffocating demands of working and care-taking. I hoped a weekend trip would literally change my life for the better!
But it didn’t “help” so much as enlighten the real problem: I’m desperately afraid of losing everything and everyone I love. I’m afraid of DEATH.
So instead of embracing LIFE, I make sure I don’t enjoy things “too much,” just in case I have to quickly prepare for losing everything and enveloping myself inside grief.
And god, it’s exhausting.
I understand (intellectually) that it’s not about “losing” so much as “cycling through” what naturally comes from LIFE: change, transition, then death. I understand (intellectually) that we cannot have life without these things.
I just didn’t realize how desperately afraid of death (and life) I’ve become.
And who would have thought that I’d travel 200 miles to realize all this? To realize, too, that I have everything I want and need within the life I’m already living.
Even if it ends someday, as eventually it will, I want to show up for all of it: good parts and hard parts (and particularly with the people I adore v. alone).
Here’s an writing excerpt from my trip -
“As I wake up alone this morning, I realize that this is maybe all I’ve been missing lately: a slow, sacred start to my day, sitting in bed to write (without being woken or waking anyone!), music playing in the background, time to think and meditate and practice yoga before the demands of the day roll in…
But otherwise, I’m truly grateful for those demands, and the people who make them.
I’m grateful for our closeness especially. Not only our physical closeless, the result of two years in quarantine. But also how deeply we know each other: our daily patterns of movement, changes in facial expression and tone of voice. Sometimes I know my people better than I know myself.
And dammit if it’s taken a trip (and 30 years) to realize that I’ve been running from the good parts of this life because I’m afraid of the bad parts.
I’m afraid of getting too close, of loving too deeply and being loved… because what kind of hell does that invite if I lose all that?
I thought I was “protecting” myself from being deeply hurt, later. Which sounds completely illogical! (It is.)
But fear is not privy to logic.
I love so deeply, so intensely that it’s hard to imagine how life can, and will, change. It’s hard to imagine loss - but also growth and forward movement. I’m holding on so tightly because I can’t bear the thought of losing the people I love and care for, the dreams I nurture, the community I treasure.
And somehow that translates into the feeling that I might explode if I don’t get time away, time alone - even though actually getting that turns out to be lonely and the complete opposite of what I desire.
I’m grateful for a getaway trip. But next time, I don’t want to go alone. That was deeply helpful during an earlier part of my life - but now all I want is as much time as possible WITHIN my family, my community.
Because, if it won’t last forever, I want to show up inside all of it (good parts and hard parts) as much as possible while I can.
And I need my people for that.”
with so much love, alycia buenger
Why I Quit Graduate School
I made this "choice" from a slew of non-options, in honor of myself and in defiance of unfair, unjust practices within academia.
It was a hard, painful decision - because I’ve planned to return to school since I graduated in 2014; but it’s also the decision that feels most in alignment with who I am and what I want now.
I feel grounded in this choice. But also I’m grieving, I’m raging, I’m releasing.
I was supposed to start grad school at the beginning of this month. But less than a week before the start of classes, I withdrew from term.
I found out, belatedly, that taking only one class per semester meant losing access to financial support; that scheduling the courseload that works for me and my family would require me to pay out-of-pocket, right now.
Something I hadn't planned for.
At first I felt defeated: one more barrier to my education.
And then I felt angry: the absurdity of it all! The exclusivity of academic institutions that highlight "diversity and inclusion" when they are doing everything possible to NOT diversify or include.
So I withdrew from fall semester, my program, and the university.
I made this "choice" from a slew of non-options, in honor of myself and in defiance of unfair, unjust practices within academia.
It was a hard, painful decision - because I’ve planned to return to school since I graduated in 2014; but it’s also the decision that feels most in alignment with who I am and what I want now.
I feel grounded in this choice. But also I’m grieving, I’m raging, I’m releasing.
I'm grieving what I thought I would be doing this year, yes. But I'm also feeling this intensity of grief that's not entirely mine: I'm grieving this loss for so many people, so many womxn, so many mothers who are locked out of university for reasons like this, and more.
I'm raging at the unfairness of rules that prevent so many voices (not just mine!) from entering spaces of academic research and study.
I'm releasing the three-year path to a graduate degree. Because I refuse to “choose” between paying out-of-pocket for the fewer classes I need or accepting the constraints of a scholarship or loan that asks me to do more than I can right now.
It's an honoring of myself, but it's also in recognition that these rules are limiting and unfair.
Even if I wiggle around barriers that limit who gets "educated," when, where, and how… what happens if they remain in place? who would I be helping if I focus only on getting myself into school?
In my statement of purpose for admission to graduate school, I said, “If I walk away from spaces (including university) that do not support me now, what does that say to future generations of womxn like me? What does that do for the next generation of mothers? And what does that say to my daughters?”
Because I thought that walking away from graduate school was the same as doing NOTHING to fight against these incredible challenges.
It's not.
Here's what I want my exiting grad school to say to other womxn, other mothers, and my daughters:
“First, we don’t need spaces of injustice to receive an education, to learn, and to become. We can do this, and better, without institutions that promote inequality and ‘oneness’ of path and choice. We do NOT have to accept unfair and manipulative rules as a form of power-over, for ourselves or for anyone else.
A degree is not everything; and sometimes, it’s nothing.
And second, there’s more than one way to fight these barriers to our education. Some people will fight from the inside, but some of us will fight from the outside - until access to education is actually a birthright (and not a compulsory one) for all of us.”
I know it sounds bleak, to have prepared this whole year for something that's now inaccessible. And YES, it’s hard.
But it also feels right; it feels in alignment with my Soul. It feels like I’m ready for something new, something different, something next.
Something that aligns with my life as a mother, too.
So, instead of graduate school, I’m creating An Artist Residency in Motherhood, "a self-directed, open-source artist residency to empower and inspire artists [writers] who are also mothers," created by Lenka Clayton (who I discovered through my friend, Sarah Shotts).
The residency is an opening to creating work not in spite of the challenges posed by motherhood by in alignment with my life as a mother, a writer, a thinker. (Which is exactly what university didn’t allow.)
The same time I had scheduled to attend class, read content, and write papers will be spent doing this work outside the classroom:
exploring my personal relationship (and our public relationship) with schooling, education, learning, and teaching
redefining the way I think about creating (it's not ONLY something I do alone; it's not ONLY something I do for fun) + the way I think about money-making (it's not ONLY something "other than" what I create)
creating alongside my life, as a mother of young kids and someone who "unschools" at home
You can read more about the specifics right here.
looking forward to sharing more soon, xx, alycia buenger
An Artist Residency In Motherhood #ARiM
an artist residency in motherhood - “a self-directed, open-source artist residency to empower and inspire artists [writers] who are also mothers,” created by Lenka Clayton
the (original) purpose -
My reasons for adopting the Artist Residency in Motherhood framework are these: to embrace working and creating within my everyday life; to redefine the “limitations” of motherhood, work, and creating by earning a sustainable income for my family - and enjoying the process; to explore my relationship with schooling, education, learning, and teaching by unschooling my kids at home and deschooling myself within our shared life.
Following my hard “break-up” with graduate school, I want to create my own education at home and inside motherhood - while also sharing the process and the results publicly.
an artist residency in motherhood
“a self-directed, open-source artist residency to empower and inspire artists [writers] who are also mothers,” created by Lenka Clayton
the why: purpose + intentions
My experience inside motherhood is one of friction: I am deeply fulfilled by those perfect moments with my girls, the deepening connection to my partner, the pure joy that sneaks through the cracks of even our hardest days; and yet I’m always trying to “sneak” more time for myself, more time for my work, more time for important and frivolous things I enjoy.
Within my role as caretaker to my girls and partner to my husband, I experience the deep inhale of genuine, perfect fulfillment. And. Contrary to the story I inherited (and accepted) about motherhood… It’s not enough.
Care-taking, Self-Fulfilling Work. Neither is enough on its own.
Loving my people is part of what makes me a Creator; and honoring my creative work is part of what makes me Loving.
So, if I understand this consciously - why do I feel GUILTY about it?
Modern-day mothers are generally handed a list of expectations that include primary caretaking, household management, and paid work (whether or not it’s fulfilling, whether or not it pays equivalent). And often, we’re expected to neglect our bodies, our hearts, and our dreams for our care-taking and work responsibilities.
Because that’s how it’s always been done. Or so it seems…
Where do these expectations come from? How do we unshackle ourselves, and each other?
Because this isn’t the legacy I want to leave my daughters; and it’s not the one I want to accept for myself.
And so, we begin.
[NOTE: It’s important to say here that many of the challenges mothers face highlight structural problems within our modern society. But until we change our laws to allow for working parenthood, until we change our laws to adequately support families of all kinds, until we change the conversation surrounding expectations of and support for women, mothers, families, and children… solving this problem falls inside the domain of individual families. Which is complete bullshit and further highlights discrimination of minority groups. But this is the kind of bullshit I’m prepared to fight against now, so my daughters’ generation can reap the benefits later.]
{ORIGINAL} PURPOSE:
to redefine the “limitations” of motherhood, work, and creating by prioritizing my mind/body/soul wellness within and around creative work for income; embracing working and creating within everyday life with kids; and earning a sustainable income for my family - while documenting (and enjoying!) the process
{ORIGINAL} INTENTIONS:
prioritize my health, my rest, my play
expand my creative capacity for both daily life + creative work by exploring my relationship with time
balance work with life by incorporating both and reframing my experience of “work”
devote myself to the process of creating (more than the product)
earn enough+ with my creative work to fully support my family + my business
the how: limits + commitments
Our culture’s obsession with productivity-at-all-costs is at odds with my experience of creative work (particularly as a mother working alongside my kids) and with my desire to prioritize the process and experience of creating more than the product and result.
For this project, I will not remain inside a perpetual state of production; instead, I will embrace the natural process of creating - which includes rest and work.
Our Natural Creative Cycles follow the seasons of the year, the phases of the moon and the menstrual cycle, the universal energy of the days of the week, and the energy of the body within a single day. These will be my guide.
I will also distance this project from the algorithms of social media by documenting my creative process and its results inside this online studio (NOW CLOSED)
While I will maintain some interaction with Instagram and Pinterest, these will not be my primary places for documentation - because my experience with social media is one of frustration and required distance.
{ORIGINAL} LIMITATIONS:
I am the primary caretaker of our two children and responsible for the majority of our family’s income. I can plan for 1 full-day and 1 half-day of childcare support from my partner, plus 1 half-day of childcare support from my parents or in-laws; but my working schedule must remain flexible to expand or contract with the needs of my family. I can plan to financially support my family with my work as a copywriter; but this requires all of my available working time.
{ORIGINAL} QUESTIONS
how can I expand time within my everyday work-life?
how can I expand my income within “limited” time?
how can I create space for myself AND my creative work?
{ORIGINAL} COMMITMENTS:
personal commitments to my health, my time, my family: daily nourishment, daily/weekly/monthly routines + rituals for support, frequent time within Nature, daily movement
devote 2 full-days to copywriting work and 1 full-day to creative work for #ARiM
write everyday: free write and/or work in the early mornings; document my cycle, my body, my experience in the evenings
document in-process creative work privately inside this now-closed studio
document completed creative work publicly on instagram, my website, and via email
submit 10 articles for publication
This is a 3-year project (10 months per year) starting September 15, 2021 through August 31, 2024.
the what: projects (ongoing)
create sanctuary (online course)
create align (online course)
create inspire (monthly online workshops)
create unravel your days with Kati Overmier (podcast, online studio, printed planning journal)
create reframe (prints of my writing)
create art / earrings for sale
take a dance class
take a pottery class
support -
This residency is currently an unfunded project. Any amount of financial or other support is greatly appreciated. Read more about how you can financially support my work right here.
Why Non-Negotiable Habits Don't Work
One of the many, many reasons "non-negotiable" daily habits fall flat for me is that, my daily life is forever changing.
Partly because my babies are forever changing.
For awhile the baby was up really early in the morning; now the girls stay up late jumping in each other's beds. Which means, sometimes we sleep in, sometimes we have a breakfast picnic outside... and sometimes we let an early movie salvage a hard day.
One of the many, many reasons "non-negotiable" daily habits fall flat for me is that, my daily life is forever changing.
Partly because my babies are forever changing.
For awhile the baby was up really early in the morning; now the girls stay up late jumping in each other's beds. Which means, sometimes we sleep in, sometimes we have a breakfast picnic outside... and sometimes we let an early movie salvage a hard day.
If I tied myself to one morning routine, or one evening routine: 1, IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN (I'm slightly averse to do-or-die “to do” lists).
But 2, I would be a forever failure.
I prefer the RITUALS we create together: slowly making hot coffee while the girls eat breakfast, documenting the backyard trees with my whispering babes, lighting a candle at the start of my work time (however infrequent), squeezing together on our too-small couch to read stories they’ll act out later.
But these are never "non-negotiable.” Otherwise I'd be constantly trying, "failing," and re-starting my life more often than not.
I prefer instead to feel the significance of sacred moments as often as possible, much more than regulating their consistency.
Thoughts on this? Share a comment below - I would love to hear your perspective.
xx, alycia buenger
When There's Never Enough Time For You
I’ve felt it. You’ve likely felt it.
“There’s not enough time for me.”
Because there really isn’t - not inside a system that devalues a woman’s time.
We might have the same number of HOURS in the day, but not everyone is deemed the same amount of VALUABLE by society (and not everyone has the same number of OPPORTUNITIES to use time freely).
I’ve felt it. You’ve likely felt it.
“There’s not enough time for me.”
Because there really isn’t - not inside a system that devalues a woman’s time.
We might have the same number of HOURS in the day, but not everyone is deemed the same amount of VALUABLE by society (and not everyone has the same number of OPPORTUNITIES to use time freely).
Mothers especially are asked to “hold down the fort” while the world bumps along around us, without us, overtop us (even if we follow the ways of income-making).
I want to do my part in changing that.
And I have a twofold mission: To consciously UNRAVEL inside day-to-day life (expand our experience of time with short-and-sweet, devoted practice!); and to consciously question the system that asks us to de-value our time currency and squeeze into smaller and smaller spaces.
We practice together. We question together. We unravel together.
My work exists to support you in putting more of yourself inside your days - so that you’re no longer squeezing in time for yourself between or after.
Because you are priority - if not inside the world, inside this space.
This is my offering to you, and to those who feel the “not enough time” mantra of modern-day society.
It’s where I make my art: It’s the place that holds my writing + my teaching. It’s birthed within and from my own experience (and now, mixed with yours!)
This is the practice, the answer-seeking, the resting place, the try-and-try again place, the reminder that you can devote yourself to your Self - even when things are harder than hard.
And my hope is that it becomes a community of support along the way.
Check out my latest project: UNRAVEL YOUR DAYS.
xx, alycia buenger