As much as we like to talk about work-life balance, sometimes life just gets out of whack. Maybe you have so many opportunities at work, that you have a hard time prioritizing or leaving work at the office. Or, maybe your personal life is a bit “disheveled” at the moment, making concentrating at work difficult.
Whatever is going on in your life, I imagine you agree that sometimes we all just need an escape. A weekend a way. A couple hours just to ourselves. Late last week, I realized I needed a bit of escapism, so I decided to go visit my best friend and her family in Pittsburgh. This three-hour drive was like a mini road-trip (and the first road trip with just me and the baby!). Six hours in the car and a weekend (almost) totally unplugged was just what I needed. Here are a few lessons — some important, some trivial — that I learned during my weekend away:
- Spotify Premium is worth it, especially if you’re in the car a lot. I have always loved Pandora and recently started using Spotify. About a month ago, I decided to try the free 30-day premium trial. The premium options — most notably mobile access even when you’re not connected to WiFi — were working on the way to Pittsburgh, but my free trial expired over the weekend so I didn’t have it for the car ride home. If I had a long commute, I’d for sure upgrade to the premium option. Heck, I may upgrade anyway. (Are you a Spotify user? If so, we’re sharing weekly playlists in our enewsletter. Subscribe to get fun music mixes delivered to your inbox each week, along with helpful PR info!)
- I need to spend more time with my friends. The last few months, for a variety of reasons, I haven’t been very good about hanging out with my friends. This weekend was a good reminder about why I need to be better than that. Newsflash: I’m really not cut out to be a hermit. I’m fortunate to have amazing people in my life — I need to remember that and call on them more.
- Embrace a periodic digital detox. Other than checking email a couple times throughout the weekend, I was disconnected from the online world. No tweets, no Instagrams, no Facebook status updates. Know what happens when your face isn’t buried in your phone? I had better conversation. I noticed the small things (like the fact that my almost 9-month-old baby waves at everything. All the time. It’s hilarious!). I was able to take a deep breath and just relax. (And, this comes from someone who truly enjoys chatting on Twitter, sharing photos on Instagram. I’m not scaling back my use of social media, but a digital detox every once in a while is warranted!)
- Spontaneity doesn’t die when babies are born. I’m naturally a planner (as most of us in PR probably are!). And, since having the baby, I’ve found myself planning even more so I can accommodate his schedule, maximize my time and get everything at work and home done that needs to be done. I’ve never been a super spontanious person, but pre-baby, I was more likely to enjoy some unplanned time. On Wednesday, I decided to go to Pittsburgh on Friday. Not pure spontaneity since a little planning was involved (mostly because I had to check and make sure my friends wouldn’t mind a houseguest for the weekend!), but close enough, right? Sunday afternoon, when I got home, I was still able to make the baby’s food for the week, get some reading done, clean up around the house and go to my parents’ for family dinner. Know what didn’t get done? The laundry. Big deal … it can wait.
- I miss car-time. My house is half a block away from my office. Many of my clients are located outside the Columbus area, which means I don’t have to drive to meetings every day. I live in a very walkable part of town. I tell you all this only to say that I spend very little time in my car. When I lived in Orlando, I’d easily spend almost an hour a day in the car. You have to drive practically everywhere there. I’d listen to NPR, call friends just to catch up, and do some of my best brainstorming. Now that I live an almost-car-free existence, I miss that “me” time. Note to self: Find a new ways to listen to NPR and brainstorm!!
- These kinds of blog posts are fun … and I miss them! I have this internal debate fairly regularly. How often should I write these more personal blog posts? Does anyone really want to read about what’s going on in my life? Or, are people just interested in PR-related topics? We’re about to find out, because I like writing these kinds of posts. I’ve gone through spurts where my writing is more personal or focused on lessons I’ve learned running a growing agency. Recently, I’ve gotten away from that style of post for some reason. I’m going to make a concerted effort to weave some more “first-person”-type posts into the content I share here. It’s helpful for me to process and hopefully someone actually enjoys reading it. 🙂 (By the way, if you do like these kinds of posts, please let me know so I don’t think I’m writing them only for my mom to read!!)
OK, enough about my random musings from this weekend. Back to our normally scheduled PR-focused content tomorrow. Stay tuned!