Time to Relax

 American journalist, Sydney J. Harris, once wrote, "The time to relax is when you don't have the time for it."

And there are times when we look at the postcard which came with this week's quote, when we sigh in longing, wishing we were there, on that comfortable hammock, looking out to sea and relaxing. 

At first sight, Harris's advice may seem paradoxical - how on earth are we supposed to relax when we don't have the time for it? It might even make us feel angry - what the **** is he talking about? But over the years, I have found that it is very good advice indeed. Because when we get too busy, rushing from one task to the next without even a breathing space in between, that is when it becomes impossible to pay proper attention to what we are supposed to be doing, and the results are rarely good. 

Yet if we strive to take a more leisured approach to the to-do list, giving ourselves a little resting space between each task, we will be able to move from one to the next with a clearer mind, and not get so wound up in what we *have to* (which is often self-imposed pressure) get done. 

I believe that this advice has become ever more important in the past few years, as more and more of us have begun to work from home, following the pandemic. And if we are not careful, it can be difficult to maintain proper boundaries between "work life" and "home life". Yet boundaries are so important, otherwise we will never be able to properly rest, relax.

One thing I have begun to do in the past few years, is to try to only answer work-related e-mails when I'm using my work PC. Rather than when they pop up on my phone. Because if I'm not sitting at my work PC, or doing ministerial work outside my home, I really shouldn't be working. And answering work-related e-mails *is* work. Our mobile phones can be a tremendous source of temptation - they are always to hand, constantly pinging for our attention (unless we've turned all the alerts off). I blogged about my own mobile's insidious influence here.

So these days, I try to consciously separate work time from relax time. And feel very much better for it. How do you maintain the boundaries between work and home?