I’ve been rereading “the not so big life: making room for what really matters” by Sarah Susanka.
And I’m reminded that there is a very simple way to simplify our homeschools.
But it doesn’t lie primarily in reducing our activities or even deschooling
Most of our homeschool lives are too big.
We have…
- Too many activities in our day-to-day existence.
- Too many lessons planned.
- Too many expectations for no sibling conflict, no complaining, no noise.
We expect coffee at a certain time, breakfast together at a certain time, studies at a certain time, chores (& perfectly completed chores too), music practice, and extracurricular activities too.
“Our whole life is taken up with anxiety, with preparations for living, so that we really never live at all.”
Tolstoy
Gotta do it all. Or do we?
Why isn’t doing a “little” more productive, satisfying, and acceptable? It certainly is more peaceful than doing everything.
Doing more activities, by book or by field trip, really does make our homeschools more valuable? Does it really provide a better education for our children? (What is an education anyway?)
Or does doing everything just give us…
- less time to think,
- less space to breathe,
- less time to play,
- and give us less time to contemplate.
Too much is too much.
Am I aware that all this activity might influence the inflection of my voice (squeakier), affect the expressions on my face (agitated), and increase the speed to which I speak (sounding demanding to my kids) when I’ve got too much to do?
Do I have time to recognize how I’m feeling or how I’m coming across when I am trying desperately to do everything?
Does a purposeful life equal activity?
Our culture suggests it does.
Instead, we live counterculturally and get to live our homeschool lives on purpose.
Our goal is to give us a lot more time to spend doing the things we want to do: also known as living our lives.
- We need to recognize that this life is temporary.
- We will live life. Do things. Not just organize things and plan things.
- We need to make our lists of stuff we do and determine that how we do them needs to be focused on satisfaction, not efficiency.
- Do we need to ask ourselves if we are living a life worth living today?
- We need to simplify our homeschools.
And so the quest for the not-so-big homeschool continues.
People also ask:
- how to live your homeschool life on purpose
- helping our kids live their lives on purpose
- Join the Homeschool Mama Book Club & discuss meaningful books to influence our homeschool lives.
- Use the self-coaching journaling workbook for Overcoming Overwhelm.
- Do you offer one-on-one homeschool (& life) coaching? Why, yes I do!
Teresa Wiedrick
I help overwhelmed homeschool mamas shed what’s not working in their homeschool & life, so they can show up authentically, purposefully, and confidently in their homeschool & life.
