Putting Us First
At the end of August, Martha and I spent a wonderful and much needed vacation for a week and a half on Squam Lake in Holderness, New Hampshire. We swam, hiked, put together puzzles and read our books. We didn’t think about work or other responsibilities for a minute. We relaxed and replenished ourselves. We got home the day after Labor Day and jumped right back into work.
The Friday after we returned home, we did something we’ve done periodically over the years. We spent a whole day together planning the next 6 to 18 months. Since we are both in business for ourselves, we obviously wanted to look at our financial well-being and share with each other the various work projects we have scheduled in the next quarter and beyond. Other topics on our agenda were fitness and health, personal projects we each have, vacations and holidays and home improvement.
In the past when we have met for such planning days, we often have started with our work. This year we did something new. We flipped the agenda around. We put us first. We started with our health and well-being, each of us committing to fitness plans that included healthy eating and exercising regularly, including cross-training and interval training. We then supported each other in several personal projects. I love woodworking and building model baseball stadiums in my basement. I’m also in the process of self-publishing a book on partnership marriage. Martha loves to needlepoint and make afghan blankets and write articles on leadership and change. We worked through all of our concerns that have stopped us in being free to do what we each love to do.
After we had a short conversation about several home improvement projects that we’ll get to this fall, we took up discussing our vacation in 2014. We already had trips planned for Key West and St. Barth in the next 6 months. Next year, we will be celebrating out 40th anniversary in August. We talked about traveling to Asia or Italy or maybe spending two weeks at Squam Lake next year if we can get the rental property for that length of time. We then simultaneously thought, “Road Trip.” When the kids were growing up, we spent at least ten summers traveling and camping around the United States. Since returning from our four-year expat experience in Amsterdam, we haven’t been seen much of America.
We talked about driving west for a three-week vacation next summer. We then considered 4 weeks. Then, we thought: “40 days for 40 years.” We grabbed the Atlas and flipped the pages to South Dakota, Wyoming and Montana. That was it! Next year in August, we are planning a road trip to celebrate our 40th anniversary to the Black Hills, Little Bighorn National Park, the Grand Tetons, Yellowstone National Park and Glacier National Park! By lunchtime last Friday, we were on fire.
We came back after lunch and brought each other up to speed on the various work projects we each have going into the fall. We could see the financial pathway to the vision of the future we had shared before lunch. This planning day worked brilliantly. We put us first.
Posted in Partnership Marriage
