Renewal

A jam-packed to-do list. Rushing from meeting to meeting. Being too busy to call a friend just to chat aimlessly.

These are all very common symptoms of a life out of alignment. And headed for trouble.

Physical and spiritual renewal, so central to one's well-being, can be so easy to overlook in the face of more pressing demands. And that's why making a very intentional commitment to exercising your muscles and quieting your spirit are so vitally important.

It may seem a wholly unnatural act to comply with the following recommendation, but take out your "personal control center" --- right now --- and schedule time for your essential, very personal, activities that no one else will demand from you.

Schedule a walk in a favorite place; reserve time for quiet, idle, contemplation; for reading an inspiring book or making a non-routine visit to a worship service (maybe in a new place); for catching up with old friends; for taking a yoga class; for shooting hoops; for volunteering as a tutor or cleaning up the park; for visiting your child's classroom...

You spend all week expending energy on behalf of others. Give yourself the gift of restoring your precious personal vitality.

And, if you must justify taking the time to do these kinds of seemingly indulgent undertakings, recognize that the energy you acquire by these necessary diversions from task-based activities can be redirected into all the other demands for your time and attention.

Assignment: Restore. Renew. Recharge.

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Don Blohowiak, a management consultant and popular conference speaker, is the author of several business books. The executive director of the Lead Well® Institute in Princeton, NJ, he may be reached at http://www.LeadWell.com/.

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