Hi friends!

Fun fact about today’s post: this is post #800 on Greenish Bookshelf! What an incredible journey I have had as a book blogger. Thank you for being part of my bookish community!

I am really excited to share my review of Tranquility by Tuesday by Laura Vanderkam. This self care book all about time is so positive and helpful. I actually felt like I could take Laura’s ideas and make them a part of my life. Her experiences and expertise inspired me to do better with my time. And I have loved the habits I’ve set inspired by her work!

Thanks to Read Aloud Revival for the recommendation.

Book Summary: “For anyone who’s sick of letting to-do lists dictate their time, Laura Vanderkam, the bestselling author of What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast , shares nine strategies for reclaiming your hours.

Do you find yourself hoping that someday, life will be less hectic? One day, you say, you’ll finally have time for the activities that you love – writing that book, completing that triathlon, traveling with friends. But if the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that life is unpredictable. If we’re not careful, dull, unfulfilling tasks can quickly occupy our precious hours, derail our best-laid plans, and make life feel like a slog.

In Tranquility by Tuesday , Laura Vanderkam explains that if you want something to happen, you need to design your life to make it happen. Work crises, childcare emergencies, and home repairs are inevitable, and the mundane tasks of life – cooking, cleaning, laundry – aren’t going anywhere. To make time for what matters, you need a resilient schedule, not a perfect schedule. Based on a time diary study of over 150 people, Vanderkam shares nine strategies for building opportunities for joy, nourishment, and fulfillment into your week.

This is more than a time management book about “how to do it all.” It’s a look at how real people changed their lives using Vanderkam’s nine rules, and how you can do the same. It’s about intentionally living the life that you want to live, and becoming an autonomous steward of life’s possibilities.”

Laura makes time management and change sound so possible! Sometimes books that talk about time management feel overwhelming or claim to be easy fix all’s. This book is not that way. It is honest. It’s personal. It gives simple ideas. It feels doable. As a busy mom of young kids, I need honest, simple, and doable. I appreciated her candor about her own experiences and her support that changing everything won’t happen. I think her best advice is to focus on a rule or two at a time and celebrate your progress from week to week. Change is a process and it’s important to celebrate success at every stage of life.

When I review self care books, I like to share some of my favorite takeaways from their book. As this isn’t a book with a story and characters like the many novels I review, I find this is a more helpful approach for me and my readers. So I hope you feel inspired by my favorite insights from Tranquility by Tuesday:

• View time as a week instead of a day. This is so simple and profound. Without noticing it, I definitely tend to think in terms of 24 hours rather than a full week. And Laura says that limits our potential and our abilities to see how much time we have. We don’t have to do everything today. But we can do a lot this week.
• Give yourself a bedtime. It actually doesn’t even have to be super early if you do the math. Start at your wake up time and go backwards 7-8 hours. She says the average adult needs 7.5 hours of sleep. That is not as early a bedtime as you might think.
• 3 times a week is a habit. I love this because I sometimes get caught up in needing to do something everyday for it to be a habit. If I don’t exercise everyday, I failed. If I don’t write in my journal daily, who bother? If I don’t eat the best breakfast everyday, I might as well not even try. But 3 times a week — I can totally do that! It inspires me! I loved the “move by 3pm rule” as well which made exercise and getting outside easier for me to think about.
• One little adventure, one big adventure a week. Plan for fun and joy. They are worth it.
• Plan on Fridays –and plan ahead. Give yourself reminders for things in the future. Plan backup slots. Plan time with your spouse. Plan time to do things you love — read, music, art, gardening, sports, choirs, anything. There is more time than you think. And remember — effortful before effortless. I love this.

I could have listed every single part of this book as a favorite. So much of it really resonated with me. I listened to this one and enjoyed the audio narration (I think she reads her own book). Great to get an overview of her ideas. I would love to own it to be able to go back to particular sections to refresh and remember. Fantastic book that has me inspired to do more and be more!

What are your favorite self care books?
What self care lessons have stuck with you?