You’ve heard of March Madness, but have you heard of May Madness? The title may be new to you, but the feelings of overwhelm during the month of May are very familiar. With graduations, end of the year parties, and every sport practicing at the same time, the hustle of May Madness can creep up before you know it. This is why I’ve created 4 Tips to Thrive During May Madness! Let go of the stress so you can enjoy the beauty of all the things happening around you. Don’t miss it (episode 291)!
The sooner you implement these four strategies to reduce the overwhelm of May Madness, the sooner you can experience the thrive factor and dare I say…rest! In these tips, we’re removing the mental workload, so your heart, soul, and mind can find peace and joy.
LISTEN TO THE PODCAST EPISODE HERE
Tip 1: Stay Kingdom Focused
People say, “You can’t pour from and empty cup.”, but I want to challenge this mindset from the very beginning of this post/podcast episode. Here’s the truth, an ugly truth if we don’t get this right: Something is always in your cup, and you’re pouring out of it regardless of what’s in there. Yikes! “Wait, Brooke, you mean to say if I feel empty-cupped, something is coming out? Like what?” Glad you asked, friend. I have felt this too many times, and from my pouring experience here’s what I know:
- Exhaustion pours out frustration at my kids, spouse, dogs, you name it
- Stress pours out toxic hustle mentality and antipathy (opposite of sympathy…I can be ruthless)
- Bad attitude pours out a contagious outbreak of the same with those I influence (hello, cute little humans turned gremlins when I do this…my bad, household)
I’m here to say, please don’t do this to yourself! I’ve experienced this enough to know that when I don’t prioritize my life around spending time with God, my kingdom focus turns from my savior to myself…and I make a bad Queen (insert all sinners here).
The absolute best way to find consistent peace, joy, and satisfaction can only be found through our savior Jesus Christ. Period. When we seek Him first, everything else is added. (Matt 6:33). My number one tip for thriving in May Madness is to have kingdom focus by spending consistent time with God.
This can look like attending church, regularly meeting with your home group, praying, reading your Bible, telling others about what God is doing for you, the list goes on. Keep this tip first, and you may not even need the rest of this podcast episode. But, keep reading/listening if you want even more practical tips on how to thrive during May Madness.
Tip 2: Coordinate Calendars
I have never been in a situation where over communication bothered me, especially during May Madness. I know you feel it too. The school emails, birthday parties, graduation events (I see you senior parents and high school teachers/coaches!), and of course, wedding season ramping up.
There are school day countdown celebrations, awards programs to attend, and each of your kids has a sports practice at the same time in three different locations. Friends, until teleportation becomes a thing for us mere mortals, it ain’t happening without a clear, consistent, calendar for all parties involved.
Now before you whip open your phone to figure out if tomorrow is crazy hair day or the day you need to be the first one in line to sign up to bring napkins to the class party, get a calendar that you like and works for you and your spouse. Make your kids adapt to whatever calendar y’all agree on.
I love me a color coordinated Google calendar, but the hubs isn’t tech savvy, and his company uses Outlook, so that’s what we use. Thank goodness that works with the Apple calendar app. Let it also be known, my husband is colorblind, so my hopes and dreams of color coordination on tech died long ago. I may never get over that, which is why everything else I use is color coordinated. Having a digital calendar on my phone has been a game changer. I always know when we’re available, have an event, or if it’s spirit shirt and jeans day.
Here’s the bonus strategy to Tip #2 Coordinate Calendars: To further drive home important dates, get a dry erase, magnetic refrigerator calendar. It keeps the schedule top of mind, and it helps answer the constant question from kids, “What are we doing today?” All you’ll have to do is point to the calendar, and after a few days, your kids will start looking at it without you having to prompt them. Take that, May Madness!
Bonus bonus: Your kids will learn some high frequency words quickly. I think my kids read the phrase “soccer practice” so many times, they knew how to spell that by age four. Hooray calendars! I’ve linked my three favorite fridge calendars below for you (images are clickable):
Tip 3: Be Flexible
As an Enneagram 1 and now recovered perfectionist, being flexible was not a thing I did. And, if I had to, I didn’t do it well. If I could go back and give my younger self advice, aside from “get really good at mental math” it would be “learn to be flexible with grace.” Remember, there’s a difference between being flexible, and whining about having to be flexible (this is a reminder to me). May Madness is ready to sink its teeth in if you’re not willing to flex. Side note: The mental math reference is for my Type 1 Diabetic son, and you can hear all about that on episode 185.
Being gracefully flexible is not blowing up on your kid when they tell you the practice location has changed as you’re pulling up to the facility. It’s not complaining when you have to go the store the fourth time this week because that project needs more hot glue sticks. Being gracefully flexible is letting it go instead of grudge holding when your spouse forgets to pick up that necessity item, so you need to change your plans and be the hero of the moment. Deep breaths, friends, I feel like some of y’all’s blood is boiling just from hearing these examples.
Here’s a fact about all the times graceful flexibility happens: It’s always inconvenient, it always needs to happen, and we make the situation worse when flexibility not grace filled. Here are a few quick tips when duty calls during May Madness (and any time for that matter):
- Build time margin into your day (even a few five minute chunks here and there)
- Make yourself smile (remember that no one is trying to get it wrong on purpose)
- Practice gratitude (flip the script, “Thanks, God, for financial provision for playing sports.”)
- Review Tip #1 Stay Kingdom Focused (perspective shift, serve the bigger purpose)
Tip #4: Address the HALT
If you haven’t yet heard of the HALT acronym, you’ve definitely felt it. Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired. With an educator background, the HALT acronym makes so much sense. In college and in public education, Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs was permanently drilled into all teacher brains. Here’s a quick description from Simply Psychology of what this means, and if you’re a visual person, there’s an image on the show notes/below on this blog post.
- Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is a motivational theory in psychology comprising a five-tier model of human needs, often described as levels within a pyramid.
- The five levels of the hierarchy are physiological, safety, love/belonging, esteem, and self-actualization.
- Lower-level basic needs like food, water, and safety must be met first before higher needs can be fulfilled.
- The order of the levels is not completely fixed. For some, esteem outweighs love, while others may self-actualize despite poverty. Our behaviors are usually motivated by multiple needs simultaneously.
When one of these bad boys of Maslow is knocking, it can throw you off your game. And, when it’s May Madness, ain’t nobody got time for that! As I’ve taught my kids the HALT, we’ve made some acronym modifications, so tweak it if you need to make it fit your people better. When any of our HALT is negatively activated, we take immediate action if at all possible. If you’re feeling the overwhelm of May Madness, or one of your people are behaving “oddly” to put it nicely, ask them about the HALT and how it can be logically addressed:
- Hungry (thirsty)
- Attitude (angry, overwhelmed, stressed, etc)
- Lonely (needs cuddles, quality time, whatever their love language)
- Tired (sore, sleepy, exhausted)
This also gives everyone the space to work on identifying feelings. You’ll be thankful when your five year old can express that they are frustrated or that their muscles are sore. I remember the first time my eldest, Sloane, got a double quad leg cramp in her carseat at age four. She had no idea what was happening to her body, and neither did I while I was driving and couldn’t assess her. Once we figured out the issue, we were able to get her a drink and a pickle. Now we know what leg cramps feel like and can describe it. Yay for the HALT acronym!
There you have it, my 4 Tips to Thrive During May Madness. Here’s a quick recap:
- Tip #1 Stay Kingdom Focused
- Tip #2 Coordinate Calendars
- Tip #3 Be Flexible
- Tip #4 Address the HALT
When you combine these four strategies, the month of May will be a breeze compared to how it was before. Go ahead and kiss the overwhelm “buh-bye”, and enjoy all those end of year parties, programs, and practices. If this May Madness post/podcast has been helpful, be sure to send this link to a friend. What’s better than thriving on your own? Thriving with friends!
Links from the Show:
- Type 1 Diabetes, Rhett’s episode 185
- Love Language Mini Series (episodes 141-150)
- Witty & Gritty on Instagram
