If you had three hours of “free time,” how would you spend it? (Either you just got giddy and excited by the mere thought of free time, or you are one of the few individuals who takes a sufficient amount of time for yourself each week.) 

Free time is not something we typically think of scheduling on our weekly calendars. Instead, we often focus on adding things that we want to accomplish, the appointments we need to keep, and simply wish for the weekend to come. When the weekend arrives, we find ourselves doing house maintenance, catching up with family, and driving to kids’ activities. This approach to the weekly routine includes some down time, however the notion of “free time” is remarkable absent. 

Free Time vs. Down Time

What is free time? It seems like a silly question, but it’s a necessary one when we consider the quality of our lives. I define free time as unstructured time that you don’t plan or fill until the moment it arrives. It occurs during the day and can be on either a weekday or on a weekend.

Free time can be spent alone or with others. You can spend it doing something active or something calming. Free time should be both spontaneous and soul filling. It’s unstructured so that you’re able to listen to your body and mind and act upon what you need at that moment.

Down time is different than free time. Down time is what you experience first thing in the morning or late into the evening. Down time is where you slowly get moving or slowly turn your brain off. Yes, it is also unstructured, but the purpose of downtime is to switch your brain on, off, or towards the next task.

Down time is inherent in our days: it appears in the cracks. As parents, we often fill the in-between moments of our day with chores, helping our children, scrolling through social media, or just taking a deep breath. Occasionally, we’ll get some exercise. Down time during the day is often accidental, and as busy bodies, we don’t often leave that time empty for very long.

Slowing Down to Speed Up

Caring for our mental health is as essential as exercise is for our physical health. Yet, we struggle with taking time for ourselves. Guilt and shame are two emotional responses we experience when we consider taking a few hours off from life. We feel like we’re “being lazy,” not being productive enough, or that we’re indulging in a pathway that doesn’t create immediate results.

We tell ourselves that, we “should be” doing something else. That we will “just get this one thing done” then we’ll sit down and read or go out for a walk. Our time disappears in a blink of an eye, and we find ourselves back in the throes of life.

Our brains are constantly running. You’re simultaneously trying to remember everything and your brain is processing information, conversations, and work. We call it “being busy,” and we laugh it off as the minimum standard for our days.

Telling ourselves that we need to be “always available” to our friends, family, and coworkers challenges our productivity because we’re multitasking by responding to all the incoming requests. We feel how exhausting it is. Also, changing our routine is hard.

What if we regularly scheduled our free time, in the way that we scheduled our priorities? I would argue that we’d take our free time a bit more seriously if we actually committed it to a slot on the calendar. The amount of free time taken will vary person to person, but I challenge you to find three hours a week. (“That’s impossible” you just thought.)

Think of these three hours — either taken an hour at a time or all in one chunk — as your way to be free from responsibility, just for a moment. 

Slowing down has a number of benefits. It allows you to dream and space out. It creates space for you to meet up with friends or get away from the drudgery of the week.

Intentionally carving out time is how you’ll complete the book you started, learn something new, take a nap, take a yoga class, or simply not be available to others for one sliver of your week.

Unlike down time, scheduling free time is meant to remain unplanned up until the day it occurs. Spontaneity will allow you to do whatever you want and be whomever you want for those hours and that’s what will help refresh your mental health.

There’s No Right Way

The beauty of free time is that there’s no “right way” to do it. The only required step is to put it on your calendar and not allow yourself to cover it over with work or other responsibilities. For me, my weekly calendar is color coordinated. My work activities are a different color from my personal activities and my family members have their own colors as well. I have decided that my free time will occur on Wednesday afternoons, as my business is closed each Wednesday.

I choose to see the chunk of time as equally as valuable as driving my son to the orthodontist and my paid working hours. I’ve committed to the block of time as non-negotiable. I can reject the feelings of guilt and self-indulgence if they arise.

Expect it to be a little challenging at first. Your brain will immediate want to fill the time. Beware: if you find yourself setting expectations of what you’ll accomplish during free time, you may want to give yourself permission NOT to have a result. The voice in your brain may say, “maybe next week,” or “you don’t really have the time.” For me, my thoughts immediately turn to the tiny tasks on my Trello list (email, tidying up, ordering household supplies).

I have to recognize that my brain is putting up a fight against the open block of time. I slow down, and I remind myself that my free time is perfectly valid. I’ve set it aside explicitly for the purpose of my mental health. I now look forward to my free time and practice allowing myself to do whatever suits my fancy for those few hours. 

Actively dedicating a few hours to yourself each week will ensure that you are more focused and more present for the other tasks on your schedule. This is how slowing down for just a few hours will actually lead you to speeding up. As you build the weekly habit, you’ll be more invested in your work. You’ll know your efforts will be rewarded with free time.

Scheduling free time also will shape your self-confidence, hour by hour, by teaching you that your time is as valuable as another’s. You’ll return to nourishing your soul by intentionally giving yourself the freedom to do exactly what you want for that moment in time. It’s a beautiful, worthwhile process that will soon become indispensable.

Does free time exist for you? How do you make it happen each week? Share with me👇🏽👇🏽.