In Depth: More Than Just Surviving - Part 2

Protecting Your Priorities

In Part 1, we took a look at what your priorities are - the things that really matter to you and your family.

Part 2 shows you practical ways to bring those priorities front and centre of your days and weeks, This can be very tricky with home ed because our days and weeks fill up very quickly and it's easy to attend to the urgent things rather than stepping back to look at the bigger picture.

So this guide isn't about any big overhauls or life changes, instead it's about noticing where your time and energy actually go, protecting what matters most and finding realistic and manageable ways to keep those priorities at the forefront.

A Life Audit: Where Does Your Time and Energy Go?

A great place to start when things aren't feeling great is to have a bit of a life audit. Have a look back over the last few days and see where your time and energy was spent. Writing it down is particularly useful for spotting patterns.

• When and where has your energy been highest and lowest this week?
• Which activities drained you and which ones energised you?
• Where did most of your unscheduled time go? On chores, admin, phone scrolling or on the things that actually matter to you?

Every time I do this, I notice the same thing: huge chunks of my time disappear into the things that need doing, but aren't really that important: cleaning, tidying and decluttering to reach a level of order that never actually arrives, meal planing and cooking, life admin that’s often urgent but rarely important or phone scrolling when I don’t want to think about the things I need to do.

Sound familiar?

Those practical and more urgent tasks may be important, but they'll always expand to fill all our time and space if we let them. Once I see where my time has gone, I can tweak things. Sometimes that means lowering my standards on housework or setting a timer for admin or my phone so it doesn’t take over - small adjustments that help get me back on track.

2. Identify Priorities and Non-Negotiables

Once you’ve seen where all your time is going, revisit what you actually want your days to be built around.

Here are some of my priorities, to give you an idea:

• Connection with my kids - unhurried, chilled out time together, not just going from one thing to the next.
• Time outdoors - walks, exploring or just being in the garden.
• Rest and recharge - quiet time or some moments of uninterrupted time in my day.
• Flexibility and play - space to follow the kids’ interests or be spontaneous.
• Friendship and community - time with people who feel good to be around.
• Passions and interests - learning or creating for myself, not just facilitating my children's.

Protecting these priorities often means saying no to things that drain energy: extra activities, commitments or social obligations that don’t align with what’s important to us.

This can be especially hard when we home educate (and parent in general), because there are always things we do for our kids that can drain our energy a bit, like activities we don’t love but that mean the world to them, a child who constantly craves our attention, or a child who likes to be out and about a lot when we prefer slower home days or vice versa.

This is all totally fine. But it’s also exactly why we need to protect other parts of our time and energy. If our days are filled with lots of giving, compromising and doing things that don't recharge us, it’s even more important to balance that out with the things that do lift us up.

3. Find Your 'One Thing'

If you’re not sure where to start, choose one small, manageable thing that supports your energy and connects back to your priorities. Something tiny but meaningful.

It might be:

• A short daily quiet time where everyone rests or reads uninterrupted.
• Getting outside every day, even if it's just a short walk, standing in the garden - or sticking your head out of the window for a few minutes!
• Going to bed a bit earlier, especially in the autumn and winter months.
• Turning your phone off in the early evening (I've noticed that any news or social media has a worse effect on me in the evening).
• A creative hobby of your own for 10-15 mins each day which you can do alongside your kids if needed.
• A weekly date night with your partner or a call with a really great friend who always lifts your mood.

The smaller, more regular things can have a much bigger cumulative effect on our welbeing over time than one elaborate thing done only very occasionally.

I've learned that the key to keeping it sustainable is enjoyment rather than obligation. If it feels like a chore or requires large blocks of time or elaborate set-ups, it's very unlikely to last.

Your 'one thing' becomes a little anchor: something you can return to when everything else feels a bit chaotic.

4. Simple Ways to Build in This Time in Home Ed Life

Some of these values or priorities need to be intentionally built into your home ed days for them to actually happen.

This doesn’t mean adding extra tasks or seeing these things as separate from being with your children, especially if you have little support. Instead, you can make the activities you do together meaningful and aligned with your values, so they aren’t just something that fills the gaps or you need to make extra time for.

Here are a few ideas that work well in home ed life:

• Be opportunistic: Finding a few minutes here and there, when your kids are off doing something on their own or are using a screen, to just sit and relax can sometimes be the difference between being snappy and distracted and having a more patience and tolerance.
• Sites of Mutual Fulfilment: I love this idea from Unschooler Lucy AitkenRead. It's finding places and activities where you and your children really feel fulfilled. Obvious ones might be the woods or the beach, watching a movie or playing a video game together. But it can also be reading a book you all love, drawing, painting or dancing together. Basically something that has minimal chance of bickering, loss of patience or frustration!
• Plan in the good stuff: Planning things in which bring you fulfilment means they're much more likely to happen. It's very easy for the important stuff to be overtaken by the more urgent but less important things. Plan the enjoyable, meaningful things in just as you'd plan in any other scheduled activity.
• Make use of support: Home education often falls mostly on mums (although not always), who carry much of the mental load and feel responsible for their kids’ learning. If you have a supportive partner or family nearby, be clear about what you need - even small things like taking turns with bedtime, baths or giving each other half a day can make a huge difference. If you don’t have that support, options such as self-directed learning groups, trusted family, playdate swaps or occasional drop-off sessions can be a lifeline.

5. When It Feels Impossible

I know this can all feel much easier said than done. Some phases of life are just hard and finding any time or energy for yourself feels impossible. When my two were younger and my husband was out of the house all day during the week, I had to find the tiniest little things as pick-me-ups throughout the day.

Looking back at that time, I don't know where I found the energy or how I managed Monday - Friday, but I think a lot of it was to do with the little scraps of self-care that I could find time for: making good use of nap times, quiet times and TV time, doing yoga stretches next to where they were playing, taking small breaks to just sit and breathe if they were busy with something, and spending a lot of time outdoors where everyone seemed happiest (and I wasn't distracted by the housework).

So start wherever you are. Take the smallest step you can. Revisit your priorities when things settle again. Keep coming back to what matters most for you and your family. When you hold those priorities in sight, you’ll start to notice more and more chances to make room for them.