Finding Balance: Rejecting the Pressure to Overschedule Our Children

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Have you ever felt trapped on the hamster wheel of children's activities, racing from soccer to dance to tutoring with barely a moment to breathe? You're not alone. In this refreshingly honest episode, I share my radical decision to cancel ALL my children's fall extracurricular activities—and why it might be the best parenting move I've made in years.

The "busy badge of honor" that many parents wear has become a status symbol in modern parenting. But at what cost? I reveal how my family's packed schedule left little time for homework, family dinners, or simply being present with my children. The realization hit me: we don't need to fill every moment of our children's lives with structured activities for them to thrive.

Looking back at my own childhood as an '80s kid, I reflect on how different things were—one dance class here, a season of soccer there—yet I turned out perfectly fine. This leads to a deeper conversation about the immense pressure we put on today's children to excel in everything from preschool to college, often pushing them down paths they never chose for themselves. The truth is, many of us with expensive degrees aren't even using them, having made major life decisions at 17 or 18 that didn't align with who we truly became.

What would happen if we stepped back and asked: what truly matters? What if success isn't measured by how many activities we can squeeze into a week, but by finding what genuinely lights us up? This fall, I'm choosing a different path—one with more breathing room, more focus on education, and more time for my family to simply be together.

Whether you're feeling overwhelmed by your family's schedule or questioning the path you're on, this episode invites you to reconsider what "having it all" really means. Follow me on social media to join upcoming live streams where we'll continue these important conversations about parenting, purpose, and finding your own definition of success.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hello everyone.
This is Still Rose's podcast.
This podcast was created forwomen, by women, to elevate
women's voices.
I hope everyone is having awonderful August.
Countdown in my house hasstarted to the first day of
school.
I'm waiting for all the lettersto come so I can get my kids
assignments in their classroomsand all that kids' assignments

(00:26):
in their classrooms and all that.
I know school has started forquite a few states already.
In New Jersey we haven'tstarted yet not in my area
anyway and so we wait with batedbreath for everything to start
happening again.
I made the executive decisionthis year to not have any of my
kids enrolled in sports orextracurricular activities in
the fall.
This might sound like not thatbig of a deal to everybody

(00:50):
listening right now, but for methis is a huge deal.
Up until this point, I havevery much been the mom who's
like let me enroll my kids in asmany activities as possible
because I want them to bewell-rounded individuals and I
want them to try a lot of things, because then they're figuring
out what they like.

(01:10):
This is the logic that I'vebeen using, and then you
definitely heard me complainingabout those, and then the
realization would hit me that ohwait, I've signed my kids up
for activities that occur everysingle day of the week and in

(01:30):
some instances overlapping days,meaning like there's two or
three activities happening onone day.
This was kind of a nightmarelast year for me in the spring.
I had the twins were eachenrolled in two activities each.
My son kind of a nightmare lastyear for me in the spring.
I had the twins were eachenrolled in two activities each.
My son kind of backed off.
He was he's not, he's not intosports at all.

(01:51):
So he was very much like Idon't really care how many to be
in anything, he's more of alaid back young man, if you will
.
Um, which in this instance Iwas like no problem, let's not,
I'm not going to push, I'malready overloaded.
And then, you know, I got busyat work and things were like
hectic and it really started tobother me that we were so busy

(02:13):
all the time.
I know some people reallyrelish that.
I know a lot of moms that arelike into it.
They seem like they really likeit, like that they're.
It's like a stamp ofachievement, like I'm really
busy all the time, I'm runningaround all the time.
I don't want that stamp ofachievement.
And the other thing I alsowanted to note and this is a
downfall on my side wasemphasizing being enrolled in

(02:36):
all these activities so muchthat we weren't actually doing
homework or anything.
Now the kids were younger andthe teachers didn't assign
homework for the classes thatthey had, so it wasn't too big
of a deal, but it still was,because you know the days that
we were like double timing itwith different activities and
this, that the next thing I'mnot practicing reading with them

(02:59):
.
You know I'm not practicingtheir math problems Like I'm not
over, I'm not leaning intotheir education, I'm not
practicing their math problemsLike I'm not over, I'm not
leaning into their education.
And this summer it really hitme and I started thinking more
and more about it.
I'm like I want them to be ableto come home from school, sit
down and do homework and eatdinner, like in this order.

(03:20):
I want this normalcy and lesshectic.
So I just decided nobody'sgoing to do anything.
Perhaps I might put them insome kind of music Saturday
class thing, but I don't thinkso and honestly I'm super
excited about it.
Like to be able to just focuson being a family and this lower

(03:40):
pace and really digging intoschool and seeing what we can do
to really help them excel, andthat's what I want my main focus
to be Now.
If all goes well in the falland I can put them all in
activities in spring, I'm goingto do it.
But it really just hit me allof a sudden.
I'm like you know what.
I don't want to sign them upfor anything.
I'm going to save some money,I'm going to save my sanity, I'm

(04:01):
going to focus on theireducation and I'm not going to
enroll them in a bunch ofactivities.
I don't need to.
The other part of this that Istarted thinking about was I
mean guys listening to this,raise your hand.
If you're an 80s baby, did youhave activities every night of
the week?
I sure as heck didn't.
My parents enrolled me in likeone dance class once and they

(04:23):
told me that, like I complainedevery single day, which you know
sounds about right I did thatonce.
I think I did soccer one yearonce for the town, and then I
did school sports when I gotolder, but at that point I was
already doing my own homeworkand it wasn't like a big deal.
It didn't really affect me andI'm a well-rounded individual.
So you know, like I startedthinking about it, I'm like I

(04:46):
turned out okay and I wasn't atactivities.
You know, every single day ofthe week, like we don't need to
do that.
And now that I'm talking aboutthis out loud, I feel like we
really we put so much pressureon our kids today to be these
like overachievers in all thesecategories.
Because they have to, they haveto shine, they have to excel,

(05:07):
they have to get into the rightpreschool to get to the right
grammar school, to get to theright high school, to get to the
best college.
If you want to go that path,I'm not really pushing my kids
through that path at all.
I want them to be educated andwell-rounded, but not in the
traditional sense of the terms.
Now, I went to college.
I know a lot of people thatwent to college.
I'm one of the very few peoplethat actually uses my degree.

(05:31):
There's a lot of people outthere in my generation that went
to college because that's justwhat you did.
That's what we were told youwere supposed to do.
That was the quote, unquote keyto successful.
You know, being a success andhaving money was go to college.
Pop that bubble, because somany of us have hundreds of

(05:52):
thousands of dollars of studentloan debt that we're like
drowning under, and you knowthey keep waving the carrot that
student loan debt is going togo away.
We're stuck with this for untilwe die, basically, and it sucks
if you didn't use your degreeLike good Lord.
I mean, imagine that, thank God, I actually got a degree in

(06:15):
something that I happened tolike, which is communications,
but, like a lot of people didn'tdo that because, really think
about this when you graduatefrom high school, you're 17, 18
years old and you're picking amajor that you're supposed to do
for the rest of your life, whothe hell?
I just rediscovered myself at38.
How are you supposed to knowwhat you want to do when you're
17 or 18?

(06:35):
When I originally startedcollege, I was a psychology
major and I wanted to go intopsychology and I wanted to be a
psychologist and I wanted tohelp people in that sense of the
term, and then eventually Iswitched to communications
because, to be perfectlytransparent here, it came really
easily to me.
Communications was somethingthat always came super easy to

(06:55):
me and I was like, let me justlean in here, like why am I
beating a dead horse, like Icould just lean in here and this
would make me some money atsome point.
So you know, I picked the paththat I picked and I'm fine, like
I'm okay, but there's a lot ofpeople that like have master's
degrees and they're not doinganything with it.
So you know, I know I went on abit of a rant here, but like we

(07:18):
put so much pressure on ourkids today to like that they
need to be doing all these likeamazing things at like five
years old, my God, like whathappened to just being kids and
like letting them find theirpath and guiding them gently and
making sure that they're okayand that they have all the
information that they need tomake the best well, you know
best educated decisions thatthey can make.

(07:38):
It's not a race.
This is not a race to a finish.
This is just living your lifeevery single day.
So, the more that we can likepull back a little bit for our
children and show them the waythat it's not a race, like we
just live every day to the bestof our ability and do the things
that we love the most, becausethat's really where your success

(08:00):
is going to lie.
That's really the key messagewe should be delivering to our
kids, not that they have to doyou know world-class sports, or
they need to do this, or youneed to be in the Olympics, or
you need to be getting straightA's.
Every single you know and youneed to.
You don't need to do any of it.

(08:21):
You have to do what feels rightfor your soul and what feeds
you.
Yeah, this is not, by the way,at all what I had planned on
talking to you guys about, butthis is sort of where I landed
and it kind of came tumbling outas I started the episode, so I
wanted to go with it, becausethat means that somebody
listening needed to hear thistoday.
So I've scaled back entirely,completely scaled back, and I am

(08:44):
actually super excited about it.
Um, I hope that someonelistening is hearing this and
saying you know what?
I'm going to make a choice hereand I'm going to choose X.
You don't have to go crazy.
You just don't Pick a life thatsuits you to the best.

(09:05):
Now, perhaps it suits you to berunning around all over the
place and that's really likelights you up and and you thrive
on that.
Do it then.
I'm not saying don't do it atall.
I'm just saying do what reallylights you up.
That was like soul-sucking forme.
I loved it because I liked tomeet other parents, I loved
socializing with everybody, butthen at the end of the day, I

(09:27):
was feeling like really drainedand like I hadn't been serving
my children the way that I needto be really showing up for them
.
So this is a personal decisionfor me, but I want to encourage
all of you to make sure thatyou're making those decisions
for yourself.
Thank you for joining me on thisepisode.
I greatly appreciate you.
Follow me on social, please,because I'm going to be
releasing the schedule of livestreams that are going to be

(09:49):
coming out.
Some of them are two a day, soI want you to really like be
able to tap in.
They're all going to getcampaigned out to the podcast
too, so don't worry if you don't.
If you miss a live stream,still going to be able to hear
it, and you'll be able to watchit on my YouTube channel.
Um, I hope you guys are havinga great week.
Thank you for being here withme and I will catch you on the
next one.
Take care.