Last weekend felt normal.  We had dinner inside a restaurant with friends and both kids competed in their sports.  Seems like coronavirus might be loosening its grip.

One lesson I’m taking away from all the isolation and quarantine of the last year is the power of routine. 

Now you're thinking...routine sounds boring.  Why should you care?

Here are the benefits of establishing routines:

1. Lower stress levels

Even if it’s not a mediation routine, going through a practice over and over again each day will calm your mind.  Plus, if you have routines in place to get it all done, your brain can stop worrying.

2. Form good daily habits

If you are trying to work on anything from spending more time with your kids to losing weight.  Building a routine around that habit will increase your success.

3. Take better care of your health

What’s the change you want to make for your health?  Develop a routine to support that change...

Your to-do list is missing the crucial thing for you to get the most done today.

What’s that thing you ask?  TAKE A BREAK!

It’s easy to spot when somebody else needs to take a break.  

• Your best friend calls you in tears of exhaustion
• Your toddler throws a tantrum after skipping naptime
• Your husband disengages from work after his 10th zoom call

When’s the last time you took a break?  I’m going to guess, past the time it was too late.

Think of it like drinking water.  You need to do it throughout the day before you become dehydrated.  You need to take small breaks throughout the day before you burnout.

Why You Need a Break and How Often

Here’s the why: the clarity and energy you gain outweighs the time lost.

The temptation is to sit chained to your desk until you finish that project.  Getting up when only forced to by mother nature or some other interruption. I can see...

“You are a product of your environment. So choose the environment that will best develop you towards your objective...Are the things around you helping you toward success - or are they holding you back?” W. Clement Stone

I keep repeating that you are a unique human. Pay attention to the factors that drive your unique productivity. 

Here are a few questions to figure out what works for you:

1. Do you work better in a busy coffee shop or quiet office?
2. What kind of light helps you focus?
3. What do you like to look at while working? (art, nature, pictures of loved ones)
4. What colors are prominent where you work?
5. Do you have artwork around you?
6. Do you have plants in your office?
7. Are you driven to get things done or do you need someone holding you accountable?
8. What time of day are you most alert?
9. What type of equipment do you need?
10. What are the limitations of that equipment?
11. What type of software solutions do you need?
12. What type of desk and chair do you need to feel...

It’s been in my closet since we moved into this house over a year ago. A giant whiteboard with sketches to organize my dreams because some “guru” said I needed it. A tool I wasted too much time on because it worked for somebody else. 

GASP! I just took a closer look at those sketches. I date one April 2019!

I love checking off to-do lists and planning the details of my day. I admire those that can easily see the big picture, and if that’s you, I have a giant whiteboard for ya. It’s littering my precious closet space.

Have you ever felt that spending time to organize yourself is an exercise in futility? It’s not you!  It’s the tools.

This assessment helps you find your personal productivity style. Go ahead, take it.  Who doesn’t love personality tests?

Cognitive Style

In school, and as parents, we are told to identify and work with learning styles. They labeled some kids visual learners, while others did...

I just said NO!

A good friend called and asked me to serve on the board of a charity. It’s a charity I happily give my time and money to, but I still said NO. I felt terrible, but this is a HUGE improvement. I used to lose sleep over these sorts of NOs. Or worse, say yes when I knew it wasn’t the right choice.

I’m a recovering people-pleaser.

People-pleasing is a disease. It makes everyone around you feel better, but in the end, the person who ends up suffering is you.

Definition of People-Pleaser

According to Miriam Webster, people pleaser has two definitions:

someone or something that pleases or wants to please people

 

a person who has an emotional need to please others often at the expense of his or her own needs or desires

The first definition sounds pleasant, but it usually leads to the second.

Even Taylor Swift is a Victim

Have you seen Taylor Swift’s documentary “Miss Americana?” It’s a...

The thing about vision boards is what the hell to do with the giant poster board when I’m all done designing my destiny? A full-size poster board is not a simple thing to store. 

Then I came across a design that you could store away in a drawer.

BRILLIANT!

All the joys of vision boarding without the annoying storage issues.

Let me show you how:

Items you need:

• An enormous pile of magazines
• 2 file folders
• Glue (I used a glue stick)
• Art supplies (pens or paints or pencils)
• A printer for personal photos

Start with flipping through your stack of magazines and clipping out any image that resonates with your vision for the year. Don’t overthink this one (and I’m really talking to myself here).  Turn on some music, grab a friend to clip with just whatever you need to make it fun.

After you’ve collected a pile of magazine clippings, take out your file folders. 

Fold back the folders about a...

I could tell from my husband's voice that I didn’t even have a second to grab shoes as I ran to the car.  Five hours later, I was tucking in my sweet boy who had just broken his first bone (actually BONES poor little dude).

Doctor's orders now limited my super active boy who had already felt the weight of social distancing.

He had a fresh perspective on quarantine.  Overwhelmed with all the limitations, those board games I’ve been begging him to play since last spring had a whole new appeal.

The good news: you don’t have to break any bones for the cure.

Here are some ways we can take a fresh perspective to move past overwhelm:

A Shift in Thinking

Now into our second full week of 2021, you’re optimistic with a fresh perspective that comes with a new year.  Use this as your next chapter.  We start a new year feeling a sense of new beginnings.  

HELL YES to a clean slate.  

Instead...

Pull out your phone and compare the pictures you took on NYE 2019 to NYE 2020.

If the visual alone isn’t enough for you, think about the people you see in those photos.  How has 2020 changed them?

Nobody could have predicted a year of a global pandemic, a polarizing presidential election, and a spotlight on racial injustice.  And that’s a shortlist.

New Year goals and resolutions are all the rage every January. Last year I jumped on the “one word” bandwagon.

This year feels different.

We make resolutions to break a bad habit or to change something we don’t like about ourselves.  According to US News and World Reports, 80% of resolutions failed in 2015. I bet 2020 blew that stat away.

The sense of hope going into the New Year is strong, but it’s calling for a higher level of commitment. Try taking a different approach to this fresh start. Try reflection.  

What is a...

Managing your to-do list should never take more time than checking those boxes.

This is the wasteland of productivity. I have waded through it too.  

We all want a system that’s effortless.  Something that supports the way our brains work rather than drag down our productivity.

The ideal is to find a system that works with you and then make productivity improvements.

Remember when you tested a hypothesis in junior high school science class?  Memories of the egg drop experiment are rushing to me.  You designed a vessel to protect an egg when dropped and then tweaked it until it worked.

Let’s use the same approach with your productivity.  Test these changes and see what works for you:

Email Monster

Can you believe about 28 percent of the workweek is managing e-mail?  That’s over a quarter of your time spent on someone else’s priorities. Some reasons we spend so much time on email...

You know that friend that has it all together.  AND she’s always beaming.  You look at her and think, “that’s a level of happy I just can’t reach.”  

Or is it?

What if I told you that a little time spent with your calendar could improve your happiness?

Yes, even if you aren’t a planner.

Before I get into the details, let’s define happiness.  Happy is a feel-good word. Another way to look at this is emotional health.  

Not everyone is happy all the time.  Even Mr. Rogers had his bad days.  

He helped kids identify their feelings.  Take the lyrics to this song of his for example:

What do you do? Do you punch a bag?

Do you pound some clay or some dough?

Do you round up friends for a game of tag?

Or see how fast you go?

Mr. Rogers was onto something.  It’s how we handle the darker emotions that’s the true sign of our...