20 Ways to Shift Gears and Increase Your Energy So You Can Live the Life of Your Dreams

1. Class Introduction - 20 Success Strategies: we're gonna have a workshop where I share 20 ways to shift gears and increase your energy so you can live the life of your dreams. And the reason I decided on this is I hear a lot of people talking about they wish they could get more done or they wish they had more energy or they wish they were able to accomplish more. And what we're going to focus on today is going to shine the light on helping you to realize you're probably accomplishing more than you realize. And if you slightly shift the way the light is coming in from the sky, if you will, you know how shadows are cast in different directions. Well, if you slightly shift how you're perceiving things, it can really change things in how you perceive things. Do you ever feel like you're losing momentum or not being as productive or as effective as you'd like to be? If that's the case, what steps do you take when you're attitude or actions seem to derail your dreams? Does that ever happen to you? It could be that you're tired or it could be that it's a cloudy day or it could be that you had too much sugar, alcohol or lack of sleep or whatever is going on with our precious, delicate systems that are affected by emotions and the chemicals in our food. You know, the positive, you know, vitamins as well as the chemical reaction. So what happens to you? What do you do when you feel derailed? Some people unplug and they go to bed. Some people go for a walk, some people go and they take a bath. What do you do when it seems that things aren't going the way that you want them to? And maybe you feel sad or upset and just seems like you're never gonna accomplish what you feel like you really want to accomplish. Or maybe you are a rare blessed soul that doesn't experience any of that. And that's the case. Tell us your secret. So my hopes today are that these 20 strategies will spark ideas and not you may not relate all 20 of them. However, look at them as food for thought or as little yummy dishes on an appetizer table, and you can choose which ones you partake in. And I do have a writing prompt, if you will, for each of these. And there's room on the notes page for the slide handouts where you can actually jot down your thoughts and treated it is a a little bit as a journal. So as we go through this workshop, you may want to pause after each of the tips and write down your thoughts. Or take the slide handouts and go someplace special where you enjoy riding and treat it as a journal and jot down your thoughts. So let's dive in, and I hope you find these helpful. So here are 20 ways to shift gears when things air, zapping your energy or keeping you from your dreams. We all get so busy with our day to day responsibilities, and life seems to be going faster and faster each time we spin around the sun. I don't know if it's as we get older. Time goes faster or just the time of our world is going faster. But with the information overload in so many things going on in, it requires more than one, sometimes more than two incomes to support a household. There's a lot on our shoulders, so how do we take the time to breathe. Or, as my mother used to say, How do we take time to smell the roses that we can enjoy this beautiful world that we're in ? You may also experience stress from worry about things going on in your life or in your business. And there are times when worry is, if worry is ever justified, is not a comfortable feeling. But especially when we love someone or we care about something, we worry. Then there are the occasions when worry. We spend our energy on worrying on things that we can not do anything about. And so it's important to differentiate between which is worried that deserves our energy so that we can help to find a solution. And which type of worry can we do nothing about? And how do we handle those feelings when we catch ourself on the worry treadmill, so we'll talk a little bit about that. Today is as well, so as we go through these 20 strategies, consider creating new habits that can propel you towards not only your goals but towards a happier, more successful life in the direction of your dreams. So in today's workshop will export 20 strategies to help you shift gears so you can experience more joy and get more done 2. Find Your Passion: I have these divided into four topic areas. The first topic area has to do with attitude shift. Find your passion. Sometimes we get stuck in the rut of our day to day lives and forget to focus on our passions and our purpose. Do you notice sometimes when you stop to journal or think or play in and and you remember what you're passionate about, You remember what your dream is, how excited you get. Do you also experience at times that you don't even know that you forgot about your dream because you're so busy living your day to day life? Well, when you recall your passion and you keep that in front of you when you write about it each day, it's gonna help to fuel your dream and help the fuel your passion. Do you notice that sometimes when you're doing exercises, not necessarily physical exercise, But when you're doing something and it's not something you enjoy, it seems like the time just lags like the longest minute, the longest hour of your life. And other time. The time seems to fly by when you're at a family celebration or a party or at the museum or doing something that you love. How the time flies by and sparks your vision confidence and brings you satisfaction. So I'm gonna encourage you to think about those times and find a way to tap into that. Because when you live with passion and purpose, your joy increases and it allows us to be more productive and happier and accomplish more. And the more we can accomplish, the more we can have a positive influence in this world and the more we can strive and head in the direction of our dreams. So find ways to tweak your routines. You can outsource energy draining tasks you can. You can adjust your overall business plan so you're more closely aligned and following the path inspires you towards your goals and these air things to journal about and you have on your slide. You have a place to write on each of these topics. And at the end of each strategy I have at the bottom in that bright, bold, blue teal ish color. I have a writing prompt, so you don't necessarily have to write on that exact prompt. But I'm hoping that it sparks an idea for you to write about. So on the topic of finding your passion, what fuels your fire and gets you excited about your business, what feels your fire and gets you excited about your business? Pause the video right now and take some time to answer these questions. This would be the first question. 3. Learn From Your Failures: The next strategy is to see failure as a learning opportunity. John Maxwell has a Ah ah book called Failing Forward, and it is. It talks about what you can learn, what you can learn from the mistakes that you make, what you can learn by not succeeding in a way that you had hoped to succeed because true failure is never trying in the first place. You may have heard that saying, You'll miss the shots you don't take. So when you take those shots and you strive towards your dreams, you're gonna have much more chance of achieving them. And the people who succeed in life who have failed so many times like Edison, how many times, if you have to fail with a light bulb and ah, Colonel standards with his chicken? I think it was like 999 times that he approached people to invest in his business, and he kept moving forward and moving forward. So question to ask yourself, Look at the person in the mirror, and how easily do you give up on your dreams? Are you willing to go through adversity? Are you willing to go through stumbling and and scraping your knee figure, figuratively speaking. And what can you do to tweak things and change? Change things so that you get more of the results that you deserve and desire because the most successful entrepreneurs aren't the ones that instantly succeed. They're the ones that take action, aren't afraid to make mistakes, learn from the mistakes they make and seek the advice of those who are where they want to be. And I should have bolted that last section. Those who are where they want to be, because sometimes we ask people for input. We asked people for their opinion, and they aren't where we want to be. They may not even have any experience in what we're asking them about, and yet we're thinking of taking their advice. So you want to take advice and you want to ask advice off people who have accomplished who are who have paved the way before you, because that's going to allow you to be more successful more quickly. So on this strategy, the writing prompt is what have you learned from a failure you've experienced. What have you learned from a failure you've experienced 4. Focus on What You Have Achieved: The next strategy is to focus on what you have achieved. How many times have you been some place when you ask somebody, how's it going or how's that project going? And they talk about Oh, gosh, I I havent even accomplished half of what I've wanted to accomplish. What if they flip that around and to say, Oh, you're not going to believe it? I am halfway to I've halfway completed with the project that I laid out. I'm ahead of schedule and I'm accomplishing so much. It's the same. It's the same exact scenario. It's just a different way of looking at it like that. Is the glass half full or half empty? So I want I want to plant the seed to you for you that when someone asked how you're doing or what have you accomplished or what are you celebrating? If you find yourself saying, Oh, I I'm so far behind or I I'm just not doing as much as I had hoped to. I'm gonna ask you to stop and change that, flip it around and talk about what you have achieved because it could blow your mind. And so here's some strategies to help you with that. So often people focus on what they did not accomplish versus what they have achieved. So here's an exercise that can help you to see how much you are actually accomplishing every day for the next 2 to 4 weeks, make a list of what you've accomplished and prepare to be wowed. You might want to put a piece of paper in your wallet that you pull out. You may want to have a page, a full page on a clipboard, and you just keep adding to it. Put the date on what you accomplished and then look back to what On the other side of 2 to 4 weeks, look back and you will be amazed at what you've accomplished, and you might not have everything in your calendar but to get you started. Here's and exercise for you. Open up your calendar and make a list of all you've accomplished in the past 2 to 4 weeks. Now again. Not everything. Maybe on your calendar. But looking at your calendar will help to trigger some of what you've accomplished. Like you may have something on your calendar that says writing time and then you'll remember? Oh, I was at the bookstore and I spent an hour and 1/2 and I wrote five pages and I edited this and I wrote down ideas for my journal. And look at that. Look at how much you accomplished. This is so powerful. So what you're doing is fertilizer for your creativity, this type of exercise. I'm going to really encourage you to find a time to dive in and embrace this one. I think it will really spur you on because when you realize just by taking daily steps one foot in front of the other, how much you're accomplishing without even realizing it. And so by journaling it by just jotting down a single line of everything that you're accomplishing throughout each day for a couple of weeks, you're gonna be amazed as you look back. I think back when I was in a I had a business partner several years ago is probably actually 13 years ago, and we were in a company, were in a company together, and it was based on sales and based on team building. And, um, very honored and proud to say that I was honored as the number three person in the company at that time for sales and team building. And he said to me, he called me up long distance and he said, What have you What are you doing? I want to know exactly what you're doing. How did you get there? And I was at in a different frame of mind and I said, I don't really know. I don't feel like I've accomplished very much and that's because I didn't track it. He said, Pull out, pull out your calendar and tell me how many appointments did you have last month? How many did you have each week? How many people did you talk to? And I realized that I had talked to 36 people, and I didn't know that. I thought I'd only talk to a few people. So when you write down what you've accomplished, how much you've written, what you're the ideas that you've, you know, come up with the people you've collaborated with, people that you've met with, you're going to see how much you are accomplishing. And then when you see what is working, they say that success leave, leaves traces. You can just follow those dive in line and rinse and repeat as to what is working for you. And by focusing on that, you are going to be able to multiply your results and multiply the success that you're experiencing. So have fun with this exercise. 5. Be Grateful for the Small Things: next. Let's talk about being grateful for the small things when you look at the small things in our lives and being grateful for each one of those and how toe bring more of what you want into your life by focusing on what you want and by expressing gratitude that shining the light on what you want and what you love and the greatest cure for feeling sorry for ourselves is to focus on what we're grateful for. So get in the habit of starting or ending each day by writing down three things that you're grateful for that day, no matter how basic these may seem, write them down because they're going to get the cumulative effect. It's like you're fertilizing a field, then re read these back at the end of each day after you write them down with a smile on your face. There's something about the energy of smiling that amplifies what it is that you're saying . So start off with a big smile, say, today I'm grateful for and watch how that lifts your heart, lift your spirits, and all of a sudden you're not feeling sorry for yourself because you realize how much you have, it could be that they're genuinely things going on that are tragic or so hurtful. And even in those times, focusing on the gratitude is going to help to lift your spirits. Even as simple as I'm grateful that I had the strength to get out of bed today. So wherever you are, just be grateful for what you have and express that with that love and that smile in your heart and watch what happens. And so this is an activity. I recommend that you try for 21 days and watch what happens over the course of the 21 day. So journal about this and you'll be able to reflect back and chart your journey over these 21 days. So what are three things that you are grateful for today? What are three things that you are grateful for today? 6. Schedule Worry Time: Now let's talk about worry. We started off at the beginning, talking about the type of worry that you need to be worrying about it because you need to come up with a solution. And then there's the type of worry that you're worrying about, something that you have no control over. So let's talk about how to deal with that. If you find that you spend time worrying about things that you have no control over, you may find this exercise helpful. One option is to tell yourself that you'll think about it later. You could just say, you know, I'm busy right now. I'm gonna think about that later, and you just shift gears later. You may forget you may forget that you were supposed to be worrying about something which would be a blessing, right? But it also allows you to focus in on the now so that you stop worrying. I find, because you know I have. Ah, I have a worry, Jean. I think I think those of us who have, you know, close family members, especially Children or elderly parents, that we're taking care of. Our worry Jean is amplified. Maybe that's a survival skill. I don't know. But I find for myself that when I dive into a work project that I love, that I'm passionate about that I'm excited about. I forget to worry. And then I remember later is like, Oh, I am so happy with, like, eight hours without worrying. That is a blessing. So that goes into my gratitude journal. So something to think about. If you can't do anything about something, then shift gears and trick your mind into thinking about something else. So here's another example. Another option is to set aside a specific time to worry. For example, let's say you're up at eight oclock and you're going for your walker. You're going to the gym and and you start to worry, and then it's like, Oh, you lose your motivation to do what you know is gonna make you feel good. You say You know what? I'm gonna go to the gym. I'm gonna go for my walk, or I'm gonna go meet my friend for coffee, and I'm going to worry about this from 10 15 to 10 40 or something like that. So again, you're putting it off because it's not like it's an urgent matter that you have to find a solution to. It's just something that's occupying your more in your mind and occupying your heart. So prioritize you and let that worry take a back seat if you possibly can. And this made This may be a new exercise where you have to flex the muscles like you know when you're working out or you're going for a run or a jog or lifting weights. And how the first you know, when you're just getting started, how your muscles are sore. So this might be painful at first. But if you just do, ah, little bit baby steps, it may really help you. And if you're riddled with worry and it really consumes your life, this is going to be the biggest blessing you can give to yourself. So when you start to obsess, tell yourself it's not worry time yet. I'll put that aside till later, and the more you do this is stronger. That muscle is going to be to push the worry off to the side so you can live your life, run your business, take care of the things that you want to take care of do the things that you love. And then during your worry time, what I found his helpful is to give myself, like I give myself, like, five or 10 minutes toe worry about it. But what I do is I do it in conjunction with breathing exercises, and I have a little mantra that I say. So I'm thinking about the worry, and I usually encompass worry with prayer and so that I'll be thinking the prayers. But then I'm breathing and saying my mantra, and then I forget what I was worrying about, and I feel so much better. But I've given myself that permission to have that little window. So find what works for you so that you can have ah so you can lighten your heart and lighten your load. So what can you do the next time you find yourself worrying about something that you have no control over? What can you do the next time you find yourself worrying about something that you have no control over 7. Learn to Like Yourself: Now let's talk about learning toe like yourself, and you may be a blessed person than you have a strong sense of self confidence, and you look in the mirror and you love who you see and you take care of yourself and you like yourself and you just have a great attitude. And there may be times where you compare yourself to others, and that usually brings us down a peg and makes us not feel so good about ourselves. So when you compare yourself when we compare ourselves to others were comparing our weaknesses to their strengths, which is not fair to you or the person you're comparing yourself to. So let's talk about ways to learn to like yourself, and it's right there alongside learning to focus on what you're grateful for and what you have accomplished. So these all aren't on that same energy wave length. For some reason, we are often our own worst critics. Now, if a close friend or a relative came to you with criticism that you have of yourself, what would you say to them? Most likely, you would reassure them and tell them how special and precious they are and how, how that how silly they are to think this, that or the other thing and that you will shine the light on their strength and how beautiful they are. Why can't that? Why don't we do that for ourselves? Maybe it's a survival mechanism that we always want to be better. However, when we can really learn to love ourselves and like ourselves, I think that it really will help to enrich our lives. So to boost your self confidence, consider writing down three things that you like about yourself each day. And you can do this at the same time that you're writing your three things that you're grateful for. So you write down three things that you're grateful for, and then you smile and you say each one of those out loud, and then you move right into writing down three things that you like about yourself. It could be that I'll just randomly think about three things that I like about myself, just as an example. One thing is, is I like how much I love people and how I could be out in public and lift people's spirits just by smiling at them and complimenting on something. Them on something that I see in them, you know, like at the store how people are so over burdened by with with nasty customers. So did tell someone who's, you know, checking out your groceries. How beautiful their sure it is. Or what a beautiful smile they have is, or how kind they were to the person in front of you. Just something to shine the light on. Something about them that's beautiful. First of all, that's gonna shape shift. Your energy is going to shift the energy of the people who are around you, and it's gonna lift that person up. So do that for ourselves, focusing on doing that for ourselves. But I would write down that as one of the things I like about myself is that I'm kind to people when you're doing it like that. It's not an egotistical thing, is just giving thanks for your blessings that are part of who you are. So this could be a really, really special, precious exercise, So name three things that you like about yourself. Take a moment named Three Things that you like about your stuff 8. Identify Your Weak Points: all right, now that we're feeling great, we've built ourselves up. We're reflecting the light on our strength. We can be strong and we can identify our weak points and plan around them, and a weak point isn't a bad thing. What it does is it shows us where we should be putting our energy, what we need to develop and what we need to outsource. So let's talk about this one. Knowing your weaknesses is the first step to managing and overcoming their negative effects , and the key is toe identifying them without judging yourself. So this is an exercise in how to make yourself even better. How toe like yourself even more because you respect yourself so much that you're not going to keep doing, for example, taking out the trash or ah, doing your bookkeeping or something that you just really, really don't like. You can honor yourself by finding a way to delegate that it may be delegating it to someone in your household or paying someone to help you with it, or if it's something that you feel that you just really don't like. But you really want to get better at it. Investing in coaching or in a course so that you can learn how to be better, accomplish what it is. That's making you frustrated because you may identify that the frustration is coming because you don't understand the technology or you don't understand the process. So getting in touch with and getting gaining crystal clarity as to why you feel it's a weak point and whether it's something you want to let go of or learn more of is going to be helpful as well. So, for example, if you know that you'll procrastinate all day if you start the morning by being on Facebook , then don't be on Facebook first thing in the morning. Use it as a treat. Use it as a reward. So rearrange your schedule so that you you are going toe work for a solid hour or you're going toe work from 9 to 11 in the morning and you're not gonna check Facebook until after 11. And when as a reward for a job well done, that is a fantastic way to take a weak point and to turn it into a strength because now it's becoming a carrot, if you will, to help you accomplish your goals to accomplish your to do list, so that's something to think about. So what's one of your weaknesses and what can you do to plan around it? 9. Act On the Quick Tasks: Our next area of focus is on productivity's e. So here are some productivity's strategies that you may find helpful. Act on the quick tasks. You know, that big, long to do list that we have. We can get lost in that we can focus on that to do list from now until kingdom come. But you know what? There's just going to be more things that are added to the list. So here's something that will help you check things off your list and make you feel that you've accomplished a great deal and also clear some brain space that you can focus on things that require, ah, lot of energy and concentration, so reduce overwhelmed by creating a list of activities that could be completed in a few short minutes. So you're creating a to do list. But the things on this to do list are all things that can be done in under 10 minutes, ideally, even five minutes, like short, quick tasks. So make a list of those. And if you find that you come up with things that that you want to write on a to do list that you know, take longer, put that on a different list. You want to create a dedicated list for quick tasks and then start or end each day. Or spend time before or after lunch, knocking out these quick tasks. And you'll be the one to know when it's best for you to focus on the quick test and do that on a daily basis. So if you know that, okay, I want to knock out. You know, three things on my quick task list, and I'm gonna do that first thing in the morning so it can check things off my to do list and you know that's gonna motivate you, Then do that. But if you think that focusing on quick test is going to derail you from what you really want to be focusing on that day, then don't do your quick task. First thing focus on that big project that you're working on and save the quick task. I think a great time is before or after lunch because you have this, like, perfect, carved out time that you can use it to, you know, endure morning work session and head off the lunch or and you're, you know, begin your afternoon work session, so find the time. That's that's best for you. To knock out those quick tasks. You'll get a lot done and you'll feel much more relaxed and accomplished by the end of the day. So make yourself a note to schedule. Time to make a list of quick tasks and place the list where you can easily see it each day . Make a list of quick tasks and place the list where you can easily see it each day. It could be in your calendar where you have a recurring appointment each day called Quick Tasks, and you have all the quick tasks in there. And as you complete them, you move them to the bottom or you delete them from the list. And another thing could be that you have it on a clipboard or you have it on a court board someplace where you're going to see it every day that you know to refer to it. So I think you're gonna find this one helpful and you'll be amazed at how much you accomplish because you're doing three things a day right? That's 15 things a week. That's 60 things a month that's 606 107 120 things a year. Bingo. As a lot of things on a to do list, I think I see some people smiling from here, realizing that is a great way to feel more accomplished when you're getting when we're checking things off of our to do list, it really is exciting and it brings us a sense of accomplishment. 10. Take Action in the Direction of Your Goals: the next productivity's strategy is asking yourself is what I'm about to do, taking me in the direction of my goals. This is a big one because sometimes we think we're busy. But we're on Facebook or we're checking email, and that's fine. There's times for that. But isn't taking you in the direction of your goals? It could be that you have scheduled it as relax ation time, and so what it's doing. It is, it's it's energizing you. You're taking a break so that you could be re fuelled to get back to work, so that is taking you into in the direction of your goals. But if you have on your calendar schedule that this is writing time, or this is time to be working on my course are meeting with people and you're checking Facebook or email or doing some, you know, playing a game on your phone, then maybe it's not taking you in the direction of your goals, so you won't be honest with yourself and use this as a gauge because it's so easy to get swept into reacting to the needs of others. So not only getting distracted by social and social things and email things and game things but the needs of others, right? The emails coming across the phone messages coming in. But there are things that you can do to prioritize your projects without feeling like you have to drop everything when the phone rings. Now it's one thing if you have someone who's an urgent situation in your family and you need to be glued to the phone, that's that's, Ah, hopefully a very rare occurrence in our lives. So short of that, turn the phone off or put it on vibrate and don't let it rule your life. So let the phone let the phone call go to voicemail. I learned a strategy about 15 years ago, and it changed my life forever. I was so reactive every time the phone ring had to stop when I had to answer it, and when I realized that it could go to voicemail. I'm not expecting an urgent call, and if it's urgent, someone's gonna call back several times, and I'll see that coming through or or, you know, figure out some kind of system. So if you know that you have people in a delicate situation, you could look and see. And if someone has just called five times or three times and you know you can make a judgement, obviously you're gonna want to get that call if if it's someone that you know. However, in the for the most part, people aren't expecting you to like jump when they went soon as they write to you or they or they call you. So let the phone call go to voicemail and you that's going to spare you talking to a lot of telemarketers because you could just block their phone block, their phone number moving forward. And you don't have to get tied up into getting tricked or sold to or whatever. And if it's someone who needs something from you, you don't have to take your focus off of whatever you are working on. So you can think about being part of a committee or or meeting them for coffee. Just discuss their project or whatever it is that you want to be able that you can call them when you are in the brains face to be totally present for them. And there are phone calls that you don't want to reply back to because, you know, you're going to get sucked into an hour long conversation and so you could just reply via email. Hey, you got your got your phone message? Sorry, I was real excited. I'm working on a really exciting project for my book or at work. In answer to your question, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Um, let's catch up soon. What did that take? Three minutes of your time. And you had you kept your brains face focused on your project and you didn't get sucked into an hour long call. Now, you could also say that someone you want to get sucked into an hour long call because we all people who loved chatting with you don't get enough time with them. You could say I would love to catch up, but I'm really focused on my project. When's a good time over the weekend that we could just have a nice visit on the phone or that we could meet for coffee if they're local. So think about that. Also, turn off the pings or rings on your phone and on the social networks. You don't need to be distracted every time someone has a thought or something comes across . You don't need to be jarred and have your concentration interrupted with the pings and a ring, so turn those off. If you like them, turn them on when you're in social networking time or answering messages time. But during work time, turn off those pings and rings. Give that gift to yourself. Here's a big one. Reserve checking your email during your productive work time. You could be someone who says, You know what? I want to check my email, my work, Whether you work for someone else or you work at home. Let's say that your work day in your mind starts at nine o'clock, according to your boss starts at nine o'clock. And if you're the boss of your own business, if you have your own business, so you decide when your workday starts and then you can decide. So in my mind, my work. They starts at 9 a.m. but im up way before 9 a.m. But I decide that anything I do before 9 a.m. is my time. I could do whatever I want when it's I'm a wimp in the in the cold weather like this, you know, 20 degrees outside. It's like I'm just not really inspired to go for a walk. But in the summer, when it's 70 degrees, I go for a walk, a six oclock, seven o'clock in the morning and I really enjoy it. I also sometimes will answer my emails first thing in the morning. For me that works. I get the emails done. They're done before nine o'clock, and then I have a free mind. And if I don't get to the emails until later in the afternoon, there's nothing. You know, I'm a check to see if there's anything urgent, and if not, I'll answer them at the end of the day. So you set when you're going to be answering emails and you don't have to. And from the minute that they come through, so you're basically making yourself and your business and your dreams a priority, what else can you do to prioritize what you are focused on? So when you're in the middle of a project, one of the things that come across your life, your desk that distract you are you someplace where there's others and they come and they just wanna hang out in your doorway and drink their coffee and chitchat. So maybe you close your door. Maybe you just let people at work. No are at home. No, I have this at home where I close my office door and it has my work hours on it. Or it says, you know, thinking, going on or recording session going on or project going on, you know, available at and you can put a little time clock. And with your co workers, you can see you know, you can figure out a system that would work without insulting people. You can make that work, so identify what are the distractions that come across your desk, your life, your world that pull you away from what you really want to be focusing on. One of the things that helped me when my son was younger was to talk about prioritizing work time and prioritizing family time and setting up a color coded calendar so he could see in color how much time I was spending with him and how much time I was spending with work. And I let him know that when I'm working, that's going to pay for us going to the movies that's gonna pay for your college that's going to pay for a new pair of pants. And if I'm distracted, then I'm not going to be able to earn that money. And we won't be ableto have those things that spoke. Volumes I remember one time was was Ah, an evening of Thursday evening when I'm supposed to be making phone calls because that was on my calendar, and I'm like, Tired did not want to make phone calls And he put his little hands on his hips and he says , How do you expect to send me to college if you're not in there making phone calls? He says, You go in there and you you go for your dreams He said to me, You go for your dreams So you want to invest your family in that time so you want to find ways to make money with your business, and if you're already doing, that's awesome. And as you're growing your business, start small and let your business take your family out for treats. So when I first started at that time, I first started my business are my business. I would let them know my business is taking us out to dinner on the weekend. My business is taking us to the store to buy a new outfit, and they see that Oh, your business is you know, not a bad thing is not taking you away from us. It is enriching all of our lives. So invest people, people will support what they're invested in and what they ah part of. So if you're finding that people are distracting you in your own home, maybe change your work schedule. If you're trying to work at a time that everybody just got home from school and they need you and they want you for dinner, it's not a good time to focus on a high concentration project. Maybe you want to do that at 7 p.m. After dinner. Or maybe you want to do that on the weekend when they're off for activities. So set a schedule that works with your living situation in your work situation, where you can really prioritise what you're focused on and find ways that you can reduce distractions and minimize distractions so that you can really focus on your projects. 11. Adopt a Motto of the Month: consider adopting a motto of the month. So we often times will have a theme of the month and will focus on writing block posts on that theme and creating content on that theme and making pictures on that theme, or or graphic images that we post to the social networks on that theme. What about a motto of the month for your own personal growth? Each month? Said a big but achievable goal, a goal for the month and then find a quote or a motto that sums up what the goal is about printed out. Or write your motto for the month on a piece of paper or on the card, or on a image that you pull into camera and you make a pretty graphic image and then pin it up in a visible spot, for example, over your desk or as the desk but the wallpaper on your desktop computer. So you see that model. You see that quote? You see that inspiration all month long, refer to it often and repeat it to yourself, allowed at least three times a day. So is part of your daily journal writing, where you're recording your gratitude and your recording what you like about yourself. You can record your model of the month, and that's then and you'll see it every day for the month, where you jot it down at the top or the bottom of the journal page, and and you spend some time writing about it when you're at it. When you're driving in the car and you get to a stoplight, spend some time and just say your motto out loud. Say your affirmation or your positive quote out loud and think about it. That would have been time that you were just watching people cross the street, which is nice. It's nice to just zone out, but it also could be a time when you just are feeding your dreams and feeding what it is that you're focused on. So just a different way of looking at things, a different way of spending time and a way of adding fertilizer and nutrients to your goals in your dreams. Adapting a model related to your main monthly goal can really help you keep focused and on target as well as inspired. What model would you like to focus on for the rest of this month? 12. Let Go of a Few Things Each Week: Here's something to think about. Let go of a few things each week. We all have so much on our plate. What can you let go off? We have so much information coming at us each day between the Internet and being on Facebook and having things come across our phone and things come across our email and driving down the highway and all the bulletin boards and watching the TV and all of the commercials, etcetera, etcetera. So much coming at it. So what can we let go off? You can relieve the pressure and create some clear brain space by letting go of or dropping things. So here are a few examples each week unsubscribe from emails that no longer serve you. If you're afraid to unsubscribe, you can have set up a email rule and send them right to a folder in your inbox. That off that bypasses your main in bucks, and then maybe you have a dedicated reading time over the weekend or in the evening that you can like reading a newspaper. But you open up your email folders and you read your e news so either unsubscribe or put them into folders and avoid your your main inbox. Another thing you can do with emails is you can have a dedicated email box just for e newsletters and things that if you only go there once every couple of weeks or once a month , you're not gonna miss anything important. But you can go there when you're in the frame of mind to explore that topic. That's a helpful suggestion as well. The next thing is, make a list of the courses you've signed up for and cross off the ones that you're no longer interested in or no longer interested or not interested in at this time. So you might even want to make a spreadsheet. So, John, go through all of your courses. Maybe you've created a spreadsheet, or maybe you have them all in a folder. Or you can go to pay power if you pay through pay, pal and look up all the receipts and make a big, long list of all the courses that you've that you've subscribed to that you've registered for. And then you could put together put them together, change the, you know, put them in order by topic area like all the ones about book writing together all the ones about social networking together. And then what you can do is you can either color code the sections or you can create a page for each topic area. If you're in a spreadsheet and you can prioritize and you can decide, you know what I really want to learn about social networking and so go through those courses on social networking and to make it a priority to instead of watching TV or doing other things that they that aren't necessary that you that you want to spend time on, spend that time going through those courses. And if you get go through a course and it doesn't resonate with you or the topics no longer relevant, you can just put a strike through through it, or you can delete it off the page and let it go. And by doing that, you may have five different topic areas. And if you know okay, for the next two months, I'm gonna focus on social media than all of those other topics that you have courses on. Don't let them pull on you. You could say, you know what? I'm going to get to writing next in next quarter or next month, so you don't have to think it doesn't do. You wait on your shoulder. You can focus on what you want to focus on. So that's another example of how to let go of things. Also, you can outsource you. Do you really want to make graphics, Create graphics for your programs or for your social networking quotes, But you're struggling with them and it's making you feel frustrated and it's pulling your energy down. Outsource them, find someone to do them for you. Do you hate doing housework or you Are you too tired to do housework? Would it feel awesome to come home, have a clean house? Whether you have someone once a week or once a month to do the heavy things, that is just a real blessing. I used to feel guilty about having someone help me with cleaning the house. You know, the big things. And then I realized that I could make Mawr in an hour than I was paying her for four hours , and by hiring her, I could help someone else feed their family, and I got the spirit experience, the awesomeness of coming home to a clean house. Look at what you don't like doing and find a way to turn it into a blessing for others and a gift to yourself. So something to consider. So give yourself permission to let go of things. So the question here is, what will you let go of or outsource first? What will you let go of and or outsource first? 13. Narrow Your Focus: Now let's talk about narrowing your focus. Are you overwhelmed by distractions or by multitasking? Try focusing on one single task or responsibility at a time and ignore everything else. You're focusing on something, and all of a sudden you find your attention being wandering, thinking about something that's totally unrelated. Have a little piece of paper that you can jot down the idea and then push it aside and focus back in on that single task. They say that it is healthier for our nerves toe focus on a single task rather than multitasking. They they whoever they are. The researchers say that multitasking can actually be quite harmful and stressful to our delegate humans systems. And so focus on a single task at a time you're gonna accomplish a great deal, because that single task is probably part of a broader task of your bigger goal or encompasses your bigger goal and you're gonna get more done. So this is something that you'll need to flex that muscle that discipline muscle. But once you do and you make this a habit, it could really change your life. Set a time for the task and the 20 to 30 minute focus. That's an arbitrary number. Some people say 45 minutes whatever you think that task would take. But give yourself a limited time. And then after that time you're gonna get up and stretch, get a drink of water or go for a walk, but really focused in without distraction for that period of time. Now I found that when I was writing and proofing one of my first books that I've kept getting pulled toe to my email. It zits very addictive. And it's just really is. I don't know it. It's just it's distracting, but it's also compelling. So what I did, is that it? Okay, I acknowledge I am addicted to my email. So what I'm gonna do is I'm going to write and proof read two pages before I allow myself to check my phone. And like some everyone's why I would feel myself getting pulled like a magnet. I've you know, I still have to finish these two pages, and I put my phone on vibrate on the other side of the table away from me, and I got so much accomplished. And the more I did it, the more I was free and the hold in the and the draw lesson toe, where I could really focus in on the project that I was working on. So again, it's flexing that discipline muscle. So how would it feel to have the freedom to focus on just one task at a time? How would it feel to have the freedom to focus on just one task at a time? And what can you do to give yourself permission to do so? What can you do to give yourself permission to do so? 14. Break Things Down into Bite-Sized Chunks: The next thing we're going to talk about is breaking things down into bite size chunks that's going to allow us to be more productive. And that's going to also overcome procrastination. By breaking down your projects into bite size chunks, you can get a lot accomplished. You also reduce the possibility of procrastination by approaching bite sized tasks one at a time. So it doesn't look like a big mountain of energy that we have to expend to this big project . Instead, look at it as a jigsaw puzzle, and we only have to do a few pieces of that big puzzle at a time that's gonna take the pressure off, making more enjoyable. And then, instead of putting the project off, you're gonna chip away at it one bite at a time. So here's a question for you. What project have you been putting off that you'd love to complete? What project have you been putting off that you'd love to complete and then make yourself a note here to identify the bite size pieces of that project, identifying the bite size pieces of that project. And then you're gonna have things for your quick task list. Potentially right. Grab a pen and paper and break that task into bite size chunks. So this would be something to do when you maybe with a cup of coffee or a cup of tea, and you're in a productive frame of mind and you want to map this out. This is this is a business building strategy right here. I really invite you to take some time to really dive into this one and and map it out. 15. Trim Your To-Do Lists: the next thing you can do is trim your to do lists. We tend to put too many items on our daily to do list, and then we get discouraged and disheartened when we don't accomplish them. So instead of trying to tackle everything on your list, focused on Lee on your top three priorities, and don't add any more tasks until you finish those three. So that doesn't necessarily mean the 1st 3 items on the list. It could be Item one, item 12 and Item 21 But you go through there and you can circle each day. So it's Monday morning, for example. What three things am I going to focus on? Go through and circle those three things. If you want to transfer those three things to a separate three things list you can. Otherwise you're focusing just on those three things. Make those a priority. Get those done and then cross put a strike through. Cross it off so you know that it's no longer on the list every week or so, you may want to re write that list so that you don't have so much many circles and lines going through things. But I would do that once a week so you can see and get the enjoyment to see how much you've accomplished. You may even want to keep those lists to see how much you've accomplished. But the top three priorities. What that's going to do. It's going Teoh postpone procrastination because you need to focus on the priorities, and it's gonna allow you to accomplish things that are most important that will allow you to gain momentum. At the end of each week, you'll have accomplished 15 items, and at the end of each month you'll have accomplished 60 items 15 a week, times four and then times 12 months is 720 top priority items. And I'm going to challenge you to do that for the next 2 to 4 weeks and watch what happens in your life and in your business. So right now, what are the top three priorities on your to do list? What are the top three priorities on your to do list 16. Stay Connected: we have gone through 14 items so far. We have six more items in two topic areas. The last topic area we're going to talk about is taking time for yourself, taking time to enjoy life. This topic area. I have three strategies for you. Take time to be around people you like and love. You want to stay connected because, especially if you work from home or you work in an isolated situation. We missed that human connection, but we're social animals. We really need that human connection, and it could really feed your energy. Could really feeds your soul if you will. It's really important to make those connections and stay connected not just in your social life but in your business life, too. Maybe you want to one day a week, find a coworker to go out with or if you work from home. Maybe you want to attend the events at your chamber of commerce and make coffee dates once a week. Finding ways to connect with people is going to really feed your energy and bring you more joy. Also, having feedback and company of others not only helps us find answers to questions, it's sand papers are rough corners and helps us realize who we are in connection to the world. So check out your local business networking groups or activities on meet up dot com, such as a book study club or a card game that you like, or a reading of group or ah, traveling group or ah, foodie group, something that you enjoy and find reasons to get around like minded people. If you wanted to be work related, maybe you want some kind of something to do with success or something to dio with. Maybe you want to develop your Etsy shop, and there's probably a meet up in your local area for Etsy shop owners, so meet up is a wonderful way to connect with people in your local area on all kinds of topics. So make yourself a note to stay connected and to do some research, find some ways to connect with others in person in your local area doesn't have to necessarily be business related, maybe even wanting to take dance lessons. Or maybe you can find out you want to take dance lessons, but you don't want the pressure of social dance where it's a partner dance, check out folk dancing or square dancing. Ah, there's lots of different kinds of dancing today where it's very easy going and inviting and fun and having that fun having that joy, you just really can be healthy for your both physically as well as as emotionally. 17. Spend Time with Positive People: The next thing we're gonna talk about here is hanging out with positive people on how important that is because they say that we become like the five people that were closest to sometimes in life. We need to let go of certain relationships, and that's never easy. We're not gonna even delve into family relationships here. Everyone deals with those in a different way. Certain family relationships, You know that you can only go once or twice a year and that you're gonna need to recover for a week or two. It's just the nature of being human. Ah, some some family relationships. You can find that if you're if you include 1/3 party, it reduces the negativity that sometimes the other person sends forth. I'm not sure we're not going to really dive deep in that. But given your circumstance, find ways to defuse negativity when it comes to hanging out with your family, we're gonna We're talking here more about friend relationships, and even with friend relationships, it is not easy to let go of certain relationships. But if you really have a heart's desire to be successful, you need to decide. Is this a relationship that's feeding you. Is this a relationship that's healthy for you and, if not finding ways to let go, maybe spending less time or being busy or not score finding that third party to be with to help diffuse the energy or to simply let go, and after a period of time, it will still hurt. I mean, I remember one. I haven't let go of a lot of friendships, but one friendship I let go off was, I'm going to say 35 years ago, and I still think about it almost on a weekly basis. I miss her. She we were good friends, but the negativity just was pulling me down and I had to let go of the relationship. So you have big decision to make but you, But when you have the realization that we become like the five people were closest to and the people that we hang out with, then you might make the decision easier. So it's not always easy. But when you prioritize your well being and your higher purpose, it will be worth it. Hanging out with positive people will raise your energy and vibrations and toxic people will no longer be attracted to you. At least that's the hope. But they say that we we tracked to us what we focus on it. So if you're focusing on positivity and then fill likely who it is, you're gonna attract more positivity. So make a list of the positive people in your life. And what can you do to attract more positive people into your life? I didn't write it here, but if you want to make a list of relationships that you need to let go of, that's something that certainly would fit right in here. It's just a question of which angle you want to focus it on. So either make a list and or a list of the people that you may want to consider spending less time with or letting go of or focus on what you do want and make a list of the positive people in your life and what can you do it to attract more positive people in your life? Maybe you can find ways to hang out with their friends. Maybe they have events going on. Maybe they have hobbies that you can get involved in so that you could be around people like them. So this is 12 Also. I don't think this is a quick answer. I think this is one where you can spend some time reflecting and going deep and doing some writing here, so make some time to go through this one. 18. Nurture Your Relationships: you want to also nurture your relationships even though you're busy, don't lose touch with the people that matter to you. Make time for close friends. Remember to thank and appreciate your team members or the people that you work with. How special would it be if you found out that it was someone's birthday at work and you brought them in a card or a cupcake? Or you initiated, Ah, round of Happy Birthday song for them? Or there's a coworker that you've been wanting to meet and you decide once a week you're gonna go out to lunch or take someone out toe lunch So you build those relationships and you want to nurture the relationships that are important to you. Maybe there's a family member who lives either locally or a little bit ways away that you would love to be spending time with. But you just keep putting it off and putting it off because you're so busy, make it a priority. Spend some time. Go on a weekend, bring them flowers, bring them something yummy, eat or take them out to eat or just go there and bring family photos and reminisce and bring a box of Kleenex. You can cry over the stories that will be so special for the for the both of you. So fine time. Make time to nurture those relationships, and you can begin and end the day by hugging and kissing your spouse or your Children. And if you don't have humans to hug you, be sure to spend time with your pets, your gerbil, your dog or your cat. It's so special. There's just that connection that that being connections, not necessarily human being. But that's just We're social creatures. And our pets are social creatures, too. So in it and it will feed you will feed you energy toe have that kind of connection. Truly successful. People aren't all about work. They know the importance of nurturing and maintaining the relationships that make all that hard work worthwhile. Who in your life do you want to spend more time with? I have a feeling there's someone right in your mind. At least one person shot that name. Don't Who in your life do you want to spend more time with 19. Walk Away from Computer: all right. Three more strategies to go through, and this is on the topic of taking time to smell the roses. 1st 1 is toe walk away from the computer. It draws us in, especially if we work online or for you work doing writing. Or they work with doing something where we need to be plugged in. That's important, but we also need to take time to be away from the computer. So let's explore a few strategies. Spending hours a day at the computer without a break can have an adverse effect on your health and your sense of well being. It also is more exhausting than physical labor because your mind your eyes, your energy is all pulled in and pulled down. So you want to have times that and ways that you could be away from the computer and it doesn't have to be long. It could be 60 seconds at a time, or five or 10 minutes at a time. So here are some suggestions. Taking a break not only helps bring oxygen to cells and restore circulation to the body, it also helps refresh and clear the mind. Try going for a brisk walk 10 minute walk, a brisk 10 minute walk a couple of times a day, maybe morning and evening. That's time for you, where you can just walk and reflect and see how pretty it is outside. Find someplace where it's, you know, where you feel comfortable walking and just get out and about if you're someplace where you can't really get out, maybe put on some music and dance or get a little stepper. That's just like a like a little I haven't hear on the place just right on the floor and it's just the steps. And so I stepped. There's no like handles or anything. It's just like a rectangle on the floor with steps and I on the cold days I just get on that, put on some music, and I stepped for a certain number of minutes, and it's energizing, exciting, and my cat thinks I'm crazy and it's It gets me away from the computer for a few minutes and always lifts my energy. So you want to find things that gonna lift your energy and get you away from the computer, even for a few minutes, even standing up reaching your hands to the sky reaching your hands to your side, doing circles with your arms, doing circles with your head with your neck on your shoulders and rolling your shoulders and taking a deep breath and maybe scrunching up your face and opening up your eyes wide and getting a drink of water or doing yoga exercises. Things like that. Some people set a timer on their computer and every hour on the hour they get up and they do something like this to energize them and to get them away from the computer. So this is another one of those muscles that you'll need to stretch to create that new habit. But this could also be something that gives you a lot of energy and lift your joy because you are energized, your body and your mind will thank you. So what types of things can you do during your computer breaks? 20. Create What You Do Want: And then we have this one, which is one of my favorite Create more of what you do want, create more of what you do want. So each time you experience positive feelings such as joy, satisfaction and accomplishment success Well, being etcetera in your personal life or your business life, ask yourself, How can I create more of this? This is so much fun. How can I do this more and think about that? It doesn't have to be a pipe dream. You can make it a reality. And in order to create more of what you want, you need to focus on it, live it, breathe it and plan for more. It doesn't just happen on its own. You need to be intentional about it. So go after what you love and what brings you joy? What things can you do to create more of what you want in your life? 21. Find Ways to Reward Yourself: and then reward yourself for your efforts. There will always be things to do in new task to add to our to do list. And rather than putting enjoyment off until someday find ways to celebrate and reward yourself on a regular basis, I recommend doing something fun every single day, even something small doing something fun, something that you enjoy. This can really increase feelings of joy and gratitude. What do you enjoy that makes you happy? An afternoon at the bookstore, a day at the spa? Ah, walk with a friend, a vacation with the family, a new outfit. Make a list of the things that you love doing and ways to reward yourself. And you may want to take this list and put it on a separate piece of paper that you can see . And each week you can say, OK, I'm Bonaduce. Pick something special from my things that I love to do list, and maybe you have two different lists. Maybe one list is like a bigger list. That's your weekly or monthly things that you love. And one could be a daily things that you love. So the daily things that you could be that you love is maybe you love to go to the coffee shop and have a cappuccino. So you treat yourself to that. Or maybe you love to lie on the rug and brushed the cat or the dog, or whatever it is that you love those you can have the daily things you love, and then the bigger rewards to yourself, such as going to the spa or going on a family vacation. So make it a point to spend some time making a list of the things that you love doing and ways to reward yourself. 22. Action Steps and Class Project: I hope that these strategies have been helpful. Men encourage you toe print off the slide, hand out and use it as a journal, if you will, because there's a notes section to the right of each slide and reflecting weak and recalibrate and get ready to accomplish more as you experience increased joy and energy in your life. So here are some action steps. Print off the slide handouts go through the suggested activities and schedule time each week in each day to focus on doing something that you enjoy or something that brings you joy. And I'm gonna encourage you to also journal each day about your progress and realizations. We talked about journaling about your gratitude, what you like about yourself and different points through here. We talked about ways to capture things that you can put write in your journal and that will give you something to reflect back on a gift to yourself, if you will. All right, everyone. I appreciate you until next time. Here's to your success. Take care