Transcripts
1. Introduction: There's no shortage
of planning tools out there to help us
better organize our time. But I've always struggled with finding a system that sticks, one that works in the
exact way that I need, even when those needs change. I've tried everything, planners, bullet journals, calendar hacks, and inevitably I end up
with a system that I abandoned after just a few
weeks. I'm Rahaf Harfoush. I'm a digital anthropologist and New York Times
bestselling author. I teach people how to build personalized humane productivity
systems so they can tackle their big goals
without burning out. [MUSIC] Adoptive planning is a unique approach that's flexible and adjust
to your needs. There's enough structure to help you build solid foundations, but then you have the freedom
to really make it your own. I call this humane productivity. By the end of this class, you'll have your own custom built adaptive planning system, including clear ways
to tackle your yearly, monthly, quarterly,
and weekly goals. I encourage you to make
this content your own. I think everyone should
take this class because learning how to make
consistent progress on goals, especially when each week or each month looks a
little bit different, will be essential in helping
you get big things done. I hope you'll share some of your work with
other learners and feel free to ask any
questions. Let's get started.
2. Identifying your Planning Baseline: One of the biggest setbacks with traditional planning
systems is their rigidity. You spend all of this
time setting up a system, but then life happens
and everything changes. You get a new project. Your family visits
you from out of town. A last-minute event pops up, or you get knocked out
with the flu for a week. You get the picture.
Suddenly all of your careful planning goes
right out the window. This is where adaptive
planning comes in. As you'll see in this class, there is a way to
maintain consistency, even one-year work and life
are constantly changing. The first step in building an
adaptive planning system is to understand who we're
building the system for. In other words, you. To understand you, we'll be looking at our
baseline of current needs. You'll need the productivity
baseline sheet, so be sure to have
your copy ready. We fill the sheet out because
if we don't understand why other systems failed or what
our planning needs are, we won't be able to create a system that's
custom tailored just for us and we might repeat the same mistakes
over and over again. To start, I want
you to think about your planning strategy
if you have one. For example, do you just automatically accept meeting
invitations as they come in? Do you have a process to set and accomplish goals
during the year? Do you have a morning routine
or an evening routine? Basically, I want to know how
do you organize or manage your day-to-day life
and I want you to write down the details up here. Now, if you don't have some of these things or any
of these things, don't worry, because many of us were never taught
planning skills. Just fill it out with what
it is that you do have. Maybe you use your phone
calendar, or notebook, maybe you stick a dozen
Post-it Notes all over the place or send
yourself email reminders. Whatever your strategy
is, write it down. Next, what do you prioritize? How do you decide
where your time goes each day or what
pulls your attention? Are you someone
that just goes with the flow to see
where the day takes you or do really like to have your time allocated in advance? Moving over to the
box right next to it, I want you to write
down if you have a strategy to
accomplish your goals. Like do you set goals at
the beginning of the year? How do you tackle the big
things you hope to accomplish? If you wanted to finish a
professional certification, if you're trying to learn
to play an instrument. Again, if you don't have
a specific strategy, that's okay, that is
what this class is for. Now, down here is a big one. This is a really important box. What planning systems
have you tried before and why
didn't they stick? For me, I kept running into the same issues over
and over again. The systems were only useful at certain
points of the year, they were overly prescriptive and sometimes it was too
much work to set them up, they were too rigid. That leads to the next
question, which is, what do you actually need
from your planning system? My weeks look so different, but I really creeped
consistency. I want to be able to make
progress on my goals. Sometimes I was teaching, sometimes I spent the
week on the road, sometimes I was with clients
and sometimes I was at home. I was getting lost in trying
to use these rigid systems. I kept missing project
milestones so I'd write all of those
needs down in this box. The final question
right down here is, how do you want to feel? I know this sounds
a little silly, but it actually is a really
helpful thing to think about. We're so focused on the nuts and bolts of our calendars
that we don't check in with ourselves to make sure that the systems we're trying
to put into place are also aligned with our emotional
and our mental needs. For me, I want to feel calm. I want to feel in control, joyful and at ease. Because if you're balancing
different projects, if you're working
with colleagues in different time zones, if you have personal
obligations that change from week to week and
all other variables, I'm sure you'll appreciate
feeling calm and in control. If you don't think
that's possible, I used to think that too, but I promise by the
end of this class, you're going to be looking at your calendar in a
whole new light.
3. Customizing Your Planning System: Adaptive planning is based on a concept I created called
humane productivity. It's a style of planning that
believes that rest, joy, and play can co-exist with
productivity and ambition. In this lesson, I'll
be walking you through one of the four pillars
of humane productivity. These pillars represent the
foundational ideas that are at the heart of the type of planning we'll be
doing together. I want you to think of your adaptive planning
as a practice, like building a yoga practice
or writing practice. It's something that you'll
be doing regularly but at a pace and rhythm
that works for you. The first pillar is
personalization. The core of adaptive planning is the belief that
you know you best. You are the architect, that means no more
cookie-cutter morning routines or one-size-fits-all
productivity hats. We're going to take our time. We're going to build
on our baseline and make sure that
everything we put into place is a direct reflection of our personal
preferences and needs. What this also means is that
while I'll be giving you general guidelines and tips to help you structure your
planning practice, everything is up for
personalization. If something doesn't
work for you, change it, adapt it, eliminate it, increase it, whatever works to make
it fit your life, you should absolutely
feel empowered to only take what serves you and leave everything else aside. It's like Legos, I'm giving you all
the different blocks, but you're the one who gets to decide which blocks to
use and what to build. We will be filling out the
personalization sheet today. Let's go through that together. Now the first part is
about guiding principles or what you'd like the planning system
to help you achieve. For example, my
guiding principles are to always feel I'm in control and prepared in both my personal and
professional life. I want to remember birthdays and send out holiday cards on time. I crave a consistent fitness
routine in writing practice. I want to make time for
the things that matter, so I would fill all
of that out here. The second box is about
your temperament. Do you replenish your
energy from being alone or from being
around other people? Do you like details
or big ideas? How much spontaneity do you want to have in
your day to day? Do you like routine or
do you get bored easily? For me, I would fill out that I'm definitely
an introvert. I like big ideas in general, but I need details
in my planning. I always like some spontaneity because while I
don't mind routines, if I don't change it
up every now and then, I'll die of boredom. Now the third box
is about meaning, what gives your life meaning? For me, it's about
being present and prioritizing my family and
friends and my health. You could say something
like you want to make sure you're
enjoying nature, you want to do
work that matters. Whatever it is, take your time, think it over and fill it out. Once you're done,
I want you to keep the sheet handy because you'll need it a little bit later. Now we're ready to move
on to the next pillar.
4. Embracing Your Whole Self: Adaptive planning isn't
just for your time at work, it has to encompass
your whole life. This is why the second pillar of humane productivity is holistic. Holistic means that
we have to take into account you as an entire person, including your
physical, emotional, social, and spiritual
well-being. This builds on the personalization sheet
we just completed, because now we're
going to start getting specific about what things
we need to make time for. This is your chance to
think about and write down everything that matters to you in terms of
your well-being, your health, your family, your community, and even your
own personal development. You'll need the holistic
sheet for this lesson. As you can see,
there are four boxes that say my ideal day, week, month, and year. I want you to think
about what it would look like if everything went
according to plan. In a perfect day, I would
meditate every morning. In a perfect week, I would work out 45 times. I would call my parents
every other day. In my ideal month, I take a long weekend
to explore a new city. In my ideal year, I take Summers off. This isn't a contract, we're just laying everything
out so we can get a complete picture of
what we actually want. What we're doing here is
starting to think about real tangible
actions that we want to make sure we incorporate
in our planning. The next two boxes are the activities and people
that replenish you, that make you feel
great about everything. This is a good reminder of what activities you want
to make sure you leave time for and who you want to connect with on a regular basis. I know we're going through
this sheet pretty fast, but this type of
work, it takes time. I want you to give
yourself space to think about all
of these things. Pause it if you have to, but take as much time as you need to fill this
whole sheet out. Once you do that, it should
look something like this. When you have your
completed sheet, we can move on to
the next pillar.
5. Aligning With Your Natural Rhythms: One of my biggest pet peeves about planning systems
is that they just assume you're going to have the same level of
energy all year round. I know that's not true for me. I feel differently depending
on the time of year, the day of the week, or even at different hours in my day. I need an adaptive system that understands these
ebbs and flows. That's where the third pillar of humane productivity comes in. Cyclical. I want you to take
your cyclical worksheet, and we're going
to go through it. Here we're going to think
about our average day, week, and monthly rhythms. To do this, you'll
have to start paying attention to your energy cycles. On the sheet, I've given you
some areas to think about. For example, are you a night
owl or a morning lark? When are you most
creative during the day? When do you lag? How does your energy track
over the span of a week? How do the changing
seasons affect you? Let's fill this out together. I'm a night owl,
which means I do my best work in the late
afternoons or early evenings. I'm most creative between
4:00 PM and 10:00 PM. Over the course of the week, I find I'm most energetic
Tuesday to Thursday. I like to ease in and out
of the week if possible, and I get more into
a nesting mode in the winter and I have way
more energy in the summer. Now here's a sheet from
a client of mine to show you how different each
person's cycles can be. She is an early bird. Her most creative hours are
between 7:00 AM and 1:00 PM. Her most energetic days of the week are Monday
to Wednesdays. She is an avid skier
in the winter, so she likes to spend as much
time as possible outside, and she likes to relax in the summer and have
a lot of downtime. We're total opposites
energetically, so how could we use the
same planning system? You might need to observe yourself for a few days to
figure out your own patterns, so don't worry if you don't have all the answers right away. Now that you know
what to look for, you'll start noticing
your own habits, and you can come back and add more detail to these sheets. Now in the next lesson, we'll tackle the final pillar.
6. Embracing Constant Change: In order for us to keep
growing and learning, we have to push ourselves
to try new things. But if every minute of the
day is already scheduled or if we're overcommitted
to a rigid system, we might miss the opportunity
to try something new that can have a big and positive
impact on our life. That's why the fourth pillar of humane productivity
is called adaptive. This means we're building
our adaptive planning system to not only handle change
but to actively seek it out. This is important because your needs, goals,
and priorities, they'll shift depending on
where you are in your life, your career stage, or even
the time of the year. By being intentional about
checking in with ourselves, we're giving ourselves
the chance to stay on track with our goals and
our hopes for the year. In the adaptive sheet, I want you to think about
any activity that you've been doing in the same
way for a long time. Do you check the same
websites every day, go to the same yoga
class every week? Do you rotate through the
same five recipes for dinner? Write all of these things down. In the box that says
things I'd like to try, I'd like you to think about how you would change things
up a little bit. Remember, this isn't about
changing your core habits, it's about making time to
explore and try new things. For example, you
can have a habit like working out
4-5 times a week. But instead of going to
the same yoga class, you could challenge
yourself to try a new type of yoga once a month or leave some space in your fitness calendar for
something totally new, like rowing or
boxing or pilates. Who knows, what if you find
something really great? What if there's a new type
of yoga that you just love doing or an instructor
that really gets you? The point is we should
always be learning, testing, and growing so
we don't fall into ruts. The next part of the sheet, tackles anything you'd like to change about your status quo. Maybe you want a better
nighttime routine or you want to move
more during the day. Write all of those things down. Then finally, I want you to
think about how you'd like to grow either professionally
or personally or both. These can be some
longer-term objectives like wanting to go
back to school, or trying to live in
a different country. The four pillars help
us ensure that we understand our needs,
behaviors, and preferences. You'd be surprised at
how many people never take the time to get to know themselves or their
own patterns. But now that you
have this knowledge, we're ready to start tackling our adaptive planning practice.
7. Setting End of Year Goals: The secret to adaptive
planning is to have the right balance between planning for your
long-term goals staying on top of
short-term obligations and having enough flexibility
to account for well, life. It's this lack of
balance that gets so many people stuck because they aren't setting
long-term goals, or they're getting distracted
by short-term stuff, or they're getting
completely derailed when their rigid planning
system experiences unexpected change. In this lesson, we're
going to start with the yearly overview because I like to start with
the big picture. It's actually my favorite
part because this is where we get to dream up the experiences, milestones, and goals that we want to tackle
in the coming year. You're going to need
the year-end goals, the goal breakdown,
and the end of your overview sheets
for this lesson. The main objective
is to ask yourself, what do you want to
have accomplished by the end of the year in
different areas of your life. I like to think about
different categories like professional
health or hobbies. As you can see, the
sheet is blank, so it's fully
customizable because personalized is the first
pillar and that way you can decide what
category makes sense to you and the number of
goals that fill right. Again, you're the one
that knows you best. Remember to include some
holistic categories from your sheet as well. This part of the process might take you the
longest because you might need
some time to think about what you want
to accomplish, so be sure to give yourself
the space to do that. Here are some
different examples of professional goals
that you could say you want to
try to accomplish. You could say, I want to take a course to sharpen my skills, you could learn a new software, you could improve your
public speaking skills. You get the idea, whatever inspires you be sure
to write that down. Mine would maybe look
something like this. I would like to have my non-fiction manuscript finished by the end of the year. I want to update my website, I want to learn how
to use Obsidian, which is a research software. I want to take one
Skillshare course every quarter and I want to
get my driver's license, do a handstand,
and be able to row 50 kilometers by the
end of the year. I would put all of those
down on this sheet. Now, we're going to take each of these goals
and we're going to break them down into the different steps that
they'll take to complete. This is where you'll use
the goal breakdown sheet. Again, the number of
steps is up to you, so go ahead and in
each of these boxes fill in a goal and break it down into its
respective steps. Once you're done, it
should look like this. Now put that aside
for a second and turn to your
end-of-year goal sheet. As you'll notice,
it's unlabeled so you can set it up for
the next 12 months. Because we're
focused on cyclical, holistic, and adaptive planning, the first thing
we're going to do is we're going to identify major time blocks
during the year that might change your
day to day routines, things like conferences, team retreats, vacations, family obligations, trips, graduations,
extracurricular activities. For example, if your team takes a corporate retreat every
November, mark that down. If you have a big conference
in May or you take a long weekend in July with
your friends every year, put that down too. At this point, you
should also reference your holistic worksheet
and make sure to include whatever you wrote in your ideal year in
this overview as well. If there are times of the year when you're going to be busy, whether it's with
performance reviews or other deliverables, this is your moment
to mark it down. We do this because when we're planning on accomplishing goals, we're not always going
to have the same amount of time each month to
work towards them. When we assume that we're going to have the
same amount of time, we end up inevitably
falling behind, and then all of our
carefully laid plans get pushed to the wayside. Here's my calendar.
As you can see, I've marked off
birthdays, trips, retreats, events,
busy times at work. This gives me an idea
of how much time I'll have to work on each goal
for that specific month. Tackling a goal during
a slower month is a completely different
experience than trying to get things done during your
busiest time of the year, and that's what we're
trying to solve for here. Now, in my ideal year, I had marked down that
I wanted to take August off and some time
off in December too, so I've made sure to
include those as you can see in my yearly overview. I have a friend
whose family members have birthdays that are
all in the same month. She knows that that month
is going to be busy with personal stuff and
parties and preparations. She understands that she'll
have less time to work on her goals than during any
other month of the year, and so she can plan
for that in advance. Now, go back to your goal
breakdown and start slotting in the different steps of each goal in whatever
month makes sense. For example, if I want to have my manuscript done by December, I'll need to have a rough
draft done by April, a final draft done by July, and have all of the
other stuff done by November since I like to
take holidays in December. Remember I wrote down
that I wanted to take August off so I can't
put anything in August. I need to take that
into account as well. What I like about this yearly overview
is that it also make sure that you don't overload any one month with too
many things to do. The boxes are small on purpose. If you jam pack each one, you're going to find
yourself overwhelmed. Start easy with the biggest
and most important goals first and then work from there. Remember when we looked at how your behavior
changes seasonally, go back to your cyclical sheep
and make sure that you're taking those changes
into account as well. For me, you can see that I'll do more writing
in the winter and more research in the summer because that's how
my energy flows. It's a pretty cool
roadmap and one that takes into account all the
different facets of your life. Once you're happy with
your yearly overview, you can move on to
the next lesson.
8. Setting Quarterly Goals: At this point, you should have your yearly overview road map, which by the way is a huge accomplishment
so congratulations. From this point on, the process gets easier
and faster, I swear. We're going to
continue breaking down your big goals into smaller, more manageable,
and realistic steps based on your own
constraints and rhythms. For this lesson, you will
need the next 90-day sheet, and if you notice there aren't any monthly
labels so that you can use it from whatever
month you're in right now. Personally, I really
liked the 90-day view. It's just long enough to offer flexibilities that I can make
real progress on my goals, but short enough that I always have the
finish line in sight. There are three reasons
I use this view. One, it makes accomplishing my goals seem less intimidating because I'm only worrying about 90 days at a time
instead of a whole year. Two, it gives me the
chance to adjust my goals based on what's happening in my life as a whole,
so for example, if I know I had family visiting, I can adjust my goals
accordingly for the month before and the month after to take
into account this time blog. Three, I can keep revisiting my annual goals and
change them as needed. Unlike a monthly plan, there's enough flexibility
in a quarter to make adjustments and adapt to any unexpected
events that come up. This means I have a
higher likelihood of accomplishing
my yearly goals. Now, this happened
to me recently, I had my 90-day sprint
all lined up and then I got a sinus infection
followed by a bad cold, and then I hurt my back. The results, I only got a tiny
portion of my goals done. But luckily, I had my 90 days sheet handy
and I was able to redistribute the
goals for the quarter without throwing
off anything else. In my case, I ended
up working on two Saturdays in the next
quarter to catch up, which was an acceptable
exception to stay on track. My point, these
unexpected things happened and instead of
freaking out and feeling awful, I turned to my tools
and I was able to find a fix quickly and easily. Say you've just had
your annual review and you've set your
goals with your manager. A 90-day plan is a great amount of time
to make progress on those goals and then
schedule a meeting for some feedback to make sure
you're on the right track. For example, let's say you want to improve your public speaking. You could make a plan
that in the next 90 days, you're going to try to present
three times each month, and then at the end
of the quarter, you can invite your manager to a presentation to
solicit feedback. This type of strategy makes sure that you make progress on your professional
goals regardless of what else is going
on in your life. The other great thing about doing this every quarter and not all in advance is that when
things shift and they will, you'll get to start
the new quarter fresh. Meaning you can make accommodations to your goals
to make sure that you're building the best plan for you instead of feeling
like you're behind. This way, you get to meet
yourself where you are. I've had some quarters where
I have blown my goals out of the water and some
quarters where I clearly over-committed
and failed, and regardless, it's okay. Humane productivity is adaptive. It's about being compassionate
with ourselves but also adapting to whatever is
happening in our lives. What you do is that
you're going to take your end of your road map and you're just
going to transfer some of your goals over. Now we have a little
bit more room. We can add details for
that particular month. Things that didn't fit
into the yearly plan like an upcoming doctor's
visit or social events. This entire process should take you about 15 to 30 minutes. Once you get used
to these tools, you will breeze through them. I promise this
happens really fast. Once every 90 days, I take 15 to 30 minutes and
I set up my next quarter, and then I just can focus on my monthly and weekly goals with the peace of mind that I am on track for my yearly milestones. Humane productivity,
if you'll remember, is about feeling calm and
peaceful, and in control. Once you're done
with your sheet, it should look
something like this. In our next lesson, we're going to tackle
the monthly view.
9. Planning Your EOY Goals: Monthly: We're going to build on
our quarterly overview by planning out our month,
but with intention. We're going to start with
the monthly preview, which is a sheet
that helps set us up for success by
giving us a chance to see what's coming
up so that we can make the needed
preparations in advance. First, go to your 90-day plan and make sure you've
got the right month, pick the priorities listed, and you can write
them down in this box that says priorities
and goals right here. Next is the float
days and workdays. I would like to see how
many working days versus vacation days that I have to get a sense for how much
I can get done. For example, in December, I'll have fewer working
days than say, in June. Let me go to one of
my favorite boxes, the routines and update boxes. This is where you look at what you have
going on this month, and you plan on how you'll
adapt in advance. This is key. For example, if I
see that I have a conference coming up during the first
week of the month, I might reschedule my language learning
lesson and instead focus on increasing
my vocabulary with an app while
I'm at the airport, or if I know I have to
stay late to finish a project with my
team this month, I might schedule a
meal prep session the weekend before
so that I know I have something healthy
to eat when I get home. The point here is that by
knowing what's up in advance, we can plan to adapt, which means we have
a higher likelihood of accomplishing our goals. The next two boxes
are for you to be intentional about replenishing
your energy and joy. Go back to your holistic sheet, take a look at the things and the people that replenished you, pick a few activities to do, pick a few people
to connect with so that you'll have
a great month. There's also a box for to-dos
and obviously a box for notes and reflections
to fill with whatever you feel like. At the end of the month,
I also like to do a review to see how
the month went. So let's fill this out together. First and foremost,
what did I accomplish? What were some of my wins? What about some of my misses? Why did those misses happen? Next? You want to think about
your planning practice, what worked, what didn't work. The last two boxes
you want to refer to your adaptive pillar sheet where you listed activities
you wanted to try and how you wanted to grow. Pick one or two, put them in here so that
you can try them out. I want to point out that the
preview and review documents are completely optional. If they aren't helpful to you, If they don't serve
you, don't use them. Find what feels good because
this is your system. For me, I found that when
I did them once a month, that increase my
likelihood of having more good days because I
knew what to focus on, I knew what to work on, I
knew what I needed to change, so it really helped me. Now, the last piece of the monthly overview is this magical piece
of paper right here. This beauty is the
one that unlocked the system for me,
the magic for me. It's my absolute favorite
page in the world. You're going to need
your quarterly plan and also all the other pillar sheets that we've been
working on so far, so make sure you
have those handy. First, we're going to start
with all the time blocks. You'll see that every week
is represented by a block. Go ahead and block off anything, conferences, vacations,
you know the drill. Next, go to your holistic sheet where you listed
your ideal month, your ideal week, list
those things out too, because we want to
prioritize what feels good. Then you're going to
take your monthly goals from your 90-day view, you're going to break
them down into each task, what you're going
to do each week. You're not going to figure out exactly when you're going to do the task on a specific day, we know that they
just have to get done at some point
during that week. We do this because
schedules change. So if you went
ahead and scheduled the entire month in detail, one tiny disruption and boom, all the planning
goes out the window. What you want to do to make this your own is to refer
to the pillar sheets. For example, my temperament
is that of an introvert, so I want to make
sure I'm giving myself a chance to rest. If I see that Week 1 is filled
with social commitments, I know that Week 2 I'll
make a note to make sure that I have time
for a deep recharge. What I love about this approach
is that I can adapt to whatever is happening
and however I'm feeling. It keeps my life manageable, which I know I've said it
before, but I'll say it again, humane productivity
and adaptive planning is about feeling calm, empowered, and in control.
10. Planning your EOY Goals: Weekly: We are in the final stretch. This lesson brings it all home. Once a week, you're going to find some time to sit down for 10-15 minutes and plan
out the week ahead. You can take this weekly spread that I've provided or you can do it right into your phone
or computer calendar. You just start to slot in
the things that matter. Four workouts a
week, a Zoom call, all your other goals, they can go here step-by-step. This is the time when
you get to decide what day makes the
most sense for you. I also like to add in any tasks here because if you don't
assign a time or a day, I find that you just
don't get them done. Now before I use the system, I would get to my desk
Monday morning and feel overwhelmed about
what to work on first, or wonder how was I
going to spend my time. But now, I do my weekly
planning on Sunday afternoons, and I get to check in
with myself to see how I'm feeling when I'm
planning the week to come. Do I have a full-day
team offsite on Monday? Well, maybe then I'll
say no to going out for dinner and I'll
recharge at home. Or alternatively, if I
was a big extrovert, maybe I would be sure to
schedule a dinner that night to let off steam with
friends or colleagues. The point here is you get to
meet yourself where you are. You get to exist at the intersection of
compassionate ambition. You get to meet
big goals and not sacrifice your health
or your sanity. I like to make it a ritual. I sit, I make myself
a cup of tea, and I take a look at what's
coming up for the week ahead. Now if you have a
regular routine, this will fly by for you. But if you're like me and you're juggling different projects, hobbies, obligations, you'll start to
understand why planning week-by-week makes
so much sense, it's so much easier. Because the core
parts stay the same, working out, focusing on
the things that matter. But how you
accomplish them might look very different each week. Here's an example of
two different weeks. As you can see,
the same outcomes, the same goals, but very
different execution. Though it looks different
each week and each month, by the end of the quarter, you'll be where you need to be, on track to meet
your annual goals. This is why we need our
planning to be holistic, personalized, cyclical,
and adaptive. This is where your customizations
really come into play. You can take into account
your ideal day, your cycles, your energy rhythms, you get to make this your own
adaptive planning system. If you don't have a lot
of flexibility at work, you can still use
adaptive planning to make sure you're
recovering and replenishing in
your personal time and for tracking
different personal goals. The level of customization
is totally up to you. At the end of the week, you just repeat
the same process, adding and adjusting
as necessary. Here's some tips that I use, but again, do what
works for you. I always make sure I
find the time to slot in my meaningful experiences
and priorities first; writing, exercise,
date night, food prep. I know that when I
do these things, my quality of life improves
and so does my performance. Don't over-schedule, leave some periods of
unstructured time to play, or rest, or just be. You might have to
experiment to actually find out how long it takes
you to do something, and that's totally normal. You can have both
structure and flexibility. You can build a
non-routine routine. You can create systems that are designed to bend with you and go with the flow
without ever losing track of what you
want to accomplish. Plus, you want to have a strong enough system that if you get an amazing opportunity, you can take advantage
of it and know that the system has enough
give to catch you. I know this seemed like a lot, because we did the
whole thing from beginning to end in one class. But once you get your
annual goals set up, you do the quarterly
planning every three months, the monthly planning
once a month, then the only thing
that you're doing on a regular basis is the
weekly planning sessions, which is a 15-20 minute
investment every week. Once you get to know
yourself and your system, you'll be able to do it
with your eyes closed. Plus the monthly reviews and previews ensure
that you're always checking in with
yourself to make any updates or changes
that you need. In exchange, you get a planning practice
that you have built, that is designed for your exact needs and your
preferences in your life. This is the promise of
humane productivity.
11. Final Thoughts: [MUSIC] Congratulations on finishing the humane productivity
approach to creating an adaptive
planning practice. During this class,
you have mastered the four pillars of
humane productivity, personalized, holistic,
cyclical, and adoptive. You took the time to understand your own needs and
rhythms and constraints. With the annual yearly
goal overview you not only figured out where you wanted to
invest your efforts, but you turned the intangible
into the practical. You mapped it out step-by-step. The quarterly overview
gave you a good chunk of time to make some real
progress on your goals, and the monthly review and preview ensured that
each month you're being intentional and thoughtful about how you want
to live your life. The weekly overview was the key. It gave you the structure to
stay focused and flexible, to be in alignment with your
body and not against it. It ensured that you move
through the world with ease, open to exploring new things, embracing change, and taking
the chance on spontaneity. You decided that to live
an integrated life you have to balance both personal and professional
obligations, and that to do so
you have to build the system that was
made just for you. Humane productivity is about the intersection of
compassion and ambition. It's a way of working
that refuses to choose between success and
a full and happy life. I can't wait to see
your systems and plans, so I hope you'll upload them to the gallery and of
course I will be in the comments
answering your questions and chatting about
the class with you. This is your system, so make it work for you. [MUSIC]