Podcast Season 1, Episode 10
Productivity / Time Management with Love
In this episode, Steve will share some tips about how to manage time, energy, priorities, and relationships in alignment with love. He shares a couple keys to finding your own way towards a system that works for you - two specific things that relieve pressure and shame from traditional time management systems. He also talks about how to be in healthy relationship with structure and flexibility. He also reviews his Ar-Rashid Journaling system which he'll be teaching in The Village in December, 2021.
Transcript
Productivity / Time Management with Love
Hello there and welcome to another episode of The Love is All-Ways the Answer podcast. Really good to be with you today we’re going to be talking about time management with love – how to be productive in a way that honors your system, that respects your own rhythms and your own preferences, so that you can manage yourself and your time and your energy and your tasks and get things done. Which is necessary, if you’re running a business for sure. And, you know, obviously, in life as well – in a way that is aligned with love that feels loving and kind to yourself and still is effective in getting things done. This is a pain point for so many people. And so I’m happy to share my ideas with you today and how I manage my own in a way that is sustainable, long term. And so if you’re ready to get to it, let’s go.
What is time management with love?
There. So today, we’re going to be talking about time management with love. I don’t actually like that term time management. But it is the term that the person who asked the question that prompted this podcast episode asked in their question, I’m actually going to read their question to you, in part. And they said this, and this question came through The Village, which is my online community for kind-hearted business owners who want the kind of support for their business and their heart so that they can let love and kindness lead the way.
And this Villager asked, they said, I’ve been thinking a lot about time management. It’s something I’ve always struggled with, especially prioritizing in sequence sync when sequencing tasks, it’s a hard word to say.
They went on and said, My experience has been that everything feels equally important. And I have a hard time committing to a plan of action. I tend to be distractible at the moment. And my mind is easily drawn away from what I’m doing. yet. In contrast, I also have periods of separation where I will be so preoccupied with a project that like dinner gets burned, right?
It seems to me that both of these qualities might be useful if I could figure out a way to apply them in the right circumstances. Right now, it just feels like a battle and maybe one that a well-thought-out system might be able to address any ideas.
And so this Villager and I actually had a personal conversation about this, which was really, really helpful for them. And there were a couple of key points that came out of that that I wanted to share with you today, along with a number of other strategies, so that you could pick and choose what might work for you so that you can manage things in a way that aligns with love and kindness.
How to do time management with love?
So I want to start with the two key points that I shared.
1. Use Structure – Not to Be Controlled, but to Be In Control
Firstly, we were talking about using structure. And a lot of people resist the idea of using structure, having a plan or a calendar, or scheduling things to get done.
And the reason the resistance that I normally hear about that is that I like to flow, I like there to be flexibility, which is totally reasonable, right?
There’s no disrespect for anyone having their own needs and how they prefer to get things done, right. But here is one of the things that I’ve always said is that flexibility without structure is chaos.
Flexibility without structure is chaos. And conversely, a structure without flexibility is imprisonment. So we need both in order to function in a healthy way. See if we’re trying to be flexible, and we just like things to flow, there is nothing holding us steady, there’s nothing to return to there’s no anchor. It’s like a balloon with helium that gets let go. It’s just going to go wherever the wind blows.
So there’s no way that you could ever put an intention on that balloon for it to end up in one particular spot because there’s just no structure around it. Even if you had a small tiny string attached to that balloon as you let it go in the air, that little bit of structure would allow you to get it to where you want it to go.
And so if we expect to get things done, if we’re running a business, and we expect to be able to get things done, we need some structure. However, the point that I made to this villager was that we use structure not to be controlled but to be in control.
Oftentimes, we feel like, if I have structure, if I put structure in place, then I’m going to be controlled by that structure by that structure. But that’s not being an unhealthy relationship with the structure. Because what that means is that we are abdicating our own sovereignty, our own choice, our own autonomy, our own agency, to the structure as if the structure was in charge.
And what we want to do is want to retain our sovereignty, retain our agency, but utilize the structure in a supportive way. You’re the boss applesauce, as Judge, Judy, is to say, You’re the boss, you tell the structure, how to support you. Right? That’s different. We’re not being controlled by the structure, we’re using the structure to be in control.
And so I use a process which I’ll share in more detail a little bit later, every single morning, which provides me with some structure. And I get a remarkable amount done in the same amount of time that I used to get maybe a quarter of that amount done. Because the structure supports me. And I’m not pushing, I’m not stressing, I’m not overwhelmed.
In fact, I’m much less overwhelmed than I ever have been, because of the structure being in place and supporting me the way that it does.
So the first big lesson for this podcast episode is to use structure, not to be controlled, but to be in control.
2. You Don’t Earn “Good Girl / Good Boy” Points By Forcing Yourself to Use Someone Else’s so-called “Perfect” System
The next thing if you are at all concerned about time management, or energy management, or productivity, you likely have read a lot have tried, a lot of things have implemented templates or systems that other people have created. And I want to share that most often… They don’t work.
Now sometimes you land on something that works brilliantly. But with people that I generally work with, and this is true of the villager that I’m referring to here and true of myself in the past, we tend to believe it’s a very common belief that we will earn some kind of good boy or good girl karma points. By implementing the system as prescribed.
Do you hear that? Does that resonate at all, like I’m gonna take this template to this person, this system that this person gives to me or taught to me and said, like, Oh my gosh, is the best thing in the world? And if I can’t do it, the way they taught it, then I failed.
Or conversely, if I’m able to do it, that makes me a good boy or a good girl. Just using and I’m using those terms, Good boy, good girl very intentionally, because that is for us adults.
That’s an unhealthy way to be in a relationship with it. It’s like we’re looking for our own validation by implementing someone else’s system as if they know how we work best. Which isn’t true. We don’t get any points for doing it like other people do it.
The only thing that matters is that your system works for you. That you have something that helps you be everything you want it to help you get done everything you want to get done.
And so what I want to encourage is the refinement thing. Give yourself permission to do it your way in a way that works for you.
So listen to the productivity experts, I encourage you to listen to what I’m going to share here in this podcast. But don’t just do it. The way I do it. I mean you’re welcome to do it the way I do it, but don’t think you’re gonna get any extra points if you do. The only way you can Extra Point is if it works for you.
So be willing to refine any system that’s given to you in a way that makes it work better for you, the system that I’m using for my productivity and my time management, energy management is, gosh, I’ve refined this thing, just dozens and dozens of times, almost weekly, I’ll make a tiny little shift. I don’t do that as much anymore.
But when I first started, gosh, it was like, three, four months that I was making tweaks almost every week, sometimes every day. As I realize, you know what, that that little piece, the way that I have, that doesn’t really work for me, or I want to add this little thing in there. I want to change that order around.
That’s okay to do. And yeah, it takes time. Refinement takes time. And you have to use something long enough so that you can really understand what’s working for you and what’s not working for you so that you can make those refinements.
And it also makes some sense of self-awareness about what does work for you. For instance, this villager who asked this question, she’s got a lot of amazing self-awareness, when she talks about being distractible and her perspiration. Right getting so into the flow that she loses track. And so with self-awareness, we can build a system that will support us.
So give yourself permission to be you. And to do it your way and honor your own rhythms. That’s the key thing. It’s okay to do what works for you, even if that way seems really backward, or real books, the traditional system of productivity, that doesn’t matter, all the productivity gurus and experts, they’re just using systems that work for a certain percentage of the population, that’s all.
And if you’re not on that percentage of the population, that is not gonna work for you. And that’s okay. It’s not supposed to find your way. And if you can’t find your way, get some help like this, villagers doing.
Tools in being productive
So next, I want to share at least four things that I think might really help. These are some of the just key points that I’ve used.
1. Prioritize your energy and your care tasks
The first one is around prioritizing your energy and your core tasks. All right, your energy is what drives your ability to do everything else. If you don’t have energy, if your resources are low, then you’re not going to be able to give your all to your relationships or your work. And so you want to prioritize your energy in your care tasks.
What do I mean by care tasks, these are tasks that care for you. I don’t say self-care, because I feel like that term has been tainted in the world. But care tasks are specific things that you can do that actually give you more fuel, or that relieve a burden that frees you up. So that you can do what you really want to do live into your purpose and you fulfill your mission in life, right. These are activities that have exponential benefit energetically, let’s talk about a few of them.
Sleep
Sleep, sleep is probably the top energy care task. So if you can prioritize your sleep that affects everything. Now that sometimes takes self-discipline. One of the key things that help in this regard is to turn off your devices, two hours before bedtime.
Now if you’re like me, and your whole life is on your devices that can be really difficult. However, I’ll tell you that. Even with this, like quote, unquote rule, or this guideline, do your own way. My devices are generally off, they go into sleep mode at eight o’clock pm. So that’s a couple of hours before bed rain, so I don’t get any notifications. And even if I checked my phone, I’m using Apple devices. Even if I checked my phone, none of the apps have any notification icons as red circles with the number of unread messages or whatever new things right?
So I’m not distracted. I’m not like oh my gosh, that has a couple of notifications. I better go check that right. There’s no distraction there. I might use the advice to read or to journal or to do some other things to keep tracking that kind of stuff. And I will use my device, do what I need to do and then shut back off. I don’t use it, to actually engage in anything that’s not purposeful and intentional.
Now, that still will disrupt sleep, but you know, you got to do it your way right? And I have I get pretty good sleep scores pretty consistently. So I’m, I’m doing an okay job there, go to bed at a consistent time, wake up at a time that works for you. Notice I did not say wake up early, because that is another violent way. That productivity, quote-unquote, experts believe that you are lesser than if you sleep in.
And I want to encourage you to honor your rhythms. If you are a night person, and not a morning person, that does not mean you’re broken or wrong. Honor your rhythms. If you like staying up until one in the morning and sleeping in till 10. Do it. Do it like a boss. I don’t like that term either. But you know what I mean.
Make healthy food choices
The second way to prioritize your energy care tasks is making healthy food choices. Making sure that you prioritize your meals, your cooking, your preparation, all that stuff. This is an area that I don’t have nailed down, although I’m doing better with it.
But your food, that what you take into your body is going to dramatically impact your energy and care.
Movement of your body
The third one is movement of your body. One of the key things I do is gentle yoga every day. It’s not aggressive, it’s very, very gentle. It helps care for my back, it keeps my body flexible and movable. It helps eliminate pain and prevents injury.
Because when any of that stuff happens, I’m not nearly as a present for any of my tasks. So that yoga practice I prioritize it’s one of the first things I do in the morning, every single day. Because it makes such a huge difference.
Spiritual Practice
Another thing, the fourth one is a spiritual practice. Now one of the things about spiritual practice, I hear from people all the time, I have a very consistent spiritual practice every single day every morning, ever, like oh my gosh, I really envy how you’re so consistent with your spiritual practice.
Well, that’s taken years and years to build. And what I hear from so many people is that they are unwilling, unwilling to do what they consider to be a partial job.
And what I want to encourage you to do is to simply be consistent with anything. That could be one minute a day. But if you do something consistently every single day, and you make it consistent that obviously, the key here is consistency, right?
Every single day, and preferably at the same time, that way, it starts to build into a routine of a habit. Just like you know, we wake up. And if you’re like most people, maybe you’re different, but most folks, I think wake up and brush their teeth, right or take a shower or something, right.
We just have that routine and it’s consistent. Or we wake up and we have coffee like there’s just a routine and it’s consistent. It’s just what we do. And while it might vary from minute to minute, if we may we sleep in one day or whatever, but that’s like the first thing we do.
That’s how you want to develop, add in a spiritual practice sometime in there. Like while your coffee is brewing, instead of doing something else, just stand there and do spiritual practice.
Stop trying to do it right. And instead, start trying to just do it, do something. If spirituality is something that how you roll, you know, something that you enjoy, do it. Even if it’s just a minute a day, it’ll make a difference. It’s a start. Alright, good.
2. Time Blocking
So the second tool I want to share is time blocking. This concept is basically setting aside a specific amount of time, which will vary depending on how you roll, how you work, what your rhythms are, where you sit down and you do what Cal Newport calls deep work.
I think Cal Newport is deep work, deeply focused, very purposeful, engaged work. If you can do that, throughout the week, I promise you, you’re going to get a remarkable amount of stuff done. No interruptions, no distractions, deeply focused time. That how much time well it varies again, honor your rhythms.
It can be anywhere from 20 minutes which would match like we may have heard of the Pomodoro Technique, but to 90 minutes, do what works for you. Some people like can only focus for a short period of time and then need a break.
And other people, once they get into it, they don’t want to break right, you remember, the villager was talking about power separation where they get so preoccupied with a project that you know, dinner will burn, right because they forget that something’s in the oven or something, right.
So if you get into a flow, this is how I work, if I get into a flow, I want to stay in that flow, because if I break that I lose the flow. And it’s really hard for me to get back into it. So I tend to do a one-hour to 90-minute block of time.
Now what I do want to encourage you to do is set a timer for whatever your time period is, whatever works for you. Now, if you get into flow when the timer goes off, and you want to stay in the flow, maybe you have another block of time, set aside. Please move your body every hour. And to do that you don’t have to go into another activity. You don’t have to disconnect from what you’re doing. I do this all the time. And it works like a charm, at least for me.
If it doesn’t work for you then find something else that might, but I will stand up for my seat. And I will like march in place, or I’ve got a little hydraulic stair stepper thing, I usually hop on that and go for one minute to move my body and I move my arms and my legs while I do that. Now while I’m doing that my mind and my heart are still fully engaged without what I was just doing. If I’m typing or writing or reading something, my mind and heart are still there. I’m just moving my body for a minute. And then I sit right back down and I’m still in the flow and I can just go right there.
What’s important in order to make that work is that we don’t allow ourselves to be distracted, we don’t pick up our phone, we don’t check messages, we don’t look at email, everything stays the same. Our hearts and minds stay the same. We just moving our bodies for a minute. And then we get back into it. Start the timer again. And go for another block of time.
Now one of the things that were time blocking is that people be like I don’t like to be scheduled or what if I don’t feel inspired at that moment to do what I have scheduled to do, right? Well, be willing to shift things around. Maybe you get into flow for 90 minutes, but you didn’t have another time block scheduled. Maybe you had other activities scheduled. And I’m guessing they’re activities that don’t, that aren’t appointments with other people be willing to shift things around.
If you get into the flow and want to stay into the flow, be willing to shift some of the other things that you’ve scheduled to another day, move them to be willing to be flexible. This you know at the beginning, we talked about people resisting because they want flexibility will be willing to be flexible, you’re in control of this calendar. Or if it’s time for a time block and you aren’t in the mood, like you just have zero inspiration, there are two things that I want to suggest that maybe you can try.
Number one is to spend five minutes getting started. Just take the first step, that’s always the hardest one. Sometimes if we take one step, we realize you know, I could take another step, let me do another five minutes, and just see if something gets moving. And then before we know it, we’re in flow with it.
The other option is to and uses this all the time as well as to have a number of different things that you could do during that time. So sometimes I’ll just block a 90-minute chunk of deep work time. And when I get to that time, I check in with my heart. And I asked to be shown what is it that My heart wants to focus on today. And I’ve got a list of projects that I’m working on different creative things that I’m trying to get done or different types of productive stuff. And then I get to choose whichever one I feel like I’m deepest in relationship within that moment. That’s what I’ll do.
So every time I get to a block, I’ve got a nice wide variety of things that I can focus on. Alright, so that’s time blocking.
3. Do ar-Rashid Journal
The next thing I want to share is my and I’ll share this just very briefly is my, ar-Rashid journal. Now, ar-Rashid is a quality that is ascribed to the divine. That means the teacher, the one who shows the right way, the one who shows the direction. It’s a practice of illuminating the path of growth. And the reason why I like that name is that it really helps to inform the purpose of my journaling practice.
Just in the morning. Because I want to be shown the way I want to carve the path, I want to pave the path, I want to make it clear and simple and easy. So that the rest of my week can just flow. It’s like if you have a hose, and you put it in the yard, and let the water go where it goes like it’s just gonna go where it’s gonna go, and who knows where it’ll go might go to the street, it might just pull in the yard, who knows.
But if you dig a trench from the hose to a place to some way could curve and do all sorts of things, the water is going to flow in that trench, you can count on it, that’s the way the water is gonna go. Because it’s that’s you dug the trench.
And so this is our Rashid journal that I do every single morning, except weekends, it’s just Monday through Friday. It clears the way for me to have the most amazing weeks, the most amazing weeks.
And so I’m not going to go through all the detail of what’s inside the journal, I’m actually going to be teaching this journaling practice in December in the village. So if you have any interest in that, I encourage you to take a look at the village, which you can find on my website at actualinfinity.co/village.
Monday is my deepest, most comprehensive journal, and it takes about an hour and a half. It’s really, really full. And I’m just, I’m going to share with you all the stuff that goes into this journal. Now it might feel really overwhelming. But again, I’m really well practiced at this. And all of this stuff that makes sense to me probably won’t make sense to you. So no need to feel overwhelmed. I mean, you’re welcome to feel however you want to feel. But I’m just letting you know why it takes an hour and a half. And just imagine if you were clear on all of this stuff and in relationship with all of this stuff in a beautiful, nourishing sustainable way for you what that might do for your productivity.
Date
So I start with, of course, the date. And then I go into some themes or some qualities or some mantras, and I just list you know, I’ve got a few that I generally use. I won’t go into all those specifics, right?
Then I summarize the big picture for me, these are the overall big picture ideas, my purpose in life, my mission in life, and what I call my anchor, which is a quality that remote that keeps me grounded and aligns everything that I am do.
Target
Then I go through a section about the number one next big target. And I whoop, whoop w o p is an acronym for from someone and I forget who the author is. I apologize. But whoop w o p is an acronym for a wish. What is your wish? What’s the goal? What’s the thing that I’m after? The first Oh is the outcome? For what? What is the outcome of that thing? The second Oh is an obstacle. What’s the obstacle here? And the P is what’s your plan to get through the obstacle? It’s a great little brief process. Super, super simple. And I go through that and outline each of those things, takes just a couple of minutes.
Wins
Next, I acknowledge my wins from the previous week. I’m doing this again on Monday morning. Go through and acknowledge. Then I asked what did I learn from my previous week?
And then last, the next lastly, how will I use this to support me going forward? So based on what I learned, what am I going to bring forward to this week so that this week is even better? And what this does is this gives me like just it’s just a step up as a 1% improvement. What can I do 1% better this week? And over time, when you aggregate that, I don’t know I’m not good at math. So I don’t know what the math is. But in a year’s time, doing this week after 52 times 1% greater than 1%. It’s remarkable how much better things get.
Gratitude Practice
Then I go have a gratitude practice and I write out what I’m great at what I’m grateful for. Then I go into my three-by-five grid. The grid is divided into three columns, energy, work, and love. Energy is about eating, moving, sleeping, and spiritual practice. Work is about work stuff and love is about my relationships, my personal relationships with people and it’s important to me to have really clear priorities and objectives and And intentions in each of those areas.
Identity
So the first row that I look at is my identity. This has taken quite a bit of work for me to get in a relationship with, but I have an identity when I’m at my best in my energy. Who is that? What is that? What is that identity of me, then I’ve got, you know, some language that I use that really resonates for me of who I want to be, right? Maybe energy, maybe you’re really active physically. And so maybe you want to be an athlete, or maybe energetically, you want to be radiant, or you want to be flourishing, or maybe there’s a title or a person that you look up to that you want to kind of embody those qualities, right?
Our identity is really important, it’s a deeper conversation, but how we identify ourselves when we are at our best, it’s important that we have one of those. Who are you when you’re at your best energetically, to be able to name that to like, personify that to be able to step into that identity, then my identity for work, who I am at my best and work and who I am at my best in my relationships, and I’ve got a term a name for all of those.
Next are the values and qualities that come through me when I’m at my best energetically workwise and in my relationships. Then I have a section for zesty behavior, which is one to three disciplined actions I will take to be this version of myself today.
And for my Monday, practice, it’s for this week. So for each section, energy, work, and love, I’ve got a one, two, and three. So I can list three things. For number one, I’ve got a protocol that I do every single day. And I usually get four out of the five one of them, I’m not really doing and I’m probably going to make refinement and take that off, because I’m not really doing it. But those things for me energetically are, well, I’m not gonna get into the details, this is not the time for details, I don’t want to make this too long.
So I listed the three things that I’m going to do this week that will help me be my best identity, and exhibit the values and qualities in my behavior. For energy, one, two, and three, then for work 123. These are the key big priorities. If I can get these three things done this week, my week, can’t go wrong, I will be so productive, like these are the big rocks, if you know that illustration. And then for love.
Typically what I do in this section is outline specific people because I’m not in a partnership with anyone. I don’t have those types of priorities. But I have a lot of relationships that I really like and want to maintain. And so I identify people specifically that I want to make sure that I reach out to and stay in contact with this week. And if I have other activities that are in this category, I’ll list those as well. But it’s just 123.
And then underneath that, I’ve got a little checkbox for time blocking my energy work, my deep work, and my deep love. And so what I’ll do is I will then go into my calendar. And I will block out time, every single day to get whatever it is that I wrote here to make sure that nothing gets missed.
Hope
The next section on the arshi journal is hope. Hope has three components a belief in what’s to come, which is kinda like an intention or a target.
So hope is made of three things belief. The second thing is an agency, meaning that we have to operate with an agency. In order to move, we have to know that we have some choices that we have some control over, moving forward towards what we believe.
And then the third component of hope, there are pathways and identifying multiple pathways to get there knowing that we don’t just have one choice, we’ve got unlimited pathways to get to where we want to go. If point A doesn’t work of choice pathway a doesn’t work, we go to B and if b doesn’t work, we go to C. We never give up. We never stop trying we’re always moving towards our hope. And I do that for energy for work and for love.
Empowerment Algorithm
And then lastly in this particular grid, the three-by-five grid is my empowerment algorithm, which is simply an If This Then That statement so that I can get 1% better and prevent backslides, what this means is Is that for energy work in love? I think about what is likely to get in my way. And if that shows up for me, what am I going to do about it? How am I going to handle it? Right?
I’ll use an example, with the time blocking that I was talking about earlier. I talked about what happens if you get to a time block, and you just don’t feel like doing anything. Maybe you’re super, super tired, your resources are low, you didn’t sleep well the night before. What do you do? Now, if you want to get something done, like what I have on my worksheet this very week, is what I recommended to you is to do five minutes, do just be willing to do five minutes a day of deep work and let that be enough. Let that be enough to start, right.
And if I sit down and take the first step, and then don’t want to take a second, then that’s okay. But at least I know that I sat down to do it, I didn’t just abdicate it. So that’s for empowerment algorithms for energy, work, and love.
Next, I have a little section for time blocking for all the other things that I want to get done every single week, like this podcast, I’ve got the podcast, I’ve got a connection in the village. I’m, I want to write. And so I’ve got writing on there, I’ve got a book I’m working on, I want to record a video every week if I can, or not every week, but be working on videos, regularly, writing an article, writing my heart notes, and doing some of the programs and other communities that I’m engaged in. And each of those things gets blocked in my calendar. So my calendar looks crazy. And all of these things are color-coded energy, work, and love. And so my calendar looks crazy. But it’s actually not crazy. It’s really spacious and amazing, and super supportive.
Support
I’ll get a little bit more into that in a second. But next, I want to go into the next section on our Rishi journal, which is support. I believe it’s really important that we think through how we’re going to get tasks done.
And what I see happen all the time is that we sit down in a time block to do a specific task. And when we sit down to do it, we realize we’re not ready, or we don’t know how we think we can get way more done than we actually can. And it’s frustrating because if you sit down to record a video and you want to get a video done, but when you sit down to record the video, you don’t have an idea of what to record the video about.
That time block isn’t about recording a video, it’s about creating the topic, like outlining what you want the video to be, then you need a different time block for recording the video. And what happens is that we’ve got a one-time block to record a video, but we’re not prepared. So we use that to prepare but then we never reschedule another time to actually record the video and then we kind of lose interest in it. And we wonder why nothing ever gets done.
It’s really important to understand your support needs. When you sit down and have a time block to do a task you must be ready to take action immediately in the task. And if you’re not ready to immediately take action then you need a separate scheduled time to do whatever you need to do to get ready.
I promise you this is like been one of the most revolutionary things in my life in my productivity is if you can really understand what’s required so that you’re ready to take action and when it’s time to take action you do and plus oh my god it’s so much easier to actually take action when you know exactly the action to take. It’s amazing. This will change your life.
I rarely promise things but I just this is such a big deal. Be ready to take action. Don’t think that you can do you can get all the support you need to take action and take action in the same amount of time. That’s not how it works. Do everything you need to get ready. And then when it’s time to take action. Go get it to remarkable.
So that’s the next thing I have on my Archie journal is a section for support, what support Do I need in order to be ready to take my zesty behaviors when it’s time.
You are worthy
And then lastly, on my Monday, our Rishi journal is a section that I call you’re worthy of having your needs. To match more deeply and in this section, I identify three feelings that I’m experiencing.
And I’ve got a feelings and needs workbook that I open up, even though I wrote the workbook, I still open it up because it can be really difficult sometimes to really clearly identify three emotions that are alive in me.
And so the variety of feeling words that are shared in the workbook is really helpful for me, to be really specific in the kind of feelings I’m having. So write down the three feelings, feelings, points towards our needs, the reason we have feelings is that needs either are or are not being met. And so I map the feelings to needs and I’ve got 123 needs.
And, again, I use the workbook to identify the needs super, super helpful. And then based on the needs that I have, I have a section for one, two, and three strategies to get my needs met more deeply.
Now, if I’m having positive feelings, that doesn’t mean that usually means that means needs are being met. But what needs do I have? Or what needs are being met? And what can I do to make sure that those needs continue to be met, right?
If we’re having negative emotions, or what we call negative emotions, or uncomfortable emotions are more accurate words. That means that needs are not being met, usually. And so we want to identify those needs that are not being met, and then a strategy that will help us to get that need met. And then I have another checkbox for time blocking deep needs.
So all the strategies that I identified to get my needs met, wouldn’t it be bonkers if I didn’t actually intentionally schedule a time to go make sure that that stuff happened? Like, it’s great to be aware of it, but I’m not going to do anything with it, then what’s the point? So I also time block that to make sure that I get my needs met? Because then if you get your needs met, oh my god, what’s that going to be like?
Possibility
And that’s the next section on the RBC journal, which is a possibility. The question is what’s possible for you when your needs are met more deeply? How does this shift your energy, who you’re able to be, what you can accomplish in your work, and in relationships, and I write out if my needs are met? I’m able to have positive, what feels like positive or comfortable, and invigorating emotions around that, what would that do for my week. And I envision that, and I write that out. And it’s remarkable. It’s very compelling. It’s very compelling. And I’ve never seen that done anywhere else.
And so that’s my Monday, our rashie journal takes about an hour and a half for me to do. It’s a beautiful, amazing exercise.
Then on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, I’ve got a much, much much reduced, there are like nine boxes that I fill out one word each. And it’s super, super simple, takes five minutes. So super easy.
And because I’ve done all this work on Monday, my whole week is really already outlined. And then Friday takes half an hour because I’ve got some other review things in there looking back at my previous week. So it’s really, really beautiful.
4. Use Google Calendar
Just as a side point, I use Google Calendar. So when I do all my time blocking everything is in Google calendar with different colors, matching energy work, and love buckets. And if something goes over time, or you know, I have a call that I wasn’t expecting or something in it, and it overrides some of the other time blocks that I have. I will move those time blocks to Saturday, not I don’t work on Saturday, I just move them there as a parking lot. And then I rebook them and I drag them around into a different place.
Usually, my Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday are pretty full and Thursday and Friday are much less full. And what I find is that because nothing goes according to plan, nothing goes according to plan. I ended up moving, the things that didn’t get done over to Thursday and Friday. And by the end of the week, everything got done. It’s really quite remarkable. I think I’ve said that 1000 times I’ll stop saying that now.
Alright, so those are some ideas. If you’d like to learn in detail, the aarushi journaling process, you’re welcome to join us in the village. Again, that’s actualinfinity.com/village.
And we’ll be going through that as well as an annual review process that I’ve used for many, many years. We’ll be teaching that in December, as well.
So those are some of those ideas so that we can manage our time and manage our Energy Manager work and manage our relationships with law.
I hope that some of this has been helpful. I hope that it helps you to experience more love, not less in all ways, and to remember that love even with productivity and time management is all ways the answer.
I look forward to speaking with you next time. Thanks so much. Bye for now. Bye for now. Bye for now. Bye for now. 💜
