What do you look for?

What do you look for?

Seems like a simple enough question, but there are so many different directions to go with that question and the answers would not be at all similar.

For example:

Q: What do you look for in a home?
A: I look for enough space for our rather large family, yard space for the monkeys to play, a well-run/well-rated school system, and a safe location.

Those answers would not make as much sense if I said "What do you look for in a work space?".

But what happens when your home becomes your work space? Things overlap. You get distracted. There is school work, with business work, with paper work, with receipts...add to that children's toys, headbands, junk mail, bills, and some photos and you have a pretty good summary of what my desk usually (and currently) looks like.

When your work space is cluttered, you allow your thoughts to clutter your brain "work space" if you will. This is how we, as work-at-home parents, end up with 2700 different half done projects (yes, this is even true for the multi-tasking mommas...sorry ladies. I'm right there with ya but...we have to be honest with ourselves.) This is how our day (okay, morning) ends up looking something like this:

Wake up
Boil water for coffee
Make breakfast for kids
"Sit on your bum in the chair please"
Get drinks for the kids
"PLEASE sit down"
Continue making breakfast
"Get off the table, please"
Reply to customer email
Notice notifications from Facebook during response to email and check Facebook
See something cool on Pinterest
Realize that you have no idea what to make for dinner
Sit down to try and meal plan (who are you kidding...just trying to plan A meal)
"Mom! Peanut spilled her drink and it's all over her!"
Get towels to clean up spill
Realize that the water for coffee has been boiling for a while
Make coffee
Make a mental note to make a slideshow about your super cool coffee hack (coming soon)
Text that friend that you have been meaning to set a coffee date up with
Check calendars for school events, meetings, and deadlines for the business
"Would you PLEASE put your clothes on!"
Realize that you haven't had a chance to get out of pajamas yourself
Listen to monkeys screaming like banshees while you get "dressed" in 6.5 seconds

   

You get the idea. That's a pretty normal morning around here. Overwhelming. (And yet, I love every minute.)

Your business should not overwhelm you. Your business should be your passion. Unfortunately though, even passionate business owners (and parents) can get burnt out. Neither one makes for a happy person.

To be honest, the clutter in my brain was making it so that the 2700 half-done projects were from home, work, and play. By the time my monkeys went to bed I felt like I worked all day and got absolutely nothing done. It was like being on a hamster wheel. I was tired.

I was perusing Facebook looking for more marketing opportunities to advertise The Monkey's Treehouse, and a sponsored ad came up for a business enrichment opportunity: Fired Up and Focused: 21 Day Challenge run by the lovely Racheal Baxter Cook. I clicked. I read. I joined...almost immediately. Now, I'm only on Day 2, and already I am more productive. Obviously these glorious 2 days has not been enough to show me a financial gain from this productivity and I still have quite a ways to go...but let me say, these last 2 days have been less overwhelming and more productive. Today's exercise was especially helpful in de-cluttering my brain.

It's called a brain dump. Try it. Grab a paper and pen/pencil. Set a timer for 15 minutes. Spend 15 minutes writing EVERYTHING you need to do. No matter how big or small it is; whether it's for business or pleasure, home or work...write it all down. When the timer goes off, take a couple minutes to write down anything else in your brain that needs to get done. Once it is all on paper, you can prioritize what is Urgent and Important (you want to eventually get to a point that this list is minimal), what is Urgent and Not-Important (necessary but you want to systematize these as soon as possible), Not-Urgent but Important (this is where most of your tasks should lie...this is where you will be most productive), and Not-Urgent and Not-Important (if nothing bad will happen by getting rid of these tasks...do that. Because quite frankly we all have enough to deal with daily.)

Now this brain dump was part of a business exercise, but what if you applied it to your life? If you were less overwhelmed and less cluttered, would you be less stressed? More able to focus on relationships with loved ones? Less anxious that not everything will get done? What have you got to lose? Besides loads of stress, of course.

This week, try and "dump your brain" at least once. Pay attention to how you feel before and in the days following.

I have been looking for calm, for clarity, for peace of mind. I believe that organizing life like this can get me there.

The question is, what do YOU look for?

(Image of monkeys on the bed courtesy of: www.clipartsheep.com)