It seems like forever since we last met, and it has been! My last article published on March 18th – since then I’ve led my first solo Roll Model Method Teacher Training, held multiple workshops around SoCal, officially launched my new brand AE Wellness, and oh yeah, GOT MARRIED!
If there’s anything I’ve learned in the last 5 months, it is the artful skill of time management, organization, and being willing to let things go. At some point (about mid March) I realized there was no way I was going to be all things to all people in the way I wanted. I let some things go, and it was OK!
you, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection -BUDDHA.
This quote could not ring more true currently. How many times have you put the needs of others of your own? Just like the airlines tell you, always put your oxygen mask on first, because you are no help to anyone if you are passed out.
Much of my success I attribute to the organization of the planner I’ve been using this year, the Passion Planner. I’ve written about it before, but honestly have so much gratitude for getting my shiz together this year. I’m confident I’d be bald and angry if I hadn’t. Now, regardless of if you are list making person or not, there is something quite helpful about getting ideas OUT of your brain and on to paper. I don’t pretend I can remember anything (honestly, I have the memory recall of a gnat) and so as soon as I think of something, I write it down. Instead of fifty billion Post-Its with my ideas literally and figuratively floating around, I now have them organized into one place.
What I love most about the Passion Planner is that is also asks questions that allow you to reflect on the good that happened. You do this during the week (there’s a space to write down good stuff that happened that you want to remember) and at the end of the month, which questions such as “What were the three biggest lessons you learned in this past month?” “What or who are you especially grateful for this past month?”. I really appreciate that the questions get me thinking about the prior month and what I want to improve upon for the coming month. Sometimes, it’s as simple as “get more sleep”.
Writing down the good stuff that happens each week helps me to also remember at the end of the month all the cool stuff that happened! You can bet your bottom dollar that at the end of July (the month I got married) there were a lot of things to reflect on and be grateful for ☺
I used to let the Post-It notes stress me out – there wasn’t any priority of which task needed to be done first, and as soon as I finished them, I threw the note out. This left me with no frame of reference of what I’d done or what still needed to be done. I couldn’t remember anything! Now, I am able to flip back a few pages and see what’s already been completed, or flip forward a few weeks and write down tasks and goals when I know I’ll actually have time to complete them. Many of my personal tasks, like making fliers for my upcoming workshops (which you should check out ehre) happened the week after the wedding, because there was no way I would be getting to them before the wedding. They just weren’t a priority!
So, if you’re up to your eyeballs in tasks and stress and you’re not sure how you’re going to manage things – get a planner. I prefer one that has the entire week spread out so I can organize my to do lists and thoughts over the week. If you don’t finish something one week, no worries as you can just move it to the next. I can honestly say that staying organized and on task allowed me to not only have the perfect fairytale wedding of my dreams, but also let me LET GO on the day. Everything went according to plan and I didn’t’ have to worry about it, because I had already handled it ;)
How do you stay organized? Are you a Post-It type of person or do you use some secret ninja planner/tool that we all need to know about? Let me know down in the comments what you do to stay on task and sane.