Hi everyone!
Sorry about the silence. Things have been very busy here lately!
There will be changes coming to the site. We are having some design work done, so soon you will have new things to look at here.
In the meantime … I have been working on some really interesting situations. Don’t ever think that your particular needs are unusual, because I’m sure I’ve met up with just about everything you could possibly think of 
Scribble down some notes on what you’re thinking about, and give me a call. You know where to find the number on the site!
The new twins are doing well. We went down to see them yesterday. They were asleep for most of the time though … I had forgotten how small new babies are. They slept peacefully in their double pram, both covered in matching blankets that Mum knitted for them. My sister is looking very composed and relaxed for someone who had five children and jazz ballet exams in a town over 100k’s away in the weekend …
Christmas is coming. I can’t believe it! We have Christmas parties to go to already, so someone is organised out there
Is all your planning done? and if you leave a comment telling me all your Christmas shopping is done …. no, mine isn’t either! Consider me your personal Christmas wake-up call …
There’s always something more interesting to do than writing a report, cleaning the bathroom, doing your GST or working overtime.
There’s always someone online searching for ways to motivate themselves to do the boring, the nasty, and the just plain old horrible jobs that they don’t want to.
What bores me might fascinate you, but that’s not the point!
1. Set yourself 15 minutes to work really hard on the boring job. Tell yourself you only have to do 15 minutes then you’re allowed to stop. Chances are you’ll be on a roll and will get a lot more achieved than you originally thought.
2. Get some company. It might be someone to come with you on the daily walk you know you should be doing. It might be a trainer once a week at the gym. It might be a mentor, or a coach, or your sister. Company makes things easier and you can both complain about the boring job at the same time
3. Write about what’s going on. You can do this in a Word document and stash it somewhere secret on your hard drive. Or you can buy a gorgeous blank notebook and use that. But write about it – all the benefits of it, why it will make your life easier, why it might get you more money.
4. Don’t bite off more than you can chew. Don’t be tempted to agree to a deadline you know will be impossible. Negotiate some extra time so you can do a really good job. When you finish earlier you’ll be proud of yourself, and the other stakeholders will be impressed
5. Break boring things into smaller tasks. It’s all very well to say ‘this house is a tip, I want it clean by tomorrow’. Come on, you know that’s not going to happen. Start with the area that annoys you the most. Start with the front entrance, or the kitchen. Start with your bedroom so you have somewhere nice to retreat to at the end of the day.
6. If you’re writing the boring report I mentioned earlier – or any piece of writing there are several tricks you can use. Firstly, look carefully at what is required. Don’t go off on tangents, stick to the subject. Less work, less stress and much more professional. Begin your document by working out a topic sentence for each part you need to address. Topic sentences are the beginnings of paragraphs, and they usually are an overview of what the paragraph will be about. This way you organise your thoughts, your document will be well organised, and you won’t forget to include essential points.
You can also turn your monitor light right down, and use a stream of consciousness method. You will obviously not be able to see what you’ve typed, and this will get the creativity going. This method will not give you a finished product, but if you type all your ideas completely randomly you will be able to organise them later into the broad idea of your document. This method will sometimes bring out points you hadn’t planned on adding, which can be interesting and useful for another perspective.
Don’t plan on perfection for the first draft. No one ever gets perfection the first time. Use the 15 minute method and just TYPE!
7. Make yourself a chart As I said before, break your goal down into parts, and give yourself a tick every time you complete a part. This will also help you sort out the specifics of what needs doing. You will be able to see at a glance where you are and what you need to work on next.
8. Ask for help if you’re stuck. It is much better to ask for help before a deadline, than to sheepishly admit that something hasn’t been done.
9. Think about your efficiency. If you’re trying to complete a task in a noisy room, or while kids are running around, or while the rest of the office is having Friday afternoon drinks – STOP. Think about what you need to work effectively and make sure you get it. Look at your timetable for the day and organise things to suit yourself as much as possible. You might need silence, or background noise, or a good supply of water. Make sure you get it.
10. Find a picture which illustrates your completed goal. If it’s a work thing you’re dealing with, focus on the pay rise, the holiday plans, the increased income. Even the compliment from your boss. If it’s a home thing, visualise the outcome. Look around online for your picture or even in magazines from your house. Make yourself a poster and put it somewhere you’ll see it every day. Look at it intently, focus on it, imagine yourself on a better path. Be determined to get there.
Because everyone deserves to have a happy life.
As we all know, life does not always give us what we want. The life we want requires effort, struggle, passion, frustration and that favorite word – motivation. You are improving yourself every time you struggle … it’s just hard to see sometimes. Think carefully about the big picture of how you want things to be, and the boring stuff won’t be so boring any more. It’s just one more step towards your goal.
Have you ever tried doing one of these?
You can use them for anything you like. They really help get your creativity going. They are great for people who visualise things in pictures, they are great for organising your thoughts, they are great for reminding yourself of things you’d possibly forgotten.
Use as many colours are you like. Scribble, use pictures instead of words, let yourself go off on tangents. You don’t have to finish it all at once, leave it for a while and come back to it.
Use mindmaps instead of notes for meetings, use them to find solutions to problems, use them to gather your ideas together.
Maybe I’ll do one and post it so you can see how messy my brain can get!
The truly peculiar thing about time management … is that there are 24 hours. Every day. No exceptions.
So why do some people get so much done? they write a chapter of their future best selling novel, they whip up a batch of scones for a fundraiser, they milk 400 cows twice a day, they deal with kids dropoffs and pickups, they have a sparkly floor, dinner isn’t late and they still get to watch some tv.
Other people are at work before everyone else, in a suit without any wrinkles. They have three meetings and a team breakfast, a meeting with their manager and their managers manager. They do lunch at that nice place in Ponsonby, then they clear up various emergencies while speaking nicely to clients on the phone. They drop off their dry cleaning, they go to the gym, they go out to dinner and then they walk the dog.
It makes me tired just typing it 
so what is the secret? we all get the 24 hours ….
and by the way I just had to do a tiny skite here, my idol sent me a text today to tell me I did 96% on my latest coaching exam
What colour is your house? where did you go to primary school? what sort of car do you drive?
Did you notice that while you were reading, the answers were in your mind almost immediately?
The strange thing about our minds is that they are always looking for the answers to questions. Throughout your life you are building such an immense store of knowledge, and it all cross checks with itself. The brain comes up with answers to support a question based on a variety of scenarios. Unfortunately, some of these are … somewhat biased.
So when you wake up in the morning and your first thought is why don’t I ever have enough time? your brain will come up with answers to that exact question.
I’m overloaded at work, there’s no hope of catching up. There aren’t enough hours in the day. I’m so busy I never have time for myself. I’m a working parent with three kids. If my flatmate/kids would only tidy up after themselves … I’m the only person who can get it done properly. No one else ever takes responsibility. I don’t have time to take a full hour for lunch. I haven’t got time ….
see how it works?
You’re dooming yourself to a horrible day before you even get out of bed.
Try Why do I always have enough time to do what I want?
It’s such a little thing but it is so powerful. The thing is, you won’t believe it until you try it.
Have a lovely Wednesday – it is 6.00am and the rain is beating down on the roof. Gusts of wind. But both the cats are inside and I have lots of things to do, the garden will grow and while it’s raining so hard it can’t be freezing cold, so hey
Hi there, did you miss me?
Back from Auckland now, it was lots of fun up there. I met some people I really liked, and caught up on some things that needed doing as well. Now I am at home sorting through debris from my old job and preparing for an upgrade to our office systems. This will happen on Monday and it is really exciting!
So anyway I am close by and you can find me on yahoo messenger: coachdawn_newzealand
Talk to you soon!
Filed under: Organisation
Here’s a list of useful stuff I think everyone should have …
- a cellphone that does bluetooth so you can drive hands free. Why end up dead for the sake of a few dollars?
- a tape measure – preferably one that’s put back in the same place each time.
- a hammer.
- a stepladder. I never realised how useful these were until the Man About the House bought one.
- a Leatherman. Mine lives in my handbag, and it’s been used for so many bizarre things …
- a laptop computer. Makes work seem so much easier and you can work wherever you like!
- some sort of alarm on your cellphone (I’m assuming you carry a cellphone). Set it to remind you of things that slip your mind – when to get up (grin), five minutes before a meeting, all that.
- a really good set of kitchen knives, not the lightweight ones, but good solid steel. Preferably with a strong set of scissors.
- a Palm, or at the very least a notebook that stays in your bag, with pen attached. Get into the habit of writing things down, even if you’re sure you’ll remember. One of the first symptoms of stress is forgetting the silly things, let alone phone numbers and appointments.
- sunglasses – avoid headaches and eyestrain. Not to mention the long term effects on your eyesight.
- rechargable batteries and a battery recharger. I hate buying batteries.
- a small plastic bag containing the following – a few sticking plasters, a couple of panadeine, a couple of twist ties, a spare blister pack of medications you might be taking, girl essential things if you happen to be a girl, an emergency ten dollar note, a couple of rubber bands. Throw it in your handbag where it’s easy to get to.
- speaking of handbags (sorry guys!) make sure your everyday bag is serving your needs. I have one that’s distressed leather and *beautiful* but it’s too deep. Things go in there and vanish, never to be seen again. If you’re constantly scrabbling around in your bag, can’t find the things you need, and it’s driving you crazy look around for something more suited to your needs. Life is too short to lose stuff in a stupid bag. Or maybe wear cargo pants
Came back to add just two more things. Hand sanitizer. You can get it from the chemists in little bottles suitable for stashing when you’re out and about. Let’s face it, the everyday germs in your own house won’t hurt you – it’s the ‘foreign’ ones when you’re out that might do the damage. I work in a school. Believe me, those places are a hive of bacteria, and this stuff is great! The second thing is dental floss. It works for really strong sewing thread in an emergency, and it saves you from those social gaffes of having grotesque green things stuck in your teeth at inopportune moments!
You know, I used to think that having a housekeeper would be *absolutely brilliant*. I thought that it would solve all those mess problems, I’d never have to stress, or clean anything, and my house would always be perfect.
It didn’t turn out like that.
A few years ago I was under a lot of pressure at work, and I was going from one stressful situation to another. I was drained, quite frankly. So I found a housekeeper, thinking that this would be a great solution. I imagined coming home from a hard day at work to find a shining home, all warm and with everything organised, so I could just flop down in a heap with not a care in the world. There were only a few light jobs I asked her to do, and she agreed to mind the kids as well.
Well I will never know how the housekeeper managed to avoid being electrocuted when she spilled a bucket of water over the carpet – and tried to vacuum it up.
There were a few incidents like this. But what finally made my mind up?
I came home after a day of work, and a late meeting which involved a lot of decision making and a lot of pressure. I pulled into the driveway and noticed that all the lights were ablaze. I went in, to find the housekeeper sitting comfortably at the table reading a magazine. Not a sign of my kids. I questioned her and found that they were ‘out’. She had no idea where and didn’t know when they were coming back.
I panicked.
My kids, at the time, were ten and eight. It was almost dark.
Turns out the son had gone off on his bike to visit my great aunt and uncle, who lived a few streets away. They were in their nineties, and probably didn’t really appreciate a late visit. They had their dinner early, so would’ve been getting ready for bed when boy-on-a-bicycle turned up. The daughter didn’t want to be left behind, so she followed.
Meanwhile the housekeeper was making the most of a chance to put her feet up.
That was the last time she minded my kids.
So after that I decided that I needed to look at things in a different way. I’ve tried a few different systems, and the worst one was not expecting the kids to help. I found that they began to take things for granted, and their view of my role was skewed, to say the very least. So now here is what I do. I don’t look at housework as being drudgery. I really appreciate all the hard work that goes into paying the mortgage, and I am lucky to have somewhere to live that I like. Our house is small, but it is comfortable and it has lots of potential. It is also in a really good situation. Everything is handy to us, and we have room to expand if we decide to. I also like the house to be at its best, because I hate drama and mess and people running around looking for things. I like a peaceful atmosphere, and I like everyone to have some ownership of our home which does not happen when Mum is being the drudge and everyone else is relaxing wondering out loud what’s for dinner? And are my PE clothes ready for tomorrow? And where is my library book?
The easiest way I have found, is to use my Palm.
These things are a necessity, in my opinion. You can also at a pinch use an online calendar. You need something that is foolproof and easy to set up. Add all the birthdays, the sports practices, the days people will be home late. Everything that has a set time. Even add in peoples work hours.
Then you look at what needs doing in your home, and you share it out. You see who has what after school, and you add in their homework times, and then you share the jobs out so everyone has their activities. If you want your kids to put out the recycling, you can add a reminder to get it organised the night before. You can make it repeat on that day of the week. As you know I have a shower-fanatic in my house, so I have alternated days that the fanatic gets first shower. Person with the second shower gets to clean the bathroom. It is working out fantastically well. It also means the ‘cleaning and tidying’ housework is spread out across the week and it’s not taking up all your Saturday morning. Your house will always be presentable and you’ll have more time and energy. It saves arguments about who cleaned what and whose turn it is next.
Try it and see what you think
ps I have heard there’s a Yahoo calendar that’s quite good … I’ll see if I can find a link.
As you all know by now, I’m generally fairly optimistic about life. I don’t walk around waiting for the sky to fall, or expecting awful things to happen on a daily basis. But I am amazed at how many people seem to live in a perpetual state of gloom!
I’m about to transition from a job I’ve had for six and a half years, to something new. It’s exciting, and I’m not worried about it at all. I’m looking forward to a change of environment, to meeting new people, to learning new skills. Even a different way of getting to work, possibly. But a couple of people have told me how nervous they would be, and wondered aloud if I’m doing the right thing, if I’m scared that it won’t work out?
Not at all. I can see they think I’m impossibly naïve. But I don’t want to spend time and energy worrying about something that’s going to happen. I think it’s all in my attitude. If you were at work, and a new person came in, would you be inclined to make their life any easier if they were scowling, grumpy, and gloomy about everything?
Nope, didn’t think so.
It is just as easy to imagine the best possible outcome, as it is to imagine doom and gloom. It might take a bit of practice – especially if you’ve been stuck in a negative mindset for a while.
Be prepared. You will be more prone to stress if your life is out of control, you can’t find your house key and the pantry is bare. Look at your organizational methods and see if there’s any tiny habit you can incorporate to make your life easier, and to make sure you’re prepared. It doesn’t have to be a huge step – just something small. I will give you a rather flippant sounding example! I usually keep the umbrellas hanging up in our garage, all ready to take in the car if I’m going out. Isn’t that organised? Isn’t that helpful? NO it certainly wasn’t. When I go to work in the morning I am not thinking about sensible things – I have a system for my laptop and my handbag, and somehow the umbrella got left along the way. So the other day the other half put the umbrella in the boot of the car.
Now, I never use an umbrella unless I’m at work, where I’m required to zoom between one building or another, or to be on duty. So keeping it in the car is the most sensible thing to do and doesn’t rely on me having the sense and foresight to grab it in the morning. It sounds like such a tiny thing, but I was so delighted to see it in the boot the other day when it was pouring and I was about to go on duty!
So if you think about things, and organise them in the ways that suit you, you’ll have less to stress about and more time to enjoy your life. Those little stupid things that crop up to annoy you will fade away.
Some more time and stress saving ideas, off the top of my head :
Keep a packet of baby wipes in the car for when people mess up (just the cheap ones in the big container are good).
Throw a sticking plaster or two in a spare pocket of your bag – good for blisters on heels or those savage paper cuts, lol.
If you’re taking medication keep a spare packet in your bag – if you forget in the morning you’ll still have some to take anyway.
Make sure you plug in your laptop when you’re working at home so the battery is charged when you go out – you won’t have to think about it.
Throw a couple of muesli bars in the bottom of your bag for days when you can’t get out for lunch.
Put a couple of those sticky hooks on the back of your kitchen cupboard, and *always* keep your keys there. They’re hidden from public view, but you always know where they are.
If you are given change when you’re out shopping, put it in the same pocket in the car every time, that way you’ll always have money for meters (unless you have kids like mine, who search the car for lolly money, grr).
Next time I’ll write about a cunning way I’ve found to get rid of housework …
I just have to make a point here, so bear with me. Normal transmission will be resumed tomorrow.
The way to keep people happy is NOT to force them into working 17 hours straight in a high stress environment, without even the chance to take a five minute break or have something to eat.
I don’t care if there is no one else that can do the job. I think it is terrible to take advantage of someone’s sense of responsibility like this. I think it is terrible that for months management has known that there is no one else who can fulfill this particular set of responsibilities, and yet they have done nothing about it.
I certainly would like to give you the name of this company, and a few more stories on the ways they fail their employees. In fact I am *itching* to.
Maybe tomorrow.
