No. Nope. No thanks. Not at this time. Nuh-uh. Nah. Sorry, but no.
Margin
Counterfeit Rest vs True Rest
Whenever you set out to make change or embark on a bold venture, there will be resistance.
One area of resistance that comes against our efforts to live a focused life is what I call “Counterfeit Rest”.
When you have rested, you ought to be recharged and have more energy.
Thus, try to find restful activities that give you energy rather than things that drain your energy.
When I teach about this in The Focus Course, we make note of the fact that true rest usually requires a little bit of effort (i.e. reading a book, cooking a meal, taking a walk…)
Where have you created false urgency?
A while back, my pal, David Sparks, wrote about getting trapped inside a cycle of “false urgency”.
And so David began asking himself this regular question:
“Where have I created false urgency?”
I spent years working as a marketing director for a large organization, and the overwhelming cultural vibe was based on urgency: Everything was urgent all the time. We were constantly changing directions, doing new things, and reacting to whatever urgent issue was arising.
When I quit that job and began working for myself, it took me years to detox from that urgency mindset.
Even in my work and life, I felt that if something was’t urgent, then it wasn’t even important. And so, as a result, I would often neglect any task or area of life that didn’t have an urgent and pressing matter.
This urgency mindset creates a HUGE dilemma!
When we have an overwhelming urgency mindset, it blurs the lines between that which is actually important and that which is not. Everything begins to feel important all the time… and that, in turn, creates a lot of anxiety, stress, and worry that otherwise need not exist.
In the Focus Course, we have a whole section of our training dedicated specifically to this exact issue because it is so common and so difficult to get out of.
One of the ways we help folks overcome an urgency mindset is by helping them to (1) identify the important work and then (2) celebrate that work.
This simple cycle of identify <> celebrate can slowly re-train your brain to value (and even seek out) non-urgent tasks and activities. The result is less stress along with more motivation to work on long-term important areas.
If you’re curious where you land regarding urgency, we created an Urgency Assessment that you can take for free. It’s completely anonymous and works great to give you a baseline.
DND until Lunch
Between 6am and noon is arguably my most precious / important / valuable time of the day for getting things done.
That’s why I keep all of my devices in Do Not Disturb until noon.
This way I am free from any and all notifications, pings, buzzes, until the morning is over and it’s time for a lunch break.
How to (mostly) eliminate busywork and procrastination →
If you’d like to get a little more organized and focused in your life, then check this out…
Next week I’m teaching a free, one-hour class that goes behind the scenes with my two personal productivity frameworks.
This is great even for folks who hate productivity and organization. (Seriously!)
When I taught this class about 6 weeks ago, it had the most registrations of any workshop we’ve hosted before.
You don’t want to miss this.
What we’ll cover at the workshop
- How to eliminate 90% of the busywork, urgency, and procrastination from your week.
- How to get more breathing room in your schedule (even if it feels impossible).
- How everyone in my company is able to take off two months (paid) every year.
- Our two productivity frameworks: The 5 Components of a Focused Life and the 4-Focus Method
- BONUS: Free “Productivity Flywheel” cheat sheet.
- BONUS: Productivity Templates: Get a free copy of our daily, weekly, monthly planning templates.
? RSVP here for your link to join us live (or to get replay access).
Hello, Sabbatical Week!
As you may know, here at Blanc Media we work in 8-week cycles.
But, for this current work cycle we did something new to us.
We staggered our sabbatical week.
Why? Well, I just opened the doors for the all-new Focus Accelerator membership (you can join here). And everyone who joins gets a free strategy call with us to help get personalized support right off the bat.
In order to accommodate the calls, Joanna and Chloe just took their sabbatical week while Isaac and I did all the calls. And next week, Isaac and I will take our sabbatical while Joanna and Chloe do the calls.
(Side note, tor my sabbatical, I’m taking my family to Colorado. If you want to see some pictures of the Rocky Mountains, follow me on Instagram.)
The Focus Accelerator (Finally!) →
Hooray! We just recently announced the all-new Focus Accelerator membership. It’s amazing and I think you would love being part.
In short, Focus Accelerator is your all-access pass to every single course and tool in our library, plus a community to help you get clear, take action, and keep going.
The rundown is that you get:
- Unlimited access to every course in our library
- Monthly coaching, workshops, and Q&A with our team
- Accountability and breakthrough with the community
(Full details all listed here.)
This is something we’ve been working on for the past 18 months… It’s finally out there and the response has been beyond what we expected. I hope you’ll come join us.
Alternative Ways to Spend 5 Minutes of Awkward Downtime
Many times, when met with small windows of “awkward downtime”, we decide to just pull out our smart phone and scroll.
Here are a few ways alternative ways you can spend those 5 – 10 minutes…
- If you Use Day One, scroll through your Day One timeline and read a previous journal entry.
- Browse some old photos and memories.
- Launch Day One (or any other journal you have) and log how you’ve spent your time so far for the day. Doing this for a few weeks can also be super helpful for getting a perspective of where your time and energy are being spent.
- Write down 3 new ideas. These could be articles you want to write, business ideas, places you want to visit or photograph, topics you want to research, date ideas for you and your spouse, gift ideas for a friend, etc. These ideas never have to to be acted on — the point isn’t to generate a to-do list, but rather to exercise your mind. Ideation and creativity are muscles, and the more we exercise them the stronger they get.
- Send a text message to a friend or family member to tell them how awesome they are.
- Stand up and do some stretching / body movement.
Have some ideas of your own? Send them my way on Twitter (@shawnblanc)
Burnout: Modern Affliction or Human Condition →
An excellent article by Jill Lepore for The New Yorker regarding burnout:
To be burned out is to be used up, like a battery so depleted that it can’t be recharged. In people, unlike batteries, it is said to produce the defining symptoms of ‘burnout syndrome’: exhaustion, cynicism, and loss of efficacy. Around the world, three out of five workers say they’re burned out.
Don’t stress the fuzzy, outer edges of life and projects
You won’t ever make all the edges of your life smooth and finished.
Even as we grow and mature in our life, the edges also get pushed out and they remain fuzzy. Don’t worry about “fixing” those outer edges — they will always be there. Instead focus on the center and on the core — the things that truly matter — and focus on making those stronger and better.
The $20/20 rule for getting rid of your stuff
When we moved into our house about 6 years ago, we re-finished the storage room and turned into a home office.
And so, well, let’s just say we don’t have very much space for storage. But that’s fine because it forces us to only keep the things we love and/or use regularly.
A guideline that I picked up a few years ago is the idea of this rule $20 and 20 minutes.
This is for those things own, and you’re holding on to “just in case” you might need it someday…
If you’re not sure if it’s something that you may need again one day, consider if it is something you could replace for less than $20 and in less than 20 minutes. If it’s easily replaced, just get rid of it now because for all you know, you will never need it again anyway.
What it means to be “coasting” in life
Coasting in life means you are not taking action.
And, thus, you are, by nature:
- Going downhill;
- living off the momentum of your past effort; or
- being pulled / pushed along by someone else.
A Return to Analog →
“For me, one of the signs of health in emotional margin is how much I’m writing in my notebook each week. If pages begin to stack up without any notes, ideation, or doodling, it’s a sign that I’m not slowing down enough to think on paper.”
Great article by Isaac this week on The Focus Course blog about the draw to return to analog tools.
It takes effort to say YES (but YES is the whole point)
A lot of productivity and time management advice includes all the things you should not do.
- Don’t sleep in.
- Don’t use your phone in the morning.
- Don’t check email before lunchtime.
- Don’t binge watch Netflix late into the night.
- Don’t have social media on your phone, etc…
- Don’t leave any emails in your inbox.
- Don’t sleep with your phone in the room.
Why is so much productivity advice about what NOT to do?
The choices you make about your time and focus should be about what you are saying YES to.
The problem is that it is a lot harder to figure out what you want.
It’s far easier (and more dramatic) to focus on what to avoid than it is to take the time to figure out what to embrace.
In fact, the whole reason we are saying NO to some of those things is so that we can actually say YES to what we really want to do.
I am not going to check my email before lunch because I would rather spend that time writing.
Having a long list of things you don’t do will not make you productive.
What do you do in the time you’ve created for yourself? What do you choose to say YES to? Saying YES to the right thing is what makes you productive.
No is easy. Yes requires focus.