How to be More Productive

Wondering how to be more productive as a busy mama? Craving simplicity in your day to day life? Here are my top 5 tips on how to be more productive.

IS THERE AN EASY WAY TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE?

Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed by the busyness of life? Do you long for downtime but feel like if you stop even for a moment, that all of the things that need done won’t get done?

If this is you, I can relate. Juggling all of the responsibilities that comes from being a mother on top of normal life and work responsibilities is a lot for anyone. But lately, I’ve been focusing on creating more SPACE in my life. Space to breath, space to pause. Space to enjoy the small moments. And the funny thing is, that the more SPACE I create in my life, the more productive I become.

So, if you how to be more productive effortlessly, read on. I’m going to share what I have learned and how it has changed my life for the better.

HOW CREATING SPACE ALLOWS OUR LIVES TO BE MORE  PRODUCTIVE

In art, negative space -or white space as it is sometimes called- is vitally important to design. White space is the empty area on a canvas in a painting. It’s the white part of the paper in an artistic magazine layout. It’s those moments of minimal movement and stillness in a dance performance, or the pause before the final crescendo in a piece of music. The intent of this empty space is to draw your focus to what is important, to draw out the potency within the action. It creates a counterpart and contrast to the busyness and enhances it energetically.

Just as quality art is intentionally designed with empty space, so should our lives be.

To consciously design a quality life, we must approach as a piece of fine art work. We must give as much (or more) thought and intention to the STILLNESS as we do the busyness.

If you’re a mother, it’s especially important that you create space. Because space creates those extra moments where you can steal some time for yourself to renew and recharge. It creates the opportunity to do those things for yourself that rejuvenate you and leave you better able to offer your best to your family. Empty space will allow those moments of connection with your children and your spouse, and more joy in the small moments.

Space allows peace. Peace allows so many good things. Creativity. Possibility. And thought it may sound counter intuitive at first, space even allows…productivity.

Here are my top 5 tips for creating space and allowing productivity in your life:

 

5 TIPS ON HOW TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE

1. Reduce and Simplify Belongings

Owning a lot of things can create clutter, which will in turn clutter our mind and reduce our productivity throughout the day. Make it a priority to minimize the stuff you own. Here are a few ideas to help you get started:

• Create small challenges for yourself. For example, I try to commit to getting rid of one large garbage bag of un-needed items per week. Usually I’ll donate them to a local resell shop or re-home items to friends and family. Or, maybe you would do better getting rid of one item per day, or 4 bags per month. It’s up to you, and really just depends on what you would be most likely to stick with.
• When you bring a new item into your home, get rid of 2 items that you no longer need. This especially applies to clothes and toys.
• If you’re feeling ambitious and ready to go hard core, then start going though your home one room/closet/area at a time. Pull out EVERYTHING, but only put back your ABSOLUTE favorite things, or the items you truly need. Get rid of anything that is broken, no longer needed or just plain stresses you out. Anything that doesn’t fall into these two categories, or that you feel unsure about, BOX UP AND PUT IT AWAY FOR 6 MONTHS. In six months, go through the boxes with fresh eyes, and donate anything you haven’t missed. Repeat this process seasonally.

Minimizing our physical belongings not only creates space for things that we really need and want, but also creates more space in our minds so that we aren’t subconsciously weighed down by mentally juggling all of our things.

2. Create a Capsule Wardrobe

Decision anxiety is a real thing, and one of my personal struggles. Making decisions STRESSES ME OUT, and so the fewer decisions I have to make in my every day life, the better.

Finding something to wear one of the hardest things for me, and triggers severe decision anxiety and frustration. However, I have found that having a minimalist, capsule style wardrobe reduces my decision anxiety DRASTICALLY.

Finding pieces that you truly love and fit well is key. Equally important is quickly getting rid of the items that you no longer need or like…don’t hold on to stuff thinking “but I might wear it SOMEDAY”.

With a capsule wardrobe, you want all of your items to be interchangeable and to match with everything else. This makes getting ready in the mornings stress free and requires very little thought or decision making, freeing up SPACE in your mind for other, more important things.

3. Be Ok with Boredom

I remember being bored a lot as a kid. If I complained, my mom would say “being bored is good for you. It makes you creative”. I remember getting so frustrated at her when she said that, but now I recognize the deep wisdom in her words.

As an adult, I think that life can sometimes get so busy that we forget what boredom even feels like. If you can’t remember the last time you felt bored, take this as a sign that it’s time to slow down. Because it’s in those moments of mind numbing boredom that the space is created for the most magical things to happen.

Boredom gives your brain freedom from stress. And when you release that stress, you’ll find yourself in a creative space where ideas and inspiration flow spontaneously. You’ll find yourself doing things you haven’t done in a long time, and that you forgot you loved doing.

When you create the space through allowing yourself to be bored, better and beautiful things quickly fill it.

If you are struggling to create mental space for yourself, my post Meditation Tips for Busy Moms might help you.

4. Set Boundaries

If life is too frantic and busy to allow yourself the time to be bored, then it is time to set some limit. Limits for both yourself and others. This is going to be a little different for everyone, depending on your situation, but here are some basic tips to help you get started:

• Don’t be afraid to say no to anything that is not a priority
• Say no to things that move you away-not toward- your dreams and goals
• Ask for help. And don’t be afraid to ask for help BEFORE you desperately need it
• Take time off. Turn off your phone. Take a long weekend. Or just an evening to yourself

Remember that your kids are watching and will mimic how we treat ourselves and allow others to treat us. No only will they learn from watching us how to be more productive in their own lives, but by setting boundaries that improve our quality of living, we are showing our children by example how to live a healthy and joyful life.

5. Brain Dump. Often and Frequently

This is my personal recent favorite strategy. I find that I so easily start cycling to-do lists through my mind, and this is the best way I have found to minimize that.

First, get a blank piece of paper or journal and a pen. Then, write down EVERY SINGLE task, goal, to-do, appointment and anything else you need to remember that comes to mind. Don’t make it pretty. Don’t worry if it seems too small or mundane to write down. DUMP IT ALL ON THAT PAPER!

Then, after you’ve scribbled it all down, you can go through and organize it in a way that creates SPACE for your brain to relax.

You can do this any way you like to, but here’s how I usually do it:

1. First, I cross off that of the things that aren’t really important and I can say no to.
2. Then, I list things out in order of importance and urgency. Anything that has a time deadline usually goes toward the top of the list. If it’s something that I want or need to get done sometime in the following weeks, I put that in a different grouping.
3. After that, group things by similarity. For example:

• Errands
• Cleaning
• Work stuff

Then, I start at the top, focus on that one task and don’t think about the others or what I’ll do next. When I finish the first item, I look at my list and move on to the next. If any other tasks or to-do’s pop into my head during the day, I quickly “dump” it onto the list.

I hope these tips for how to be more productive helps you the way they have helped me.

Remember. Don’t be afraid of stillness. Allow space.