Latest / Overwhelmed Working Woman: Boost Productivity, Master Time Management, Overcome Overwhelm & Stop People Pleasing / #79| How to Have Awesome Productivity and Get it All Done WITHOUT Overwhelm
Transcript
- 0:00Michelle Gauthier: Just imagine this next Friday afternoon and imagine that on that Friday afternoon you have completed everything that you needed to get done for the week.
- 0:08Michelle Gauthier: No last minute scrambling, no feeling overwhelmed or exhausted, just calm and satisfied that you got it all done.
- 0:15Michelle Gauthier: You're listening to Overwhelmed Working Woman, the podcast that helps you be more calm and more productive by doing less.
- 0:27Michelle Gauthier: I'm your host, ichelle Gothier, a former Overwhelmed Working Woman and current life coach.
- 0:32Michelle Gauthier: On this show, we unpack the stress and pressure that today's working woman experiences, and in each episode you'll get a strategy to bring more calm, ease and relaxation to your life.
- 0:44Michelle Gauthier: Hey friend, thanks for listening and joining today.
- 0:48Michelle Gauthier: I want to talk to you about how to get it all done without feeling overwhelmed.
- 0:54Michelle Gauthier: It's not a magic trick, it's just a strategy, and there are really just three simple steps that you need to take in order to be able to finish your week feeling totally accomplished and checking everything off your list.
- 1:07Michelle Gauthier: By the end of this episode, you'll know exactly how to do it.
- 1:10Michelle Gauthier: If you haven't planned your own week yet, maybe you've finished listening to this episode and you do it today.
- 1:16Michelle Gauthier: So last Friday I coached my last client of the day and I finished at about two o'clock in the afternoon and I looked back at my to-do list and my schedule for the week and I thought yep, good to go.
- 1:28Michelle Gauthier: I did it all.
- 1:29Michelle Gauthier: I got everything done that I wanted to do.
- 1:31Michelle Gauthier: I will tell you right now that that feeling is the best - to be able to finish the week and just know that you checked all of the boxes that you put out there for yourself.
- 1:41Michelle Gauthier: And also, I was feeling completely fine.
- 1:45Michelle Gauthier: I was not totally drained like I spent every last bit of my energy.
- 1:49Michelle Gauthier: I also don't miss at all that I used to have to work until 6, 7, 8 o'clock on a Friday night to get that feeling.
- 1:56Michelle Gauthier: It was 2 o'clock.
- 1:57Michelle Gauthier: I called it a day and I made a note to myself to record a podcast on this very feeling and exactly how you can get it too.
- 2:06Michelle Gauthier: So today I'm going to tell you about exactly what to do so that you can get everything done in a week and you can feel calm and productive throughout the week.
- 2:15Michelle Gauthier: First I'll teach you how to set the tone by deciding how you want to feel.
- 2:19Michelle Gauthier: Then I'll walk you through my weekly planning process using the calendar clean out method, which I describe also in episode 51.
- 2:27Michelle Gauthier: And then, finally, we'll talk about staying on track each day by sticking to your plan without overworking or adding in extra tasks.
- 2:36Michelle Gauthier: Okay, let's jump right in.
- 2:38Michelle Gauthier: So I'm going to tell you exactly how I planned my week this very week, and you can take that as an example for you.
- 2:46Michelle Gauthier: I've got lots of resources that you can use.
- 2:48Michelle Gauthier: There's a worksheet to go along with it if you want to use that to plan your week, but I'm going to give you all the details about how I planned this week, which is honestly the same as how I plan every week.
- 3:00Michelle Gauthier: The first thing that I think about is, how do I want to feel this week?
- 3:03Michelle Gauthier: I focus on the feeling and the intention before I even think about what it is that I have to do.
- 3:08Michelle Gauthier: So maybe one week I want to feel really energized.
- 3:12Michelle Gauthier: Maybe I want to feel really focused.
- 3:14Michelle Gauthier: Maybe I want to feel excited.
- 3:17Michelle Gauthier: This week I chose calm and productive, and I chose those because I knew there would be a lot to do, but I didn't want to feel frantic or overwhelmed.
- 3:27Michelle Gauthier: So just ask yourself - a step one, before you even start - what's the feeling that I want to carry through this week?
- 3:33Michelle Gauthier: And then we'll use that feeling to guide your decisions as you decide what to do when.
- 3:39Michelle Gauthier: Okay, now you're ready to create your schedule for the week.
- 3:44Michelle Gauthier: So, if you haven't already, you'll gather up everything you need.
- 3:48Michelle Gauthier: You need your to-do list.
- 3:49Michelle Gauthier: You need your calendar.
- 3:52Michelle Gauthier: If you have a separate calendar, like for your kids' sports or something like that, grab that.
- 3:56Michelle Gauthier: If you have a specific work schedule - just get together everything that you'll need in order to create your plan for the week.
- 4:04Michelle Gauthier: Now that you have all that, you're going to create your to-do list for the week.
- 4:10Michelle Gauthier: So if you had one from the prior week, that's always a great place to start with anything that you didn't get done.
- 4:14Michelle Gauthier: If you have recurring tasks that you know you need to do, anything that's specific to this week, just make a big ole to-do list.
- 4:20Michelle Gauthier: I like to separate the page into two for myself.
- 4:23Michelle Gauthier: I like to do a personal on one side and then a work on the other.
- 4:26Michelle Gauthier: So you take a look at your whole big to-do list and then what you want to do is you want to eventually you're going to estimate how much time each one of these are going to take.
- 4:35Michelle Gauthier: Now, some of them like my to-do list,
- 4:38Michelle Gauthier: this week, I had to call my insurance company about something, I had to call and make an appointment for my daughter, a doctor's appointment, et cetera, so I'll group all those things together.
- 4:46Michelle Gauthier: So I'll make a group of things in my personal that are phone calls I need to make, or things I need to look up on a website.
- 4:53Michelle Gauthier: And then I made a second group - I had to run errands that were in-person, like returns.
- 4:59Michelle Gauthier: I'm always talking about returns on here.
- 5:01Michelle Gauthier: I feel like returns are just like part of my life because I do so much shopping.
- 5:05Michelle Gauthier: So I had to do returns and go to a bunch of different stores, and so I grouped all of those together, even though they were separate to-dos.
- 5:12Michelle Gauthier: On the work front, if it's something that I'm going to work on, like, for example, writing and recording podcasts, if I want to do this week's and next week's, I'll group those together and estimate that to take, you know, two or three hours or whatever that takes.
- 5:25Michelle Gauthier: So what you want to do is first write everything down - I'm just recapping - write everything down, then group where possible and estimate how much time each one of those are going to take.
- 5:35Michelle Gauthier: Now you could do a little spot check here and just add up what you got on your to-do list.
- 5:40Michelle Gauthier: So sometimes you might find that you have 25 hours of stuff to do, but your calendar's already full for the week.
- 5:49Michelle Gauthier: This is actually really helpful and good information, and we're going to get to that right now.
- 5:54Michelle Gauthier: So now you're going to create your actual calendar.
- 5:57Michelle Gauthier: What I do, and this may or may not work for you, you just have to do whatever works for you, but I have my calendar on my phone,
- 6:04Michelle Gauthier: but I find that it's really powerful to take a blank page - I use that remarkable tablet that's like a notebook tablet - and I just get a blank page that has the week on it and then I just write out the times that I have things for the week, even though it's on my phone.
- 6:19Michelle Gauthier: Just because that is my own preference, you don't have to do that.
- 6:22Michelle Gauthier: But there's something I really like about having it written down, and when I write it down it helps me kind of remember and visualize how the day is going to go.
- 6:30Michelle Gauthier: So then you write down everything for the week.
- 6:33Michelle Gauthier: For mine, I start with when I have client sessions, because those are my for- sure committed times.
- 6:39Michelle Gauthier: I put in everything I know I have for my kids.
- 6:41Michelle Gauthier: So my daughter always has a horse lesson, maybe there's a soccer game et cetera.
- 6:45Michelle Gauthier: So I put in commitments I have for my kids.
- 6:47Michelle Gauthier: I put in my workouts.
- 6:49Michelle Gauthier: I can't work out at the same time every day, just based on my schedule.
- 6:52Michelle Gauthier: So when I see how those things are playing out I choose which times I'm gonna work out, put that on there.
- 6:59Michelle Gauthier: So by the time I have that all filled in, I have a good feel for how much space I have to get my to-do list done.
- 7:06Michelle Gauthier: Because, for example, on my to-do list I don't have an item for, take Josie to horse lessons and I don't have an item for see my clients.
- 7:15Michelle Gauthier: I just do that, you know, that's just on my calendar already.
- 7:18Michelle Gauthier: So then I can look back at my to-do list and say, okay, like, for example, I told you I was going to run some errands.
- 7:24Michelle Gauthier: I see on Monday I have a nice open space, so I'm going to plug in running errands here and I'm going to plug in making phone calls on Tuesday at two o'clock because it looks like I have an opening there.
- 7:35Michelle Gauthier: When I work on podcasts I like to have a good amount of time to do it, so where do I have that space, et cetera, and what you'll find - this is like the most important part of this entire episode - what you'll find is that you probably have more things than you have time.
- 7:51Michelle Gauthier: So don't shove it all in there and put it on your list and put it on your calendar when you know you can't get it done.
- 7:58Michelle Gauthier: That's how you get overwhelmed.
- 8:00Michelle Gauthier: Only put on there what you actually have the space to do.
- 8:04Michelle Gauthier: A nd you might find out as you're doing this,
- 8:07Michelle Gauthier: one of my clients just told me this last week that she made her to-do list for the day, she had three tasks on there, and it turned out that there's no way she could get all three of those tasks done in one day, so she reduced it to just one task.
- 8:19Michelle Gauthier: So that can be frustrating when you don't get as much done as you estimated; that things actually take more time than you estimate.
- 8:26Michelle Gauthier: If you're like me, that's how it always is.
- 8:28Michelle Gauthier: I like to just, in my mind I estimate low, and then it actually takes me longer.
- 8:32Michelle Gauthier: So when you do that, you find out, that's great information, for next week I'll know when I'm going to write record a podcast episode, I need to book two hours instead of one hour or an hour and a half or whatever.
- 8:42Michelle Gauthier: So I just thought, I need to book two hours instead of one hour or an hour and a half or whatever.
- 8:49Michelle Gauthier: So as time goes on, you'll get better and faster at knowing how long things take.
- 8:51Michelle Gauthier: But this step right here, where you're deciding what on your to-do list is going to actually go on your calendar, is critical, and this is the moment where you can decide, I'm going to not make myself overwhelmed, I'm not going to overschedule myself.
- 9:02Michelle Gauthier: And this might be something that you have never done before.
- 9:06Michelle Gauthier: Maybe every week you just have previously tried to pack everything else in.
- 9:10Michelle Gauthier: But if you're listening to this podcast, I'm assuming you want to be less overwhelmed and in that case, don't overschedule yourself.
- 9:17Michelle Gauthier: Last thing to do as you're working on this schedule piece: so now you've got all your committed appointments, you've got your blocks where you're going to run an errand or write a podcast or whatever your version of that is, and then just take a look at your schedule and see if there's anything that you want to or can remove.
- 9:35Michelle Gauthier: It's always good just to take a look and say, do I really have to do absolutely everything on here?
- 9:40Michelle Gauthier: So now you've got your schedule, and then the third thing you need to do is just check in with yourself every day.
- 9:46Michelle Gauthier: So when you get up in the morning, or whatever your process is maybe you do it when you sit down at your desk, or however you start your workday, take a look at your whole schedule for the day, see where you're going to be when, see what you've scheduled in to work on, and just make sure that that still works.
- 10:01Michelle Gauthier: One of the things that I had scheduled for my week last week was to go to the DMV, and I went to the DMV and I wasn't able to complete the errand that I was trying to do because I have to just go get another form somewhere else.
- 10:13Michelle Gauthier: So that was frustrating, because I didn't get to check that one off the list.
- 10:17Michelle Gauthier: Well, I checked my first visit off the list, but I had to schedule it again because it turned out to be a longer one than I thought.
- 10:23Michelle Gauthier: So you'll have stuff like that.
- 10:25Michelle Gauthier: But every day, just check your list, make progress, and then by the end of the week you will have noticed every day that you're checking things off and getting things done and that if you set yourself up for a reasonable schedule, you'll feel just like I felt last Friday, where I got everything on my list done and I felt calm and productive.
- 10:46Michelle Gauthier: One thing I want to remind you about is that episode 51, which is about the calendar clean out method, goes into even more detail on this, and it also has a corresponding worksheet.
- 10:57Michelle Gauthier: I'll put a link to that in the show notes so that you can grab a worksheet that can be your guide, especially as you are just getting started on this new process.
- 11:06Michelle Gauthier: Now let's move on to Michelle's Do Less for More Success tip.
- 11:10Michelle Gauthier: This is a tie- on to the clutter challenge that we did a couple weeks back, and my tip is to spend two minutes on email management every morning.
- 11:29Michelle Gauthier: So I think it's human nature that, as one of the things we do when we wake up in the morning - hopefully not the very first thing - but we check our email and kind of look at our day.
- 11:38Michelle Gauthier: If you are a person who gets a ton of emails - I definitely do, not for my work, I get a lot of advertisements and other things, just take the time in that moment to delete the emails that you don't want and maybe even unsubscribe.
- 11:55Michelle Gauthier: I have found that doing this just for two minutes every day keeps my inbox manageable all the time.
- 12:01Michelle Gauthier: An app that I use and I really like and suggest is called Spark and it manages all your emails.
- 12:08Michelle Gauthier: So it pulls all my emails from my various email addresses and it puts them into categories so it shows you the ones that are high priority, that come from people, and then it has a category for notifications and a category for newsletters and it's really easy just to scan the newsletters, for example, and mark them all as read.
- 12:26Michelle Gauthier: So I can just take a few minutes every day and my inbox stays totally manageable.
- 12:32Michelle Gauthier: I recommend that you give it a try.
- 12:33Michelle Gauthier: Okay, that's it for today.
- 12:36Michelle Gauthier: If you are enjoying this podcast and you feel like you're really picking up what I'm putting down about how to feel less overwhelmed and how to be mindful about things, I think you would absolutely love group coaching.
- 12:48Michelle Gauthier: My group coaching is called The Good Life and if you really like this podcast and you like the advice and the things that I talk about and the approach that I take, I think you would absolutely love group coaching.
- 13:00Michelle Gauthier: To me, the most fun and useful part of it is the community that happens among women.
- 13:05Michelle Gauthier: It's all women who are trying to improve their lives and are totally encouraging and supportive to each other.
- 13:10Michelle Gauthier: I teach you all kinds of concepts and little bite sized pieces, and then you come to group coaching and you can ask me any questions and I coach each person individually.
- 13:21Michelle Gauthier: So if that sounds like something you're interested in doing to finish out 2024 and start 2025, because it starts in November and it goes until February of next year then get on the waitlist.
- 13:33Michelle Gauthier: If you're on the waitlist, as soon as it's open, you'll get a notification and you will also get a discount.
- 13:38Michelle Gauthier: Okay, have a great week.
- 13:40Michelle Gauthier: See you next week.
- 13:41Michelle Gauthier: Thank you for listening to the Overwhelmed Working Woman podcast.
- 13:48Michelle Gauthier: If you want to learn more about my work, head over to my website at michellegauthier.
- 13:52Michelle Gauthier: com.
- 13:54Michelle Gauthier: See you next week.