photo credit: The Welsh Poppy

168 Hours, a book by Laura Vanderkam, is one of the best treatments of time management, productivity, and busyness that I’ve ever read.

And I’ve read quite a few books on those topics, being semi-obsessed as I am with, well, time management, productivity, and eliminating busyness so I can just do what matters most.

Step 1: get some expert advice, then follow it.

One thing that Moms and other busy, distracted people can do to start taking action (instead of running around like headless chickens) is to take the advice given by experts to busy professionals and apply it to their own lives.

Sometimes Moms tend to wallow in Mom-oriented advice which, while often entertaining, isn’t always good. When you’re really looking to get down to the important stuff in life and quit wasting time, do you need another primer on making summertime crafts or coming up with a new menu plan? Nah.

There’s a time for those, but first you need to get the basics in order. (Disclosure: for me, there is never really a time for “making summertime crafts.” The closest I come to that is having popsicle eating contests with my kids.)

So, from the expert (Vanderkam, not me), here are four principles (and my accompanying diatribe) that can help you quit wasting time and start taking action.

1. Seize control of your schedule.

You are the master of your own fate. If you want to make excuses and let other people obligate you to do stuff, that’s still your choice. I’d recommend not going that route by learning and using one little word: No. It’s a great word. You can say it nicely, and repeat it often, and it will be very effective.

Another thing you can say is, “Hmmm, I’d love to help you but I’ll need to check my calendar first.” And be sure you don’t check it right then while standing in front of the person. Wait. Give yourself time to really think through whatever request has been made of you: is it important? Does it fit in with your priorities? Do you have any desire to do it? Are you even interested? Does it pertain to life at all? Will it cause you to cut out important things? What do you have to say no to in order to say yes to this request?

Your time belongs to you and only you. What you do with it is up to you and only you. If you choose to be passive and let other people fill up your time, that’s still a choice you’re making.

2. Do not mistake things that look like work for actual work.

Ehhhm, summertime crafts? Not work. Now if you’re into crafts, and that’s something you want to do (with or without your kids), power to you. It’s your choice what you fill your free time with, and it should be stuff you enjoy.
But work is different than hobby, free time, fun time, family time, and so on. Define what work is for you, whether you’re a stay at home Mom or a work at home Mom or not a Mom or whatever. Know your work so you can know what your work isn’t. Know your work so you can make work a priority. Know your work so you can take a break from it.

3. Get rid of non-core-competency tasks by ignoring, minimizing, or outsourcing them.

Nobody, and I mean nobody, is good at everything. And nobody has to be.

You may not have the budget to hire help for all the stuff you don’t enjoy/aren’t good at, but you can find ways to make it take less of your time.

• You can streamline your cleaning and housekeeping chores. Lower your standards a little bit. You have other stuff to do. If you get a kick out of cleaning your baseboards monthly, do it. But if not… um. Let it go.
• You can trade off with your spouse. Who says he has to mow the grass and you have to make dinner? What if you’re a rotten cook and he’s an amateur chef? Play to your strengths, people. Everybody will be happier.
• You can quit doing stuff. Not everything is essential. Truly, truly evaluate the things that take up your time and just get rid of stuff. Will your family suffer or the world quake because you choose not to do something? Probably not. Drop stuff that you don’t like and that doesn’t matter; spend time on the better stuff.
• You can hire cheap help. Your own kids, neighborhood kids, students, friends, family members… Set a price on something (painting the bedroom? cleaning out the garage? organizing your paperwork? watching the kids? washing the car? picking out new curtains?) and then find someone who’s willing to do it for that price.

4. Boost efficiency by getting better at what you do.

Read up. Practice. Take a class. Set up routines and systems to enforce your best work patterns. Treat yourself as a professional and invest in the ongoing education you need in order to be the best at what you do, whatever that is.
The people who are most productive are people who are very good at a limited number of things, and who focus on doing those core things. Get very good at what you do, and do more of it.

But overall, regardless of children’s age or marital status, women reported both more guilt and distress over work intrusions into the home. - USAToday

Women in both the adolescent age group and the 25-33 age group reported a higher level of expected guilt than the men. - NY Daily News

There have been studies that show that “problems in interpersonal relationships tend to evoke guilt (interpersonal guilt) and moral dilemmas more often in women.” This is labeled as “interpersonal sensitivity.” -  FYI Living

We know without analyzing further that guilt is counter-productive, a waste of time, an unnecessary burden.

If we really did know that guilt helps no one, wouldn’t we quit allowing it to influence us?

guilt and conviction are not the same thing.

May I pose a suggestion, peoplings of the women variety?

Try it.

This is good news for people with less-than-stellar backgrounds and bad news for people with a perfect past.
Oh wait. I’ve never met anyone with a perfect past. Have you? I guess that makes it good news for all of us.
True, there are prejudices to overcome, assumptions to dispel, and first impressions that aren’t accurate. You have to deal with what other people expect from you because of what they know (or assume) about your background. You still have to reckon with the emotional burdens and false ideas that you carry from your past. But you aren’t locked in there.

What you do, day after day, carries more weight than where you’ve been. People may expect one thing of you, but if they consistently see something different, soon that is what they will expect instead. That can be good or bad: what’s good is that it depends on you. It’s in your hands, your choices, your life. Who you are and who you become isn’t a matter of determinism, but of your will.

Challenge Update

I’m doing better at getting up early: more early mornings than late ones in the last ten days, though I’m still not quite hitting my target. But I’m getting closer, and the more often I get up early the more I enjoy the time I have in that quietness and the more I want to get up (even earlier) the next day. I’m building strength here…

and with exercising, too.

The best idea I’ve had for exercising isn’t mine. My neighbor asked if I wanted to start walking in the park with her. We live right across the street from the city park, which has a 1/2 mile paved walking loop. I feel a bit hamster-esque, yes, but it’s easy to keep track of how far you’ve gone and easy to push a stroller. Last week I walked three times by myself. I went 2 miles the first two days and 3 miles the last day. This week my neighbor and I have walked together; we went 5 miles on Monday and 4 miles yesterday. My legs are so sore, but I feel so much better and more energetic overall. Having someone to exercise with makes a huge difference. If you struggle to fit it into your life consistently, see if you can’t find a buddy.

House/Work

I’m working on getting some routines in place for the general (dull) repetitive (dull) house cleaning that must be done on a regular (dull) basis. (Do you get that I find it kind of, um, dull?) Routines are perfect for dull duties: you set up a routine, you pay close attention the first few times you follow it so that you don’t leave anything out (that’s important), and then you can go on auto-pilot while you’re employing it the rest of the time. You can think about your next great writing project or hair style, talk to your kids, call your best friend, listen to a podcast, sing with the radio. Whatever. Makes the dull stuff much better.

Here are some house routine articles and tips I’ve come across:

Great article at Minti: Routine for Grown Ups – Easy House Cleaning Tips.

The Queen of Kaos (whose posts and podcasts I enjoy) has good advice for Creating a Daily Routine.

AOL Home offers some ideas to develop A Cleaning Routine for Busy Women.

Old-Fashioned Homemaking also tells us how to Create a Cleaning Routine.

And Zen Habits offers a somewhat broader article on how to Handle Chores, House Cleaning, and Errands with Simple Systems.

Hope you find those helpful!

The quote above is the antidote to the plague of perfectionism that keeps so many of us in a place of continual dissatisfaction and failure to reach our goals. We are waiting until we are ready, until the moment is right, until everything is in place, until Situation A is resolved and Situation B is over and Situation C is no longer demanding our time.

Conditions are never just right. People who delay action until all factors are favourable do nothing. William Feather

Waiting, waiting, waiting. Waiting until we feel ready. Waiting for energy. Waiting for motivation. Waiting for certain conditions. We call it prudence, or thoughtfulness, or planning, or timing. The Bible calls it being a sluggard.

The sluggard will not plow by reason of the cold… Prov. 20:4

The sluggard always has a reason why now is not the right time. The sluggard never has enough energy to get himself moving. He doesn’t feel good. He is depressed. He has many ideas but no movement. He has grand intentions but never takes action. He cannot produce the force necessary to get him out of the rut he lives in and onto the road he envisions.

As the door turneth upon his hinges, so [doth] the slothful upon his bed. Prov. 26:14

We call it perfectionism; the Bible calls it being slothful and warns us of the consequences:

The soul of the sluggard desireth, and [hath] nothing… Prov. 13:4

We think of lazy people as those with no ambition, no dreams, no ideas, no plans. Not true. Lazy, or slothful, or sluggish, simply means, respectively, to be disinclined to action, to be inactive, or to be habitually inactive and slow. One who is sluggish has no power to move himself.

Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.
Wayne Dyer

The pull of perfectionism is the pull to stay still. Motivation lies in taking action: one step leads to another. Progress creates more progress. You must learn to take action even when you don’t feel like it. You create the energy you need by acting as if you have it before you feel it.

Faith follows facts, and feelings follow faith. Too often we get that process all in reverse. We wait for the feelings; then we start to believe; then we assume that, since we feel it, and believe it, it must be true after all. But what if you stop “feeling it”? Suddenly your faith is shaky because the foundation – those ever-changing feelings – is shaky. Feelings change. Faith crumbles. You are back at the beginning. It must not be true after all. “I guess I wasn’t supposed to start that business.” “I guess I’m not really a writer.” “I guess it just wasn’t meant to be.”

Get your facts first. Are you, or aren’t you? Do you want it, or don’t you? Is it worth it, or isn’t it? Can you do it, or not? Is it a real desire? Have you made it a real goal, whatever it is? Whether it is a career change, a lifestyle change, a health issue, a new habit to form or an old habit to break, a relationship to evaluate, or a personal goal to achieve, you must take the time to find out what is true. Weigh the pros and cons. Discuss the matter with wise people you trust. Read about the subject. Pray about it. Determine what the goal is and how you best to get there; determine that you should and will get there.

Build your faith next. Be firmly convinced in your mind that the object you mean to pursue is worth pursuing, then just as firmly reject any suggestions to the contrary. Do not allow negativism, other’s opinions, and temporary obstacles to create doubt of what you know to be true. Begin taking action. “Faith without works is dead” is not trite religious phraseology. Take one step and then another. Persist.

The feelings will follow. You may not feel like a successful writer; feelings are irrelevant. If, after thought and deliberation, you determined that you should and will be a successful writer; if you begin taking action consistently toward that goal; if you do not allow discouragement and daily life to sway you, soon you will begin to experience the feelings that you expect.

Success seems to be connected to action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit. – Conrad Hilton

Keep moving forward. Do not allow the pull of sluggishness to keep you down. The warnings are there if you do – you will not see your desire accomplished. The promises are there if you refuse to give in:

…The soul of the diligent shall be made prosperous. Prov. 13:4

Motivational quotations from Goal Setting Guide.

Scripture quotations from Blue Letter Bible.

Image courtesy of thegoldguys.blogspot.com/ or www.lumaxart.com/.