Good morning my lovelies,
How are you all doing today?
So today we are going to talk about your mindset and how it impacts your time and productivity – because more than anything else, your mindset, plays a massive role within it.
And when I refer to mindset – I don’t just mean how positive we are in general.
I mean specifically the actual thoughts we have, the sentences that we play in our brain at any given time. I’m also talking about the overarching belief systems we have underpinning those thoughts. The programming of our subconscious minds. How our brains are wired. Their tendencies and patterns. How they have evolved. The conditioning we have been subjected to. And I’m also including within this our nervous system capacity – and our emotions.
Because all of these things (our thoughts, and emotions) – are what drive our behaviour – how we act, what we do, how we show up –
Thoughts – I want to get fitter
Feelings – Desire/motivation
Actions – Sign up for the gym class
Our brain gives us the direction, which creates a push inside of us to do something, and then we do it – it’s how we evolved…
Thought – We need to go hunt and get food for tonight
Feeling – Urgency/motivated
Action – Go get the spear
And this is actually the problem.
Because there are many solutions both inside and outside of your business to you feeling more in control of your time, having more time, working less, earning more, having a better work-life balance, juggling less, being more productive and effective and efficient…
So these include:
- Getting support or asking for help on the things that are time shouldn’t be used on
- Constraining our focus – pausing or stopping certain things so that the math of what we are taking on fits into our week
- Simplifying our business – our offers, our strategy
- Streamlining our processes
- Automating our systems
- Planning our week, planning our days
- Eliminating time wasting, and scrolling
- Staying focused to get stuff done
- Being firm with our boundaries as to when we stop working
- Saying no to other people we don’t have time to help
- Raising our prices so we can work less and still earn the same amount
- Being less perfectionistic – doing things less well, so they take less time
- Doing things immediately so they don’t build up and take more time to sort out later
- Changing our business model to one that leverages our time better
- Simplifying our communication channels so that’s quicker
- Managing our mind and our body’s needs and our emotions better so we can better cope with juggling it all
These are all solutions or tools available to us…that help us better manage our time…
But the real problem is that we don’t implement those solutions, or consistently use the tools available to us.
And why we don’t do that – that is because of our mindset/our thoughts and emotions around using and consistently implementing the solutions or tools.
And a simple way of demonstrating this…
Is to think about the person who is in control of their time, who is earning what they want, working when they want, who finishes work on time, has a great work-life balance in their business, has a tidy home, a spacious schedule, has time to work out, has a happy family life…
Imagine that person for a minute – it can be just an idea of a person, or someone who comes to mind…
And I want you to consider what time solutions they have implemented…
What behaviours are helping them? How are they showing up? What approach do they have to their week, and to their time? What actions or inactions are they taking?
So take a minute to imagine that person in your mind (let’s imagine she is a woman – Woman A) – and jot the things that come up to you…
They are typically things like…
A – Hired help at home (cleaner), has a system for keeping things organised and tidy at home in between cleaner coming, hired a good team of people working in her business for her / outsourced things that she is not the best or quickest at, charges a good rate because she values her time highly, decided her finish time is 4pm no matter what, and she sticks to that, she plans her week in advance, she has a system for managing her time, she follows that system, she reviews her day the night before, she fits in a workout before lunch, she schedules in breaks, she limits her availability / finishes appointments with clients on time, she has boundaries and says no to things she can’t fit in, she has automated systems in her business which save her time, she doesn’t spend any time on social media other than for a scheduled plan for her marketing, she is disciplined, she batch cooks at the weekend so she can eat healthy during the week, she has her kids appointments and her commitments all on her calendar so she never double books herself
These are all actions and behaviours and solutions that she uses to better manage her time and productivity.
Whereas the woman who is totally overwhelmed, feels out of control, has no time for exercise, has messy chaos at home, has a family that she doesn’t feel she spends enough time with, is hustling in her business, not making the money she wants, overworks, finishes late, and has zero work-life balance…
What are her behaviours do you think? What solutions is she not implementing?
A – Trying to do it all herself – in her business to save money, at her home because she feels she should be able to do it all, no time spent organising home to make it easier for her to keep on top of, reacting to things as and when they happen in her week, not much automated in her business, doesn’t plan the week ahead, reactive in the day, goes with the flow – whatever shouts the loudest gets done first, works through her breaks, takes a while to check certain things in case they aren’t good enough, says yes to other people’s requests even when she knows she doesn’t have enough time or bandwidth to fit them in, doesn’t make the time to make her business simpler or her strategy more constrained, or automated
The reason for the difference between these two women – are that one is taking actions consistently or using solutions consistently that help save time, or help control time…and the other is not.
The actions they are taking, the solutions they are or are not using – create their time reality…
And the reason for the difference in their actions – is because of how they are thinking, and feeling with regard to those actions, those solutions, those tools, their time, the tasks or projects they’ve taken on and themselves. It’s down to their mindset.
So there are four core areas that we want to do an audit of, for ourselves, of our thinking, of our mindset as it relates to time and productivity and the potential solutions we have available to us – so that we can see what thinking is serving us, and what thinking is not – and then we can work on changing the thinking that isn’t helping us create the time reality we want.
So I’m going to first outline what the four main areas are, explain a little bit about how your thinking in each area will be impacting on your time and productivity, give some examples of thoughts you may have in those areas to help you identify your current ones, and then I want you to note down what comes to you. Because once we are aware of what our thinking is, we can then see if it is serving us or not,
And if you can’t access what your thoughts or beliefs are in a certain area – tap into thinking about that woman who has her sh*t together – Woman A – and how she probably thinks about herself, about planning, systems, being organised, juggling it all – and then think about Woman B – and see where you resonate the most.
So the first area – is your self-identity/self-concept. Basically, your thoughts about you.
For example – you think you are a particular way, or you have a particular characteristic E.g. I am a procrastinator. I am not very disciplined. I am not organised. I’m productive. I work better when busy. I’m lazy. I’m no good at tech. I’m a planner. I am a hustler. I’m a winging it kind of person. I’m easy going. I’m bad at consistency. I am a perfectionist. I am a people-pleaser. I’m shy.
Why do your thoughts about you impact your time and your productivity?
Well, we always act in accordance with whom we believe we are. It’s very challenging for us to do things that we don’t think we typically do, i.e. that feel out of character for us – simply because it feels wrong. We feel we are going against who we are – even if that change or act is a positive one. And acting in the opposite way of who we believe we are, is actually not what our brain wants us doing – because our brains love to be right – and so if we have a thought about ourselves, we want our actions to be in congruence with what that is.
So if you have any of the thoughts above – like I am a procrastinator. And you strongly believe that about yourself, it will become extremely challenging for you to start behaving in completely the opposite way and start doing things right away – when they are added to your list – rather than leaving them until the absolute last minute.
Or if you believe you are not organised, then it will be very challenging for you to adopt an organised approach to your business, or your home – which would, if you did adopt it, undoubtedly help with overwhelm, feeling more in control, and saving time when it comes to looking for things.
So how you think about yourself matters.
And you can probably imagine the things Woman A thinks about herself – and they will all be characteristics that will typically help her either adopt time saving solutions, or be more productive.
So have a think now – pause this episode – and dig deep to think about the thoughts you believe to be true about yourself, your personality, your character traits – particularly as they pertain to your time.
The second area of your mindset that will be impacting your time and productivity – are your thoughts about time.
These could be thoughts such as – I have no time. There’s never enough time.
I’m never in control of my time. There’s never enough hours in the day.
I’m pressed for time. I have too much to do. I can’t fit it all in.
Or maybe thoughts like I like being busy. Or my time is free.
And the trouble with thoughts like these – are that typically thoughts relating to their not being enough time result in you feeling overwhelmed – and overwhelm is the least productive emotion you can have – so you will end up either spinning out and not doing anything effectively, flitting between tasks, wasting time, inefficiently working – or you will end up freezing – and neglecting everything you have to get done – for something else that isn’t on your list but that will give you a break away from that dreadful overwhelmed feeling.
Neither of which are helping you get through your list of tasks in your limited amount of time.
Thoughts like I like being busy or my time is free – will typically lead you to staying stuck on a hamster wheel – that you will eventually burn out from, or at the very least, will make it challenging for you to ever have time to slow down. And it can also be a real barrier to utilising money to leverage your time – because everyone else will seem expensive if you are thinking your time is free.
So have a think – how many times do you have thoughts like these running through your head on a day to day basis?
The third area of your mindset that will be impacting your time and productivity – are your thoughts about the particular task/project/goal you are working on. So this is either your thoughts relating to the actual doing of the task, or it is your thought about the potential outcome/possibility once you have completed the task.
So this might be you thinking you hate a particular task. Thinking of something as boring, or hard, or overwhelming. Or it could be you thinking that once you do that task, then you will HAVE to do something else. Or there is a possibility that the end result will be a failure.
These thoughts create so much resistance to you doing the actual project or task, that you will end up procrastinating, perfecting or doing everything you can to avoid the task or project – as your brain will simply be trying to keep you from experiencing discomfort and a whole host of other negative emotions.
So take a second to think about an actual project or task, or even a goal that you have set for yourself – that you know you have resistance to doing or pursuing…and see if you can dive in and see what your thoughts are about that particular task or goal. In the doing of that task, or in the potential outcome – and see what thoughts you are having that are responsible for that resistance.
And lastly, the fourth area of your mindset that will be impacting your time and productivity – are your thoughts about particular time saving solutions – that you know, if you implemented them would help you be more in control of your time, or would help you be working less, and having more of a work-life balance.
If your thoughts about these potential solutions are sh*tty ones. Or that they will require effort or time to implement. Or if there is a risk with implementing them that has to be taken. Or if they simply are just you not believing that it’s available to you as a solution – then you will be getting in your own way when it comes to you creating the time reality that you really want, and that those solutions could help you achieve.
For example, I used to think I couldn’t afford to hire help in my business – because I wasn’t earning enough, or didn’t have a consistent enough income to be safe enough…So of course, I wasn’t even looking into making it possible. And it meant that my time was always going to be used up by me doing the tasks that should have been outsourced, so capping my own potential.
If you think that planning takes too long to do – then that will never be a solution that you use to help you get in control of your time.
And there is no ONE right solution for everyone – but if you have crappy thoughts about all of them, then you have to accept that you might not ever create the time reality that you so badly want.
So again, pause this episode – and think about some of the solutions that I proposed at the beginning of this episode – and what thoughts come up for you as I go through the list. Are you immediately writing off time solutions you could be testing out and using, simply because you have sh*tty thoughts about them.
So in summary, your mindset really really matters. Because it not only impacts how you show up in your business, and with regard to time, it impacts how much stuff you get done, and what time saving solutions are available for you to use.
And knowing what your thinking is – in each of those four areas, is the first step to seeing what changes need to be made, for you to go from overwhelmed time chaos to calm time control.
The next step will then be working on changing the thinking that isn’t serving you – and that is exactly what we do in my Time Mastery Program. So if you want the details for how to enrol, simply send me a DM – with the words Time Mastery, to me on Instagram – my account is @kirsty knight coaching. And I will get back to you as soon as I can.
That’s it for this week, peeps.
See you next time.
Recent Comments