OMG I did something AMAZING! I wanted to tell you all about it #BecauseSharing…
Recently, my partner had a lady come to speak to his school staff about mental health and in particular, about how we will never complete all of the tasks on our to-do list. Like, never. Ever. WTF? I know, it’s kind of depressing to realise this.
Even though (deep down) we know this, we continue to beat ourselves up about never finishing ‘all the things’. WHYYYY???
Do you know that 80% of the things we accomplish in our day, never existed on our to-do list in the first place? Yep! Crazy hey!!?? They’re the things that we do incidentally, or opportunistically or sometimes urgently, due to timing, urgency or something going wrong.
Instead of working SOLELY from a to-do list, she challenged the staff to stop every hour or two and create an ‘accomplishments list’. All of those little things that we get done without realising.
So, I tried it.
I couldn’t believe how liberating it was. I had over a page full of accomplishments listed, yet only half of my to-do list ticked off. And guess what? I couldn’t have cared less. I celebrated the fact that I had achieved so much in my day and it made my to-do list feel like child’s play. What a reprieve!
It’s important to note though, that planning and scaffolding your day is still super important. In order to have a successful day, you must schedule your appointments, responsibilities and tasks, and prioritise them accordingly. As we know if it’s not scheduled, it often never gets done. So still do this. Still set 3 main priorities and a wish-list of to-do items. But run your accomplishments list simultaneously.
Every couple of hours, stop for a minute or two and scribble down all of the things you accomplished in that time.
Maybe you took an unexpected phone call that converted into an opportunity or sale.
Maybe you took the garbage out to the wheelie bins as you walked by to do something else.
Maybe you folded the clothes while you watched The Bold and the Beautiful (look, I’m not here to judge). All of these things matter and they all count as accomplishments. So write them down!
At the end of the day when you would usually sit down to your glass of shiraz and beat yourself up over all of the things you didn’t get done today, pick up and read your accomplishments list. That glass of shiraz will soon feel like a celebratory glass, because girl, you’re awesome and you kicked butt today.
I’ve created an amazing accomplishments list template for you and it is available in my resource library for free!
Pop your details in below to gain access to the resource library and download your freebie.
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