I had a client this week that was really out of whack.  He’d lost his vision and gotten way off track.

What do you do when your get up and go has got up and gone, you’re thinking this is just too hard and you really don’t know how you are going to do it?

Everything is a trauma, nothing is going right, your computer is not working blablabla.

I personally have overcome trauma, overcome  grief, disadvantage and lack of finance.  I don’t say that to bignote myself, but like all of us, we’ve all had our setbacks and honestly, some things you wouldn’t credit a person could emotionally survive.

And yet, we come through…  You know, once things are going wrong and there have been  some hiccups where things are slowing you down, it’s very hard to get going again.  If you lose momentum, it is terribly difficult to regain it.

But you must!!!

First of all you need address  why you are thinking this is too hard and is this really true?  What has happened to shift you from forward to slow, stop or reverse…  I

Look behind your thoughts and feelings.  How can you disect this and change this from negative to positive.  Don’t just throw around some empty affirmations.  I am a believer in affirnmations, but you need to believe in the actual affirmation for it to work.   I cannot tell myself I am Elle MacPherson,  it is not realistic to me so therefore I can’t trick myself into believing it – you must be authentic.  You really need to look into this and find the positive, seek genuine ways to discredit your negative slump.

Get a hold of your schedule (no doubt there will be a week or more of tasks now that you are behind in).  Take some baby steps,  break it down.  Treat yourself like a fragile child if needs be.  Set tiny tasks and reward yourself.  Before you know it, you’ll have completed some of the tasks and you’ll feel that ball start to roll again.

Time management is fantastic but if your motivation is gone, your time management, schedule and everything else can go out the window.  Your schedule gets thrown out.  You can be distracted, look at other things, it doesn’t matter what your plan is, you won’t look at it.   It doesn’t always start through a lack on your behalf.  This is the single largest danger of working at home with children – things happen and you have to stop work to attend to them.  A week with feverish children, sleep deprivation and an untidy house can very easily snowball.

You need to do whatever you can to get you back on track.  It might be another person to check in with each week / fortnight whatever – your accountability partner, having a coach in place.  You need to have measures in place to keep a check on yourself.  If you don’t have any of these, you need to do everything you can to get that “zing” back.

Remember your goals, remember why you are doing this, remember your desired income, your ideal client, remember your children – you don’t want to go back into the workplace.   No work equals no income.

Do some meditation, an energy workshop, whatever you need to do to boost yourself back up.  It doesn’t matter what it is – get your picture / vision board out and look at it, have it in front of you and get your passion back.  This is what you wanted to do – you started it and you need to keep it going.

Moral to this Story:

This happens to all of us!!  Sometimes it sneaks up and we’re in the midst of a slump without even realising it.  Just know that you can overcome it and get back on track.

ACTION:

Have a very clear vision.  Put together a vision board, have some tools ready, just in case you find yourself in a slump.

Full article following this week with more tips and tricks.

You may say “I have certain things that need to be done, why not just go with the flow and get them done”.

It does sound simple when put like that.  The problem is however, that in a life that is based at one location and involves a number of people (including children), things quickly change.  Emergencies happen, children get sick, someone pops in and it is all too easy to lose track of where you were and what still needs to be done.  In my case, the children were both sick last week and not at all interested in either sleeping or entertaining themselves.  It was constant cuddles all round.  By having my plan, I was able to very quickly prioritise what couldn’t be postponed, and simply had to wait until I’d gotten them all off to sleep at night, then burned some midnight oil.  I work on three plans.  My “Big Picture” my goals and dreams, goal income, goal lifestyle etc.  Then I have my main timeplan.  What I need to plan to do to meet my business and home needs.  Lastly my micro plan, each and every little thing that needs to happen to run my business and run my home on a daily basis.

By having a plan your home and business will run more smoothly.  Nobody is invincible; in fact I have the worst memory in the world.  So, I plan around my memory, I plan with the view that I will forget something.  By having an itemised to do list, nothing gets forgotten.  I’m also a terrible procrastinator.  Being organised ensures that I have time enough for the good things and my children are guaranteed of quality fun time with their mom and don’t suffer living in a pigsty or with me constantly at the computer when they need me.  It is quite difficult to get into a routine, if you are not used to it.  Children function well with routine and actually require it and it helps with their development, learning boundaries and the responsibilities of the real world.  Trust me, it is well worth the effort.  All of your family members and your business clients will reap the rewards.

It’s very easy to neglect certain chores in favour of those that are easier or more pleasant and whilst this may not be a problem at the time, with so much going on, one tiny thing overlooked can become a very large issue later on.  You can also be left with a very tight deadline and far too much to try and squeeze into your timeframe.

It is absolutely true – a stitch in time saves nine.  Make sure you have a calendar – hang it where everyone can see it.  I must admit – at this stage it is only useful to me, neither of my children is old enough to read, but I have a color for each of us, and every single appointment is on that calendar.   Set up your daily plan. For this I have a book – you can even buy them now with each page printed up as a “to do” list.  So – the appointments and main events all go on the calendar for everyone to see, then I break it down into a more detailed to do list for each day.

I keep a white board in the kitchen, if something pops into my head, no matter what it is, an idea, something for the shopping list (very handy) or something I need to do – onto the whiteboard with it.  It’s also fantastic when someone rings if the children have stolen all of the pens….

Plan your day.  Try to have it prepared the day before so that you can get your head around what you’ll need to be on top of for the next day.  Read your to-do list the night before, this gives you a jump start when you wake up in the morning. You’ll be surprised at how much more smoothly things run by planning.

AND…..  The biggest plan of all – plan to change your plan!!!

Moral to this story:

A little organisation goes a long way.  Being organised and planning each day is not going to take the fun out of everything or become a cumbersome chore.  It will ensure the smooth running of your family and business and ensure that everyone has enough time allocated to keep them happy.  It will also ensure that you have a little time – just for you!

ACTION:

Get a calendar.  Start planning your day.  Start using a “to-do” list.  Print these up yourself – you can then get exactly the size you want.  Word and Publisher have a number of simple templates as well.  That will help you schedule in a fashion that gives the main time to the things that you feel are most important to you.

What was to be my blog (last week…) was about my big lesson.  “You can’t do everything on your own – get a team.”

If I’d stuck to my timetable and not tried to do something I shouldn’t, I would not have had so many wasted hours that were unprofitable.  I would also have posted this blog last week!!

Don’t try and do everything yourself.  Yes, you can save money but sometimes your time is more valuable.  Praise yourself for what you can do and forget the rest.  You’ll only beat yourself up when you can’t get the desired result doing something outside of your skill set.  It’s fun for a challenge sometimes, but this is business and you can have fun later.

I’m hopeless. (One of those things I need to work on in my personal improvement arena is my perfectionism and the resulting need to do everything myself – I need to relinquish control).   Like many others, I’m also trying to save money, there have been a few very big ticket items come in around the home in the last little while and I need to be a little careful.

So, I’ve been running around willy nilly in the last few weeks thinking I am superwoman.  It has messed up my own timeplan and wasted many hours.  I also have to remember that things don’t need to be perfect, so long as they do the trick (still in a neat and professional manner) it is more important to take action that to wait.  Trust me, it is true.  Studies show that perfectionists are more likely to be underachievers because nothing is ever good enough so they wait for it to be perfect and never actually take action.  Now you know my weakspot.  It also leads to procrastination (but I’ll talk about that another time).

It is enough to be Mom, Dad, partner, boss, secretary, taxi driver, cleaner etc. etc. without having to be master of professions outside your core skill set.  If the activity is not directly related to what you do to create income or to caring for your family – get someone else to do it.  None of us can be a pro at everything.  I specialise in some fantastic things, but need to remember when I do not specialise, to stop penny pinching or being a control freak and get someone that knows what they are doing in to help.

We all need help and it is nothing to be ashamed about or worried about.    Learn to work with others, delegate and give up a little.  In the long run with the right people doing the right tasks the end result is much better.

P.S.  I’m not talking about a huge staff, especially if you are a one woman/ man show.  Just have the right people and resources available so you can get help, pose a question and get advice when you need it.  Tweet your query… Post it on Facebook…  You’ll be surprised at who is out there and will be delighted to help you.

Moral to this story:
Get a team (friends, associates, paid service providers).  You can’t do everything yourself.  Something as simple as getting a neighbour’s teenager to mow the lawn for a few dollars can save you a couple of hours per fortnight that can be better spent in another way.  Getting someone else to build your website will give you hours free to make real headway on your articles, product or direct marketing. (I should heed my own advice – lol)

ACTION:
Think about it a little – see what you can delegate to someone else – business or personal and give yourself some time for something more important.