Summary

WHEN YOU SUCK AT MAKING SPACE FOR LIFE...sometimes you've gotta SCHEDULE it!

I don't know about you, but in my former life, there were certain things that I never seemed to have time for. That workout. That phone call home or to my best friend to "catch-up". That hobby that I used to love but that's been collecting dust for ages...

Because you and I? We've always been so much more than the thing that earns us a paycheck each day. And yet, our schedules don't reflect that. How we spend our time doesn't reflect that.

And that sh** needs to change, doesn't it.

In today's podcast episode, we're talking about 4 things you need to schedule to take back your damn life. Each of these 4 things represents a fundamental component of self-care - and no, I don't just mean physical self-care. I mean mental, emotional, social, and physical self-care.

And just be scheduling these 4 things into each week of your life, you'll find that you'll start to prioritize the things that should always have been priorities anyway!

For show notes, head to coachellyn.com/podcast and, of course, if you have any questions or want to connect, head on over to @coachellyn on Instagram.

ACTION STEPS:

• Tip #1 - Schedule social time

  • This is for your social self-care

  • Don’t let these just be ad hoc or spontaneous

  • Schedule social time each week - a phone call, zoom call, quick coffee, or walk!

  • Tip #2 - Schedule your workouts

    • This is for your physical self-care.

    • My trick? Have a recurring appointment in your calendar so that you have it on every single day and just move it around to where it fits each day.

    • Tip #3 - Schedule time for your hobbies

      • This is for your mental self-care

      • I define this as anything that’s intellectually stimulating. It might be a sport, a form of art, reading, knitting, etc.

      • It can look like blocking out a few hours one evening to paint or a consistent 15 mintue time in the morning to read. Small or large commitments work great here!

      • Tip #4 - Schedule time-off

        • This is your emotional self-care

        • Stop telling yourself you’ll take time off when you’re “less busy” because we both know that’s never going to happen

        • Instead schedule your time off (even a staycation works), and fit in your work and responsibilities around it! If you’ve got the PTO, you’re going to make yourself a better human and a better employee if you use it!

RESOURCES IN THIS EPISODE:

• My “Calm in the Chaos” Masterclass - here

Transcript:

(00:00):

Hey there, friend. And welcome back to the take back your life podcast. You know, I'm really, really glad that I made this switch to monthly podcasting, it has made the moments when I sit down to record podcasts for you feel so much better, I feel so much frankly, less burned out when I'm sitting down on a monthly basis. So I hope you've been enjoying the shift. If you are new to the take back your life podcast, I hope you've been enjoying being able to go back and look at some of the more recent content, some of the most popular content. I hope you've been really, really leveraging that. It feels like it has been so long since I sat down and did this and it has. My last podcast was actually an interview. So it has been seemingly almost two months since I put my butt in my desk chair and sat down and had this conversation with you. So I'm really excited to be back. And I'm also really excited because this is going to probably be the last podcast episode of 2020.

(02:09):

Thank God. This year is almost over. Am I right? And I'm not under any delusion that things are going to magically become so much easier and so much more seamless come January 1st. But I know there's so many of us that are just so excited that this year is almost over and today. I really wanted to talk about something that as we look ahead to 2021 is really going to serve as something that is going to help you take back your life that is going to help you hit the reset button and really start making sure that you are taking care of yourself.

(02:42):

And this is one of those things that I don't give a. If it's December, you could start doing today. You could start doing tomorrow. You can start doing this ASAP to help you start to take better care of yourself, to overcome your burnout and to take back your life. And what we're going to be talking about today are four things to schedule to do. Just that I know scheduling is not sexy by any means, but these are four things that if you put these into your calendar first and prioritize them first, it is going to make a massive difference in your life and in your ability to get the done that, you know, you need to, that you're responsible for that. You have obligations around, but also to make sure that you live beyond that. Because we know you are so much more than your work, you are so much more than your job title, and these few tips I'm going to give you are going to help make it so.

(03:35):

I'm going to try to make this a short, punchy episode. I know I always say that, and sometimes I end up talking for forever, but we're going to really focus on doing that today. So as we get into these four things, the big point that I want to make is these four things represent some fundamental aspects of self-care. I don't know about you. When I often think of self care. I think of the physical, I think of a working out eating healthy and sleeping and drinking of water, but there's so much more to self care than that. There is physical self care, but there's also emotional self care. There's mental self-care, there's social self-care. And the things that we're going to talk about scheduling in this podcast episode are things that address those different aspects of self-care. So with that, let's get into our four things to schedule.

(04:20):

Thing number one, and this is related to your social self-care is to schedule social time. I get that we're in a pandemic. I get that many of us are quarantined. I live by myself. I get how hard this can be, but it's so important for us to schedule that social time, that time to interact and get rejuvenated by the people we care about most and that we vibe with most. So many of us - even prior to COVID in our, you know, past lives, if you will - this was something that it was kind of like an ad hoc thing. Like you would spontaneously go meet up with someone for dinner or for happy hour or whatever, but really this needs to start becoming something that is just a part of your schedule. That you block out time for. Like, I really try to make Saturdays my social day. I try to have something on the calendar every either Friday night or Saturday, that is social time where I'm spending time with people that I really, really care about. That can be as small as, you know, going and grabbing a coffee with someone, or I live right up the hill from this beautiful walk, right along the water. And I've met up with people where we've just gotten a coffee and we walk together, or it could be a zoom call. If all of the people you care about most are really, really far away can be phone call. It can be anything, but blocking out that time in your calendar protects that social component of your life and makes sure that you are prioritizing it. And it's not getting overridden by a to-do list or a meeting or something like that. So that is tip number one is to schedule that social time into your life so that you can really make sure you're making your social self care a priority.

(06:02):

The next tip is around physical self-care and that is about scheduling your workouts and, or your physical activity. However you want to think about it. I have been a huge proponent of this tip for years. I got my start for those of you that don't know in health and fitness coaching and accountability coaching for people who were trying to get in better shape. And the biggest trick I found that made the hugest difference was prioritizing my workouts by making sure that my workout is scheduled somewhere in my calendar. I literally have a recurring appointment for my workout every single morning. Now, do I do it every single morning at that time? No, I don't. But having that show up in my calendar helps give me that little nudge in the right direction to make sure that I drag around that workout. And I find a place in my calendar where it fits.

(06:55):

So that is my big recommendation to you is to schedule your workout, schedule that physical activity, whether it's just as simple as a walk outside or an kicking weightlifting workout, I don't really care, but schedule it somewhere in your workout. I highly recommend the thing I do, which is that recurring appointment. And then you just drag it to where it fits, drag it to where you can make it work in that day. Schedule. It doesn't have to be a standing appointment at the same time every day, unless that works for you. But it's all about just making sure that you drag it around and that you find a place where it fits in your life. Okay. So tip number one, schedule that social time, tip number two, schedule your workouts. It's making your social and your physical self-care a consistent priority so that they are not getting pushed to the wayside by other things.

(07:46):

The next one is like your emotional self-care. This one is something so many of us high achievers need to do. And something that admittedly, this is the one I struggle with the most, probably this one's about scheduling time off. I have a goal for myself that I've recently realized is going to be really important for me moving forward each week, I take at least one day off. Ideally it would be two, but obviously I have a day job and a business. So I shoot for taking one day off a week, every month I shoot for taking an entire weekend off. And then every quarter I shoot for taking either a vacation or a small staycation. The idea here is for too many of us as high achievers, we push our vacation to a slow season or a time when we quote unquote, won't be as busy.

(08:39):

But for so many of us, as I mentioned, as I was talking about my chaos to calm class for black Friday, us high achievers have a tendency to create our own chaos. We say yes to all of these things. We've put all of this stuff on our plate. And then we wonder why we have no time to travel, no time to see people, no time to take care of ourselves. We've done that to ourselves. So instead of, and this is the common theme today, instead of scheduling your vacations around when you're not going to be busy, recognize that you're probably always going to be busy because you're you and schedule the time off anyway and make those busy things. Those commitments, those tasks fit in around that time off. This is going to be a huge one. And I'll say it again. This is probably the one I struggle with the most, but it's something we all need for our emotional self-care.

(09:32):

We cannot burn the candle at both ends all the time. We have to take time off. It makes us better workers. It makes us better humans. It's just so important for our emotional self-care. So tip number one, schedule that social time, tip number two, schedule your workouts or your physical activity. And tip number three is to schedule time off last, but most certainly not least is all about your mental self-care, which how I distinguish this is mental self care is all about doing things that stimulate your mind. That can be reading about a topic that you love reading about. It could be podcasting. It could be, um, you know, painting. It could be sports, it could be hiking. It could be so many different things, but it's about stimulating your mind by doing something that you're passionate about, that you're engaged in, that gets your kind of creative juices going.

(10:24):

And this one's just really about scheduling time for those hobbies. And for that fun, it might mean for me, some of my hobbies are like, I've gotten really into watercoloring during quarantine. It could be singing and music. It could be hiking, but it's scheduling time for those things. So you are making sure you are getting that intellectual stimulation in. It's also kind of an emotional self-care thing because so many of our hobbies could also fall into time off, but it's really just about making sure you're making time for those things that you love, that you get that passion and that stimulation from it could also look like something smaller. Like I read every single morning that I would also classify as mental self-care. So it may not be like scheduling that. Well, I'm going to take Friday night off so I can paint. It might be just setting aside 15 minutes every morning to just read on topics that are really, really interesting to you.

(11:19):

Again, none of this stuff has to be complex. Your social time does not have to be this epic night out. And it probably can't be because COVID physical self care does not need to be a crazy workout. It can be simply a walk around the block. Emotional self-care does not need to be a crazy vacation. It could literally be giving yourself a meet day where you don't check email. You don't check your phone. You just kind of indulge, whatever feels good to you. I used to do that all the time. I love it. I called it a me day and it was glorious. It could also be, even if you want to go on vacation, it could be a staycation just and checking out an Airbnb in a local, like little town that you haven't been to before mental self care again can be those small habits in the morning.

(12:01):

But I feel like we tend to overcomplicate these things, but more so than anything, these things tend to get back-burnered or pushed to the wayside in favor of those to-do lists kind of items and those tasks to help us feel like we're being productive and we've achieved something. But these sorts of activities, there's a reason why they fall into the realm of self-care because they help us care for ourselves. And in caring for ourselves, we can become the best version of ourselves and we can overcome our burnout and take back our life. And that's why these are so crucial. That's why these are the four things that I think above anything else we need to make sure we're scheduling into our daily life so that we can make sure we're prioritizing the things that put us at our best. That right there is the whole point.

(12:50):

And that's really why I wanted to dig into this with you all today. So I hope you got so much out of this. I hope that you saw something in here where even if it was just one thing where you were like, yeah, you're right. I do need to be better about scheduling that. And if you did, I highly encourage you grab your planner right now, get on your calendar right now and schedule that thing. That is all I've got for you guys right now. I told you I was going to make the short and sweet in this probably the shortest episode I've recorded in forever. But with that, thank you so much for listening my friend. And I'll talk to you next time. Bye.