How To Be More Efficient
Have you ever clicked on an article on the web with a catchy title like this and been so disappointed that they really didn’t meet the promise of the title? I have! But today, I’m going to be efficient and get right to the point. How do you become more efficient and GET STUFF DONE?
I literally just took a 30-second break to update my SEO below because I always leave that to last and by the end of my writing time I DO NOT want to take care of the silly SEO.
HOLD THE PHONE!
You just said you were going to get straight to the point, right? Well, I was kind of proving my point. To be efficient you have to first do things SMART. I know that I won’t want to take care of the SEO after writing 600+ words of KILLER content so I did it right off the bat and ate my frog of the day.
1.Be smart. I’m going to guess that you know exactly all the difficult things you need to get done but save them for the end of the day. Are you hoping that they will magically do themselves? Yes, I get that hope too, but it never works. I once read a book that encouraged you to eat your “frog” first thing in the day. Essentially, they were saying, do the hardest thing FIRST in your day. Check out his book below.
2. Set a timer. Feeling really inefficient? Set a timer and commit to writing, doing laundry, photographing, playing with the kids, doing whatever you aren’t getting done. ONLY do one thing during that timer and finish it. If you are always struggling with being efficient in doing your laundry, set an alarm on your phone each night and spend 15 minutes doing the laundry. You can carve out 15 minutes for something, right? If not, maybe you need to prioritize what is really important.
Still wanting to be efficient?
3. Limit multi-tasking. Doesn’t this seem a little counter-intuitive? If you really want to crank something out and build up your efficiency, try and limit the amount you are switching between tasks. When I sit down to write for the blog, I commit to it wholeheartedly. I try and not check my phone (which is currently going off…), I close tabs on my computer, and sometimes I plug into music that won’t distract. My favorite is nature sounds, BTW. Have an important proposal you need to draft? Lock yourself away in the office so that you won’t be interrupted. Is your laundry now 10 stories tall? Make a date with yourself at 9 PM when the kids are in bed. Maybe it isn’t the most fun date but you will get it done in 1/2 the time, I promise.
I hope you can also appreciate that I am writing this blog post instead of doing my laundry. Eek. Send help!
4. Clarify your goals. It is awesome to make goals. Both broad and narrow goals are so needed to keep you going and pushing for that hard-to-reach thing. Make sure, ABSOLUTELY SURE, your goals are crystal clear and the direction you really want to go. If they aren’t, time to revisit them and rewrite your goals. This impacts your ability to be efficient because if you don’t set clear goals you are just going to be spinning your wheels figuring out what you need to do.
Last one- brace yourself…
5. Cut out excess/waste. YIKES! I was saving the best for last. Tell you what, I have a lot of processes that go into my daily blogging life and about a month ago, I got to a point where I knew something needed to give. I was sacrificing efficiency for the sake of the algorithm and I knew it was killing me (figuratively of course!). What did I do? I cut back. It was hard and painful and I am still working through it, but I did it and I feel like the fog has cleared.
Back to the laundry situation, maybe you need to cut back on the amount of clothes you have. Maybe you are washing too many clothes because you HAVE too many clothes. Are you over-extending yourself? Are you volunteering at church, the president of your homeowners association, trying to start a company, trying to shoot creative content, trying to keep up with two active boys…wait. Guys, I need this just as much as anyone else. Something has to give or all of the impacted areas are going to suffer.
Okay, loves, what do you think? Have any other tips for being efficient? I just wanted to let you know that all my SEO markers are in the “good” zone which has never happened on this blog before. This is cause to celebrate. Celebrating something that ACTUALLY works. Git’ it done!
Only love, Keri