Tag Archive for: Cass McCrory

How to Rest and Hustle Over the Holidays

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BONUS FREEBIE: Want even more ways to stay organized, productive and less stressed? Click here to get access to my List-Making Starter Kit. It will boost your efficiency and get you back to doing more of the things you love.

Having just released my book, Listful Living: A List-Making Journey to a Less Stressed You, I’ve been doing a lot of media interviews. 

Since book is all about becoming less stressed, and given the time of year, the same question tends to pop up time and time again – how do you cope with holiday stress?

There’s a lot of pressure this time of year. You’ve got to buy presents, go to social events, travel, organize flights and what about all the cooking? There’s just so much going on. How do you fit it all in?

I’ll answer some of the most popular questions I get here:  Read more

Eat The Frog to Get More Done

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Do you ever get that feeling when you first wake up, the fear of knowing that today you have to do THAT task.

The thing you’ve been putting off for weeks now and the deadline has finally arrived. Maybe it’s paying your bills or deciding which contractor to sign with.

I’m a natural procrastinator myself so I will try to do these kinds of tasks at the last minute and if it has to be done on a particular day then you know I’ll be dreading it.

But there is another way.

A few weeks ago during my Listful Thinking MasterClass my web designer and media strategist Cass hosted my class because she has a very unique way of looking at productivity and I thought they would learn a lot from her. And they did! During Cass’s talk, while discussing the perils of procrastination, she explained her belief that you have to “eat the frog”

What?

Eat the Frog is a productivity concept in which you do the tasks you want to do the least  first. By getting the awful tasks out of the way your burden for the day is lifted and you can actually enjoy the remainder of it. And be more productive because you crossed off something that was looming large.

This simple concept really resonates with people and the fact that it frees up the rest of your day is a built in reward that encourages you to banish those procrastination habits!

Ok so what task will you use to Eat the Frog today?

Put Yourself First This Year

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When did more become better? Longer hours, bigger sacrifices, fewer hours of sleep. This is becoming the new norm for many people and even I get excited when I see an article that claims to have the secret schedule of the most successful people. But the truth is you don’t need to be getting up early to go to yoga, work a 10 hour day then get home and make a freshly-prepared home cooked meal, before you rush of to your child’s clarinet recital. I’m not the only one who has noticed this growing trend, it was a big topic of discussion at the Listful Thinking afternoon tea event and it was raised in my friend Cass McCrory’’s recent podcast interview.

Buying into the “more is more” philosophy can set you up for failure. It can lead to blaming yourself that if you just push a little more then you’ll be able to achieve all your goals. That’s not always necessarily true.

Truthfully, however, working harder can only help you up to a certain point. Beyond that it you may only get diminishing returns. This is the point  when the benefits gained is less than the amount of money or energy invested.

After my appendix burst, I started taking a ‘just enough’ approach. I learned this when I interviewed Heidi Hanna, a stress expert, in my book Listful Thinking but didn’t really apply it til now. She told me to make a “just enough” list instead of bogging it down with lots and lots of to-dos. The list contains only the minimum requirements that I would feel like just enough after completing them.

The free time I have left over can be spent doing things I enjoy or that I want to work on. I find that in the long run prioritizing  my mental and physical well being, instead of just working hard all the time, has been a key part of my success. When you have more room to breath you have to more time to:

  • Think creatively
  • Be inspired with new idea
  • Concentrate on the task at hand

I’m challenging you to put yourself first this week! Make a ‘just enough list’ for today and share it with me on social media. (@ListProducer on Twitter, @ListProducer on Instagram, or here on Facebook) I’d also love to hear about the other ways you prioritize your well being.

Stop Making Lists & Go With The Flow

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I love making lists as you know. I make them for anything that comes up in my day or in my life. Sometimes though, I feel that with all this planning, I’m missing out on stuff. I’m so busy making sure that I follow my roadmap and then I’m no longer living in the moment.

I was probably drawn to Cass, my website designer and marketing strategist, because she experiences this same feeling! She is an efficient worker with a bit of a type A personality like me. Just like me she feels most comfortable when every second of her day is planned.

In a recent podcast interview on The Lively Show, Cass explained how her obsession with planning was stopping her from enjoying her own life. So she set about changing her ways to give herself more time to just go with the flow! I was totally inspired by this idea and I had to share it with you. Read more