4 Steps to Making Stuff Actually Happen, Part II, with Guest Expert Marina Darlow of Systems Meet Humanity

August 14, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Today I’m pleased to welcome back Marina Darlow of the Systems Meet Humanity podcast as a guest expert for the second part of her two-part series, 4 Steps for Making Stuff Actually Happen.

(If you missed it, my interview with Marina on her podcast aired last week. You can check out our interview on the podcast here: http://vision-framework.com/podcast/jenna-avery.)

Marina is a systems expert who focuses on helping people be more productive by putting workable, human systems into place. I invited her to write about how to help us make our work actually happen. 

Enjoy!

4 Steps to Making Stuff Actually Happen, Part II

by Marina Darlow

Hello again, Marina here, thanks to Jenna’s gracious invitation.

Have you chosen to do something exciting since we saw each other last? Maybe a task you’ve been avoiding for a year, looking at you accusingly from the to-do list? Have you started it already?

Good.

Today, in the second part of our series, we’ll see how to keep at a task, and then to finish it, completely and unquestionably. We’ll also touch upon a rarely-mentioned and hugely time-hogging matter — the transition from one task to another.

Part II: Staying On Task and Completing It

As a refresher, there are four stages to each task:

  1. Choosing – deciding which task to start NOW.
  2. Starting – starting is often the hardest thing to do.
  3. Staying on Task – keeping focus and fending off distractions.
  4. Finishing – knowing where you draw the line in the sand and consider something finished.

In Part I, we discussed Choosing and Starting. Today we’ll be covering Staying on Task and Finishing.

Ready? 

Let’s start with Stage 3, staying on task.

Stage 3. Staying on Task, and Fending Off Distractions

“My mind runs at such a fast pace I get so far ahead before one task is finished. I am thinking about the 2nd and 3rd things on my task list way before task 1 is complete, or get deathly bored and skip to something more engaging.”

This is a quote from a client. Can you relate?

How do you stay on task?

Keeping your mind from racing ahead of you and instead staying on task ultimately comes down to how you handle three key variables:

  • Managing your environment,
  • Matching the right task to your available energy levels, and
  • Choosing the right level of stimulation for you.

1. Manage Your Environment. The key idea is to have your environment be as distraction-free as possible. Close the door. Put on headphones. Clean your table. Leave only a handful of tabs open. Hang your personal list of rules for creative tasks somewhere you can always see it.

Important: Don’t make it too sterile. Who wants to work in the OR? Unless you’re a surgeon, of course.

2. Match Your Tasks to Your Energy Levels. Brain-dead? Don’t try to write your next masterpiece. Do admin stuff instead. Find your most productive times of day, and schedule demanding tasks then, whenever possible.

In most cases you already know when you’re at your best: morning, afternoon, or evening.

3. Choose Your Stimulation Levels. This one is tricky and usually achieved through some trial and error. However – there are some guidelines. The “mind-racing” often happens in one of the following scenarios:

  • You’re doing something mundane, or only mildly demanding, and kind of boring.
  • You have a lot on your plate and you haven’t made a very clear list of priorities.

If you’re doing something that doesn’t require all your mental faculties, you’re using the spare brainpower to think about unrelated tasks. Naturally, you start feeling stressed, bored, disengaged, and probably resentful. Time to strategically multi-task.

For example:

  • Listen to a podcast while folding laundry instead of worrying about doing the dishes.
  • Fill out forms while choosing a design (or a venue) for your presentation.
  • Fidget with your favorite spinner while taking meeting minutes.
    It often helps if you have a “lead” and a “supporting” activity. It also helps when activity A is more cerebral and activity B is more physical.

If your mind is racing in a handful of directions, and you feel all of them are equally stressful, time to take a pause, and get back to your plan. Look – what should you be focusing on NOW? This week? Today? Give yourself permission to worry about the later stuff… later.

Stage 4. Finishing Tasks

The key here is to know when the task is finished. How do you know? You define the criteria at the outset.

Some things are easier than others. Clean the office! When is the office considered officially clean? When there’s no more boxes left, just a table, a chair and a laptop.

When is the chapter finished? Hmmm…

When you have said all you planned to say? Sure, but how do you know? Outlines help. Deadlines help too. Sometimes, when you’ve worked on it for 3 hours, after the initial “good enough” version is ready is where you draw the line in the sand.

The important part is to decide ahead of time when you’d consider your task DONE.

Bonus: The Art of Transition

Now that you know how to finish, let’s task about how to transition from one task to another or return to a task after an interruption. “Transition” is a fancy name for making this shift.

Here’s what happens, most often at a subconscious level:

  • You become detached from a task.
  • You experience a drop in your energy.
  • You then re-attach to a new task.

This process requires your brain to get back to higher energy and focus levels, consuming surprisingly huge amounts of time and effort.

Transitions tend to be harder for visionary creatives.

  • It’s harder to start, because of the all-or-nothing perception.
  • It’s harder to stop, because you’ve either been hyper-focusing, or you’re lost in the details.
  • Your emotions – anger, confusion, frustration – cause an unpleasant drain on your mental resources. (That’s actually true for everyone, creative or not.)

So how can we make transitions easier?

Three elements: awareness, planning, and ritual.

  • Awareness. Allow time and energy for transitions to occur. For example, schedule at least 15 minutes between meetings. Give yourself permission to get up from your desk and walk around the office after you’ve finished a tricky piece of code, and before you start the next one. Stretch and sit there for a moment after writing a proposal, and before you make your next call.
  • Plan for transitions. Have a well-defined plan ahead of time. A plan makes it easier to both detach and re-attach, because you know what’s coming next. Anxiety levels go down, and you don’t waste mental energy figuring out what’s next. We talked about this in Part I, around the process of choosing a task.
  • Design “transition rituals.” A ritual can be absolutely anything, as long as it is short and easy. The meaning of the ritual comes from you. But it helps if a ritual is connected to tasks at hand.

    For example: a ritual to transition from research to writing can look like this:

    1. Bookmark the browser tabs you’ll need later.
    2. Close all research-related tabs.
    3. Get up and jump 3 times.
    4. Open a Google Doc.
    5. Click Tools->Voice Typing.
    6. Start with 30 seconds on talking gibberish into the mic.

A ritual anchors us, helping us along on the path from the detachment from one task, through energy drop we experience, and into attachment or re-attachment.

Broadly speaking, there are three types of transitions:

  1. From task A to task B.
  2. From task A back to task A after someone interrupted you.
  3. From task A back to task A after you’ve interrupted yourself.

You may design one transition ritual to rule them all, or you may come up with a different ritual for each type. Or you may want a ritual for each key activity you’re doing – a ritual for transitioning into writing, a ritual for doing house chores, a ritual for getting back on track after someone has interrupted you, and so on.

The rituals you develop will ideally become habits, because when an action is a habit it saves you tons of decision-making energy, or in other words, activation energy.

To Recap

Execution is rarely effortless (otherwise me and a host of my productivity-geeky colleagues would be forced into another line of work). But a strategic approach to your workload at each of the four phases (choosing, starting, staying, and finishing a task) makes the shiny “getting things done” goal tangibly more achievable.

Choosing a task becomes way easier if you follow a plan, broken down into bite-size chunks.

Reducing activation energy really helps to start anything, however daunting – remember the 20 second rule?

A fitting environment coupled with the right stimulation levels keeps us on task and fends off pesky distractions. Finally, (no pun intended) setting criteria for “what’s considered DONE” at the outset is absolutely essential to, well, finishing.

What about the twilight zone between the tasks? Developing quick and easy rituals for mastering transitions will make a huge difference in your ability to make things happen.

Combine these tools and you’re unstoppable.

About Marina

Marina Darlow is a systems expert and a productivity geek. She sees her job as helping impact-driven entrepreneurs get 10-20 more productive hours a week, stop leaking money, and prevent stress-fueled breakdowns.

An engineer by training, Marina came to a realization a couple years ago: working for a conglomerate was not as inspiring as she wants her life work to be. Her quest for inspiration brought her to found Vision Framework, a company that builds small, purpose-driven businesses from the inside, helping entrepreneurs run their companies with ease by putting effective, easy-to-use, and fun (yep!) systems in place.

Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash
Filed Under: Getting Stuff Done, Guest posts, Productivity, Writing Tagged With: , , , , ,

4 Steps to Making Stuff Actually Happen, Part I, with Guest Expert Marina Darlow of Systems Meet Humanity

August 11, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Today I’m pleased to welcome Marina Darlow of the Systems Meet Humanity podcast as a guest expert.

My interview with Marina on her podcast just came online this week and I encourage you to check it out. We had a terrific conversation about systems and writing, including working in small chunks, how emotions can be “signposts,” and more.

You can check out our interview on the podcast here: http://vision-framework.com/podcast/jenna-avery

Marina is a systems expert who focuses on helping people be more productive by putting workable, human systems into place. I invited her to write about how to help make work actually happen for us here. 

Enjoy!

4 Steps to Making Stuff Actually Happen, Part I

by Marina Darlow

First, thanks, Jenna for bringing me to be a guest on your wonderful blog.

As a systems geek with a penchant for implementation coaching for creatives, I love to write about making stuff actually happen.

I’ve noticed that people love setting goals, even making plans, but when it comes to implementing, never mind doing it consistently, from week to week… then we have a problem.

So let’s talk about the real, tangible implementation of the tasks currently residing on your plate. And, hopefully, on your calendar.

There are four stages to each task:

  1. Choosing – deciding which task to start NOW.
  2. Starting – starting is often the hardest thing to do.
  3. Staying on Task – keeping focus and fending off distractions.
  4. Finishing – knowing where you draw the line in the sand and consider something finished.

This two-part series will help you glide through each of these phases, from decision to completion. Today we’ll start with Choosing and Starting. 

Part I: Choosing What To Do and Starting the Task You Chose

What, in your opinion, are the biggest barriers to execution?

In my experience it’s the trio below. I wonder if you can relate:

  1. The all-or-nothing approach.
  2. Time-blindness, or as a client of mine once said “What do you mean what’s my timeline? I have “now” and “not now.”
  3. Trouble with transitions.

If we don’t address this unholy trinity, it can cause a lot of damage: by making you feel “always behind,” getting in the way of making decisions, leaving you overwhelmed, and working yourself to the point of acute burnout. As Jenna mentions in our interview, visionaries are particularly prone to overwhelm. They’re able to imagine the result very clearly, and therefore they can see the gap between “here” and “there” in all its mind-boggling glory.

So how do we overcome these obstacles?

The first step is to dig deeper into the Anatomy of the Task: what it’s made of, where the implementation breakdowns tend to happen, and how to address each scenario.

As I mentioned before, each task has four phases:

  1. Choosing
  2. Starting
  3. Staying on Task
  4. Finishing

Today we’ll look at the first two phases:

Phase 1. Choosing a Task

Last year I did a large round of interviews as research for a course I run.  “Setting priorities” came up as one of the four top challenges my interviewees mention. No wonder – this is where both “all-or-nothing” approach and time-blindness come to mess with your head.

You want to do All The Things, and you’re at loss how long will it take.

If you read Jenna’s blog, or better yet, work with her, I’m going to assume you already have a plan and even that you’ve broken it down into small chunks.

You might even have a calendar that tells you what you’re supposed to do this afternoon at 2 p.m.

Even it’s not an exact task, your choices are now blessedly limited. This is will make your life much, much easier.

However, you might still have two to three options to choose from. What do you do, if no obvious choice presents itself? (Obvious could mean a looming deadline, an especially exciting task, or a task you’ve been prompted to do with someone else. It can also be just an easy decision for whatever reason.)

What do you do if you still struggle to choose?

Here are two good possibilities: 

  1. Choose randomly. Flip a coin, if you wish. Any decision is better than no decision.
  2. Make a good enough decision. For the perfectionists among us – making a “good enough” decision is a huge step forward.

Here’s some surprising motivation: making a decision stimulates the pleasure centers of the brain, increasing dopamine activity.*

In a fascinating experiment, two rats are given cocaine. Rat A had to pull a lever to receive an injection. Rat B didn’t have to do anything, it just hangs out there. Guess which rat gets a bigger boost of dopamine? That’s right, the lever-pulling Rat A.

An active choice creates a change in the brain circuitry responsible for attention, and in how we feel about the action we chose. We choose –> we get dopamine. If we just hang out, like our friend Rat B, we get little to no increase in pleasure.

So make that decision. You’ll feel warmer and fuzzier.

Phase 2. Starting a Task

You’ve chosen a task? Great! Let’s start.

Hmmm… easier said than done. You should’ve seen me shuffling around the house, sitting down, staring at the screen, opening and closing the browser, anything to delay the start of writing this very post. Starting a task, especially if it’s something big or important can be daunting.

Here’s a tactic I’d like to share: the 20 second rule. It was developed by Shawn Achor to build better habits, but I found that the concept works just as well for starting a task.

“I like to refer to this as the 20-Second Rule, because lowering the barrier to change by just 20 seconds was all it took to help me form a new life habit.” ~ Shawn Achor

The idea is to reduce the barrier to a desired behavior. He coined this rule by moving his guitar from the closet to the middle of his room – right next to him instead of just 20 seconds away. “Three weeks later,” he says, “I looked up at a habit grid with 21 proud check marks.”

The task in question can be a part of forming a habit, or a one-time undertaking. Either way, starting a task requires “activation energy,” and our job is to reduce it to minimum.

How?

  • Adapt your environment and design a ritual. If the task in question is something you do often, like writing, editing, or putting books in order, the best way is to adapt your environment and design a ritual. For example, I start most of my writing sessions by talking into a mic. (Voice typing is a fantastic invention!) So I always have my microphone next to my laptop. However, I only plug it in before a recording session. The ritual of plugging the cord into the port signals to me that I’m about to start recording.
  • Start with the tiniest action. If the task is a completely new, or unusual, or just happens rarely, start with the tiniest action. Really small. No, even smaller. You’ll gain momentum. Remember, no “all-or-nothing.” Small, incremental steps are the way. If you’ve decided to clean your new office, start with removing a book closest to the door.
  • Design a “new task” ritual. Another approach you can employ: design “new task” ritual, for everything new or unusual. Making a cup of coffee, slowly and deliberately, does the trick for me.
  • Partner up. If you’re really struggling, find a person to help you kick-start. I can’t think of anything more effective than a friendly sounding board, someone to hold your hand, and frame the here-and-now for starting your task. A presence of another person is… binding. We tend to pull ourselves together, our focus increases, and we suddenly find ourselves perform and stay on task. For instance, when I was floundering, trying to assemble different pieces of information into a coherent article, I ended up calling a friend and begging her to spend a few minutes just listening to me ramble. What do you know, 15 minutes later I had a detailed outline, with all the references in the right places.

A side note: Sometimes, you’d need to mix it up. With the creative crowd, a ritual works for a while, until it doesn’t. You get bored, your brain finds a way around the ritual. So if you feel that opening a blank document and talking gibberish into it doesn’t help you start writing anymore, time to invent a new ritual. Maybe you’d want to choose a radio station with a soundscape to keep you focused, then open a blank document.

Stay Tuned for Part II

That’s it for today. Next time we’ll discuss how to stay on task, and then how to (finally!) complete it. Amazing, isn’t it?

About Marina

Marina Darlow is a systems expert and a productivity geek. She sees her job as helping impact-driven entrepreneurs get 10-20 more productive hours a week, stop leaking money, and prevent stress-fueled breakdowns.

An engineer by training, Marina came to a realization a couple years ago: working for a conglomerate was not as inspiring as she wants her life work to be. Her quest for inspiration brought her to found Vision Framework, a company that builds small, purpose-driven businesses from the inside, helping entrepreneurs run their companies with ease by putting effective, easy-to-use, and fun (yep!) systems in place.

 

*The Upward Spiral: Using Neuroscience to Reverse the Course of Depression, One Small Change at a Time, byAlex Korb PhD
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Filed Under: Getting Stuff Done, Guest posts, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , ,
Race to the finish

On Finishing (and Perfectionism!): A Review of Jon Acuff’s Finish

April 10, 2018 by 4 Comments

Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of DoneI’ve just finished reading Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done* by Jon Acuff. It’s a delightfully irreverent book packed with useful insights — sometimes counterintuitive — about how and why we stop ourselves from finishing (hint: perfectionism is the root cause).

It’s been a particularly fun read right now for three reasons.

First, I’ve been reading it alongside several of my Circle members and we’ve been discussing it on our online site. I have a feeling we’ll be doing this again. It’s a mini online book club. Yay!

Second, I’m just about to lead the goal setting call for the Deep Dive Writing Intensive I’m running (we start writing next week!) so I’m looking forward to incorporating some of Acuff’s principles into our goal setting work. And since the Deep Dive Writing Intensive is designed to help people finish (or make major progress in that direction), it’s particularly apropos.

Third, I know I’m a recovering perfectionist. Or at least a perfectionist who’s trying to recover. (The first step is admitting you have a problem!) So this book was useful on both professional and personal fronts.

Here are some of my favorite takeaways from the book:

  1. The “day after perfect” is the make-or-break day. Acuff says the “day after perfect” often turns up as soon as day two of pursuing a goal. I see this happening with writers who put in a big burst of enthusiastic writing for their first day out (sometimes later), then crash and burn the next day by going into massive writing aversion and avoidance the next day… which can lead to despair and giving up. I much prefer to see writers pacing themselves for the long haul. Acuff makes the point that we have to focus on “moving forward imperfectly” and “trying again… today, tomorrow, or next week.” I’ve always been a fan of “starting over tomorrow,” whenever I get off track with my goals so I’m right there with him.
  2. There’s a difference between commitments and distractions. Acuff makes a useful distinction between the things we’re committed to doing, like our day jobs and our kids, as our commitments, and things like Netflix — and those side projects you turn to when it’s time to write — as distractions. See how simple that is? I found this useful for reinforcing what I do when I write out my Three Big Rocks list, which is to focus on the key things I want to accomplish for my goals that day. I don’t include my standing commitments (taking care of my kids and exercising, for example), because I think of them as “givens,” but prioritize the three major commitments I’m making for the day.
  3. You can look for your own sweet spot with rewards or penalties (or both) when it comes to goal setting. Acuff says, “make it fun if you want it done,” and recommends establishing a reward or a penalty for your goal. I’m more motivated by rewards than punishment, but his writing had me think more about deciding on really fun rewards, and deciding on them in advance. I’m particularly thinking about how I can do this on the daily and weekly scale (one example he gave was how author Sammy Rhoades would reward himself with a Friday afternoon movie for meeting his writing goals, which sounds right up my alley).
  4. Pay attention to where you “hide” from your goals. Acuff describes both “hiding places” — where we go to avoid our goals — and “noble obstacles” — the clever schemes we design to make it so we can’t possibly focus on our goals because we’re serving some higher purpose. I’ve seen so many writers over the years come up with the most fascinating and suddenly highly important non-writing or OTHER writing projects than they originally come into our programs with. This is really worth paying attention to and short-circuiting.
  5. Put your new idea at the finish line for your current one. If you tend to come up with a new idea that’s much more appealing than your current project the minute you start (in the coaching world, we call these Bright Shiny Objects), Acuff recommends making the new idea the project you “get to” work on when you finish your current one. With writing, I recommend what I call a “Project Queue” (tips on how to do this with writing projects are in my free guide, “How to Choose Your (Next) Book“). The core idea is to promise to work on the new idea next. In a sense it even becomes a reward for getting to the end of the current one. Yay!
  6. Aim a little lower with your goal setting. Acuff recommends cutting our goals in half, either by cutting the quantity or output in two, or by doubling the amount of time we give ourselves. This is because most of us are entirely unrealistic about how we set our goals. I’ve personally been setting fewer and fewer goals over the last few years, after seeing myself being unable to attain the multiple, too-fast-paced goals I was aiming for, and I can see right now from checking my 2018 goals list that I may have a bit more tweaking to do after reading Finish, especially after the hard start to the year I’ve had. 
  7. The “day before done” is another place many of us go astray. I’ve witnessed this in my own writing, suddenly becoming apathetic toward a screenplay, telling myself I’ve just lost interest in the story. Acuff identifies three primary fears triggered by a looming finish, including a fear of what happens next (Amazon reviews!), a fear it won’t be perfect, and a fear of “what now?” The key, he says, is addressing these fears with a combination of trusting yourself to figure it out and being open to seeing what happens.

More my favorites in this book are the “secret rules” we use to sabotage ourselves (“If I lose all this weight, then I’ll have to go dancing/be looked at/feel more vulnerable”), choosing what to “bomb” (where you’re strategically choosing to suck at something in order to prioritize your goal), using data to track your goals and “celebrate your imperfect progress,” and many more.

While there were times I wasn’t 100% sure if I thought Acuff was actually writing about resistance and not so much about perfectionism (which I consider to be a subcategory of resistance), I loved what he shared and he has stirred some useful thinking and insight for all of us who have read it. 

Highly recommended. 

* This is an Amazon affiliate link, which means Called to Write will earn a small commission if you purchase the book after clicking on this link, for which we are greatly appreciative!
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Filed Under: Creative Blocks, Getting Stuff Done Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Systems and Focus and Goals, Oh My! … Plus the 3 Necessary Ingredients to Finish a Book or Script

January 19, 2017 by Leave a Comment

I recently read a blog post by James Clear that suggested we forget about setting goals and focus on systems instead. I appreciated his points about how goal-focused thinking can get us into trouble because it can: 1) keep us dissatisfied with the present moment, 2) cause trouble with long-term progress, and 3) create a sense of control we might not actually have. I agree with all of those points.

But I disliked the implication that therefore goals should be forgotten. Like anything else, they are one possible tool to help us create outcomes that we want, and like any other tool, they need to be used wisely. At the end of the article he even says, “None of this is to say that goals are useless. However, I’ve found that goals are good for planning your progress and systems are good for actually making progress.”

So despite the fact that it seems that James and I are in agreement about the value of both goals and systems, since there’s usually a lot of debate around this time of year about whether or not goals or resolutions are “right,” I thought I’d share some of what I’ve learned from working with hundreds of writers on goal-setting and creating systems to help them reach those goals (writing habits).

The truth is that goals and systems can work hand-in-hand quite beautifully. Here are eight thoughts about goals, systems, focus, and finishing:

  1. There’s no one right way to do anything. We each have to find what works for us individually. My way of setting goals might not work for you. Your way might not work for me. You don’t even have to set goals if you don’t want to. But what I’ve seen is that when we focus on something specific (a goal) and pursue it, we are much more likely to achieve the outcome we’re looking for than by hoping it will happen. 
  2. Systems, habits, and routines alone can get us somewhere, but we can get lost along the way when we use them without an intended outcome. I love, love, love systems. And systems in and of themselves are brilliant solutions for consistently problematic issues, like dishes stacking up in the sink and feeling overwhelmed by them (run the dishwasher every night without fail), or laundry taking up writing time or becoming a magnet for resistance (schedule a time for laundry outside your writing schedule and stick to it), or putting off paying your bills (create a routine for how and when you write checks).

    But if you’re attempting to use a system, routine, or habit to achieve a long-term outcome, like writing a book, you actually have to have an outcome in mind in order to reach it, aka a “goal.” You can’t just write every day and hope it will happen (though it may eventually, assuming you keep working on the same thing without fail, which perhaps sounds obvious but can be a big assumption in the world of project-hopping writerly types). I’ve seen too many writers get lost in the weeds of writing without writing toward an end, and lose track of what they set out to do in the first place. Even James actually had an outcome in mind for the system he was using (writing and publishing blog posts twice a week).

  3. Goals help us focus our efforts. Honestly, there is so much going on in our lives, that unless we are super clear about what we are trying to accomplish, it’s easy to get pulled off track. That writing habit can become a pat on the head (“See, I did my writing today!”) unless it is focused. Pick something to finish. Finish it. Pick something else. Finish that. Repeat. Setting a goal keeps your eye on the prize.
  4. Goals set in a vacuum won’t get us very far either. Having stated the importance of goals, I see many writers creating unrealistic goals (“A page a day!” … but what happens when you’re in revisions, are you still going to write a page a day in addition to revising?) or using magical thinking to neglect the reality of their daily lives and ending up frustrated at year’s end because they don’t achieve their goals. Or even worse, they set goals to match what other people are doing, whether or not that’s achievable in their lives (“My friends are all writing six scripts a year, so I should be able to do that too, right? Never mind that they don’t have kids or that their spouses are independently wealthy.”). We have to set goals that work within the context of our lives, even when we’re setting stretch goals for ourselves. 
  5. Goals without systems are likely to fail. Goals and systems work hand-in-hand. Want to finish a book, a good one? You can’t write it without a writing routine or practice. You have to put in the time, show up, and do the work. It won’t happen on its own, and it probably won’t happen well if you’re binge-writing it at the last possible minute. (And even if it does, the cost on your health, well-being, and future writing energy may be higher than you like.)
  6. Use systems and milestones to counteract flagging motivation on long-range goals. When we set very long-term goals (such as year-long goals), they can feel so far away that we have a hard time staying motivated and engaged with them. Having a writing system helps us manage that sense of disconnection from our distant goals, particularly when we combine it with milestone goals. A system helps us keep writing — it’s a practice we’re accustomed to engaging in every day — so we can’t help moving the project forward, as long as we don’t stray to another. We can also hugely benefit from setting shorter term goals (one to three-month goals) that are completion milestones along the way to the finish line. That ultimate finish line can feel really far away, so we can give ourselves something to work the system with in the meantime.
  7. Taking stock periodically helps maintain momentum. Post your goals where you can see them, check in with them on a regular basis, and take stock of what you’ve accomplished so far (add up ALL THE THINGS, even if they seem small) to help you see your progress and stay motivated to continue.
  8. Progress without a finished product isn’t particularly satisfying. Yes, as writers we have to be in love with the process and the practice of writing. Yes, we may never be published or produced. There are no guarantees. Yes, yes, yes. But we can still take our books and scripts to their completion points to the best of our abilities and ship them out into the world, and move on to the next project. We can use goals to focus our efforts so we get to the finish line. Working a system and being productive without focusing on an outcome or a finish line can become an endless loop that doesn’t feel satisfying otherwise. We have to have both.

The 3 Necessary Ingredients to Finish a Book or Script

From what I’ve seen, there are three necessary ingredients to finishing a book or a script:

  1. A specific writing project to work on. Preferably just one long-form project. I rarely see writers completing more than one project at a time successfully. Maybe the true pros can do it. Maybe. My recommendation: Pick one project at a time. And finish it. Then do the next one.
  2. A writing system. You can also call this a writing habit, practice, or routine. It means showing up daily or near daily to write. This is what we do in my Circle.
  3. A goal for completion. Yes, set a goal. I’m a fan of SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Resonant, Time-Bound) because they help us double-check to make sure we’re being specific enough about the who, what, where, why, and how. Set a goal for when you’ll complete your book or script, and while you’re at it, map out the timeline too. 

So put those systems and goals to work, and make your writing happen. I’ll be right there with you.

diamonds

In other news, Make 2017 Your Year To Write is available in the shop and on sale through January 31. Check it out here: http://programs.calledtowrite.com/2017-vision.

 

 

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Ask Jenna: How can I stay more focused on my writing?

July 24, 2013 by 2 Comments
I received some great questions from one of our Writer’s Circle members the other day about staying focused on writing, and she gave me permission to answer them here.
 

The Question

First, here’s her question:
[I’d love some] tips for getting more focused when I’m writing. Several factors are at play, I’m sure, but probably the biggest ones are:
 
1. Internet Addiction. It’s a bad habit, but I am constantly checking for new email messages. Need to shut off the interwebz while I’m working, but I find that even if I do that I still find other ways to distract myself (getting up for water, making lists of other things I need to do, etc.)
 
2. Resistance. The usual. It’s easy to be excited and loose with my ideas when I’m not facing the keyboard, but as soon as I say it’s time to work I freeze up, get distracted.
 
Any tricks for combating these issues?
 
I feel like it’s just a matter of discipline, but even knowing that I still haven’t been able to make better habits. And, even more frustrating, it’s only when I’m working on my own projects — the things I should be MOST excited to have time for. If I’m writing for someone else (with a deadline, for money) then it’s not a problem because it’s just a task to cross off my list, so I do it.”

The Answer

Here’s my answer:
 
First, great questions, thank you. Second, here are some thoughts to get you started with this shifting all this:
 
  • For the internet: Experiment with being super ruthless about the rules (for now) about what you’re allowed to do or not. For example, turn off the internet connection while writing, close the email program, maybe even try the app Freedom to block access to all internet related stuff for a specific chunk of time.
  • Pay attention to all the things you distract yourself with and figure out a system for them so they can’t distract you. This is what I call “You-proofing your writing” (more on this in a future article). Don’t see these “distractions” as failures, but as parts of the puzzle to refine. Examples:
  1. If you typically find yourself getting up for water in the middle of a writing session, design a new routine to get a glass of water before you sit down to write. I keep a bottle of water next to all my writing spaces so can I refill my glass easily.
  2. For to do lists, consider a 5 minute purge of everything on your mind before you start working. Or keep a pad of paper close at hand so you can quickly jot things down and then get back to writing. I like to use the app “Things” to track my ideas and to dos, so I pop into that program and put things on the list if they nag at me while I’m writing. Yes, it’s better not to break concentration. But if it’s keeping me from focusing because I’m afraid I’ll forget it, it’s worth it to me to take a moment to get it down.
  3. Other distractions might include taking phone calls (turn off the phone if you can or have caller ID so you can see if it’s your kid’s school calling), having a messy desk (dump everything in a box!), people dropping by (put a sign on the door that says “Do Not Disturb”), etc. Think about the possibilities, notice when they come up, and see what you can do to anticipate them.
  • Be mindful of the distractions on an emotional level. For example, if email is your downfall, think about why you’re called to it. Are you looking for something in particular? I find that when I’m feeling vulnerable, I’m more likely to turn to email as if I can find solace there. It doesn’t work, and it’s worth seeing that I have an unfulfilled need so I can seek fulfillment for it elsewhere in its proper place. Or notice that you want to get up and get water right when you’re reaching a hard part of the project. How can you support yourself through that moment rather than turning away from it?
  • Understand your resistance: On a similar note, we “freeze up” because we get into flight/fight/freeze mode when tackle our own projects because our projects MATTER to us on a deep level. Being AWARE that distractions and things like finding it easier to work on other people’s projects are all part of the normal fears that come up about writing can make it easier to stick with it and navigate it, using things like:
  1. Setting super small goals so you can more easily talk yourself into doing them, e.g. 15 minutes. Then stick to it. You can increase the time the next day and beyond, but the idea is to create the habit around a strengthened comfort level first. So it might be slower at first but it will pay off over time. It’s a bit like building muscles up over time.
  2. Using a timer to help keep you focused for the duration of your writing session goal. I find I’m much less likely to get up or do other things while I have a timer running. It might seem silly or weird but it’s worth experimenting with.
  3. Talking or coaxing yourself through it. When you notice yourself getting distracted or feeling stuck, tell yourself, “Okay, this is just fear coming up. I know how to do this. It’s just putting one word on the page after the other, and I can even change it later if I don’t like what comes out. Just one word after the other.” Or something like that. Acknowledging the fear really helps. Discipline doesn’t help here as much as self-compassion does.

Your turn

Do you have a question? Submit through my contact form here and I’ll do my best to answer you on the blog.

Also, what do you notice about your typical distraction patterns? Post them in the comments and I’ll toss out some system strategies for you too!

Warmly,

 Jenna

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Are success and failure really opposites?

June 19, 2013 by 6 Comments

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post called “What is failure? What is success?“

As I went to publish the post, I searched for a graphic to go with it, and I was so struck by how the graphics I found showed success and failure as opposites — two things moving away from each other.

Here you can see what I mean:

failure & success

Or this version:

Success and Failure Road Sign with dramatic clouds and sky.

Pretty much the same thing, right?

Here’s another one:

Success And Failure Photo

The problem I have with these graphics is that they defy logic. I guess we’re supposed to assume that at a key crossroads in our lives we have to make the “right” decision in order to succeed. If we don’t make that “right” decision, we’ll fail. And sure, I suppose there are some truly right and wrong answers, but particularly when it comes to something like “success”, which can have so many different relative definitions, how can there always be one clear answer?

As I discussed in my earlier article, Thomas Edison made endless numbers of attempts to perfect his lightbulb. Were those attempts “failures”? Sure, I suppose in some sense they are. But didn’t those “failures” ultimately lead him to success?

And doesn’t make these graphics inherently flawed?

When you think about it, showing success and failure existing in opposite spaces is a perfect example of a “fixed mindset” versus a “growth” mindset, like Carol Dweck writes about in her book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.*

Dweck says that a fixed mindset is a belief that “your qualities are fixed in stone” and creates “an urgency to prove yourself over and over.” This kind of thinking leads us to believe that we only have a certain amount of talent, intelligence or character and there’s nothing we can do to improve it — save possibly making the “right” choices.

This ties right into this black or white thinking of success and failure existing only as opposites.

The growth mindset on the other hand, is “the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts.” This means that “a person’s true potential is unknown (and unknowable); that it’s impossible to foresee what can be accomplished with years of passion, toil, and training.”

If we adopt more of a growth mindset about success, it seems to me, we want a graphic that looks something more like this:

pathtosuccess

Or even like this:

pathtosuccess2

Your turn

What do you think?

I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments on the blog.

Warmly,

 Jenna

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* Affiliate link

 

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The Dreaded ‘D’-Word

September 14, 2011 by 5 Comments

Lately I’ve been talking a lot with my very right-brained, creative, multi-passionate, multi-talented clients and cohorts about the “D”-word.

Yeah, that’s right.

Discipline.

It’s enough to make an artist cower in terror behind legions of excuses and doubts or pipe up with even a little disdain.

(I’m an artist, I like to go with the flow / wait for the right mood to strike / follow the energy / be divinely inspired.)

(Not that there’s really anything wrong with that. As an intuitive, an empath, and a Four, I can relate to ALL of that, and I don’t even think it’s “wrong” per se.)

But the thing is, when it comes to getting our creative work out into the world, we often go to sleep on ourselves instead of doing the work to make it happen.

We go to sleep on those deeper-yet-oh-so-slippery truths that tell us what we need to do our best work.

We forget.

We get busy with other things.

We wait for something that never comes.

Is Discipline Really the Enemy?

It never ceases to astonish me how little actual discipline is practiced when it comes to doing the hard work of creating our stuff.

And by hard, I don’t mean Hard. I mean HARD.

The kind of hard that keeps you massively resisting showing up to your writing or your canvas or your practice development, even when you don’t even realize it (we’ll save the other D-word conversation for another day).

You think you’re too busy, you need to make more money first, or your kids need too much of your attention.

Ha!

The truth is, you need to make a commitment to get your Butt In Your Seat and show up to the creative Big Dream you know you are here to fulfill.

There is simply No Other Way it is going to happen.

One thing we do know is that the artists who take regular action to see their work through to completion are the ones who quietly make it happen.

Here’s the funny thing about all of this.

You don’t need to force yourself to make big, giant, rigid commitments of time and energy to make your work happen.

It’s much simpler than that.

Make discipline your friend and ally.

Just commit to taking regular, consistent, and small steps and you’ll move forward in a sustainable way to seeing your dream become a reality.

Inspiration From Seth Godin:

“While you and I have been busy running down dead ends and wasting our effort, scientists have been busy trying to figure out what actually works. And they know how:

  •     Small steps work.
  •     Consistent effort works.
  •     Group support works.

That’s it. Three things. Set a goal, and in small, consistent steps, work to reach it. Get support from your peers when you start flagging. Repeat.

You will change.” 

Your Turn

For me this looks like screenwriting every weekday for a minimum of 15 minutes and reporting in about it to my Writer’s Circle group.

What does it look like for you?

I’d love to hear from you.

 

Jenna

 

Coming Attractions

~> October 6th. The next session of my Writer’s Circle accountability system starts. Stay tuned for details about how you can participate.

~> November 10th. My next Life Purpose Breakthrough ‘Big Vision’ Group. Details. Only 3 spots remaining.

 


~> This Thursday. Right Brain Business Planning with my buddy Kris Carey. We’re closing in on completion!

~> FRIDAYS & now morning times too. Sacred writing time. The Do Not Disturb sign is up.

 

 

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When “One Size Fits All” Doesn’t Fit For You

July 13, 2011 by 4 Comments

If you’re an artistic type — a writer, painter, poet, songwriter — an empathic, spiritual healer type, or a scanner with lots of passions and interests, you’re not one who’s likely to thrive with a “one size fits all” approach to developing yourself and your work in the world.

Personally, I’ve found that as an artistic, empathic, sensitive, creative being, I do best when I have the opportunity to work with a coach or mentor who will find ways to work with me rather than expecting me to fit inside a specific box or program.

There are so many opportunities out there right to grow and develop your work, it can be overwhelming to decide how to invest your precious time, energy, and money.

Here are a few suggestions I’ll make:

  • Look for people to work with that you admire on a deep level. It’s easy to be swept up in the glamor of what people SAY they are doing. Use your intuitive radar to look beneath the surface to look for a match on integrity, honesty, commitment, and forthrightness in the people you choose to work with as well as looking at what their previous customers have to say about them.
  • Look for mentors who “get” you. There’s nothing more important than working with someone who understands you, what makes you tick, and your vision as much as possible. For me, that looks like working with a mentor who understands what it’s like to be highly sensitive and empathic, who truly likes me and what I stand for, and who “gets” what it’s like to be bright and creative with a million ideas a minute.
  • Look for mentors with expertise and a proven track record in what you are wanting to accomplish. You’ll have a much better chance of success when you work with someone who has been where you want to go. Your mentor only needs to be a few key steps ahead of you to make a valuable difference in what you are up to.
  • Invest at a level that is high enough to motivate you into action but not so high that you put yourself and your future in jeopardy. I’ve seen so many of my colleagues and friends over-invest in high level programs that don’t pay off as fast as they hoped they would, and while some will tell you that investing highly can stretch you into playing a bigger game, it can also be paralyzing if the investment is too out of reach for you financially. Also keep in mind the long term value of the investment in your life as you make a decision.
  • If you work privately at a higher level with someone, choose a mentor who will craft a custom-designed process or program for you that addresses your specific concerns and challenges in a way that feels accurately and highly aligned with what you are facing. Especially at a high-level, “one size fits all” is rarely the right strategy. We are all at different points along the path to our creative destiny so it doesn’t make sense to start at the same place as everyone else.
  • If you choose to work with someone in a group program for cost reasons, make the point to choose a mentor you have a strong resonance with and who has their feet on the ground, not with someone who is promising you the stars. Look for carefully selected groups that kick off with everyone being at about the same starting point.
  • Be willing to dig deep. It’s easy to want to jump to implementation (as I know all too well!), but spending time on the essence and deep think of what you are doing will save you time in the long run. Choose mentors who will go deep with you, hold you to that deeper truth and the big vision, as well as support you to put in the elbow grease and take the nitty-gritty, practical implementation actions to see it through to the end.
  • Last, don’t invest in anything unless you are seriously committed to making it happen. Spending the money does NOT guarantee the results. It won’t do a lick of good if you don’t have the time, energy, and discipline to see it through.

Your Turn

I’d love to hear from you about:

  • What this sparks for you?
  • How can you apply this in your own life?

 

Coming Attractions

~> July & August. Doing Creative Destiny Assessments with visionary creatives ready to claim their creative destiny. Details coming soon.

~> August 4th. My next Life Purpose Breakthrough ‘Big Vision’ Group. There’s ONE spot left. Details. If you’re interested in the next group (probably in September), email my team here and we’ll add you to the list.

~> September. Beta-testing my new writer’s accountability system with a select group. Stay tuned for more info.

 


~> MONDAYS. Right Brain Business Planning with my buddy Kris Carey.

~> FRIDAYS. Sacred writing days. The Do Not Disturb sign is up.

~> Daydreaming about going to Comic-Con next week and getting an autograph from Nathan Fillion. #imsuchageek

~> Re-reading the entire Song of Fire and Ice series by George R. R. Martin so I’ll remember what the heck is going on when I get to “A Dance With Dragons” (can’t wait).

~> Vacationing with my family in August (at least part of it!).

 

 

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It Starts With Who You Are

June 15, 2011 by 4 Comments

Doing something — anything — successfully in the world requires a solid foundation.

What is that foundation?

It’s you.

It’s being clear on who you are, what you do, and why you are doing it.

I’ve been chatting with some of my favorite coach friends and mentors and I’m noticing a trend, at least among the tribe of deep thinkers I hang out with.

I see that out in the world so much of the focus is on how you get stuff done (which I love, don’t get me wrong) and how to have a plug-and-play business or project or widget (not so much), but there isn’t much of a focus on WHO you are, WHAT you care about, and WHY you are doing what you are doing (which I love even more). The focus instead is on how much money you can you make and how fast can you make it, or other more practical, surface level implementation tools.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

But unless you have the foundation in place, unless you’ve claimed your identity and know who you are and who you want to be, all the implementation and practical tools in the world will not serve you.

It starts with who you are.

Hear more on this subject on my upcoming Dreamification Radio broadcast this Saturday, June 18th on claiming your creative identity.

Your Turn

I’d love to hear from you about:

  • What this sparks for you
  • What’s the creative identity that YOU are ready to claim?

Coming Attractions

~> June 16th and 23rd. My Life Purpose Breakthrough series continues. Details.

~> June 18th. Next Dreamification Radio broadcast. Details.

~> June 28th. Mark your calendar and stay tuned for a special, affordable one-time class that’s perfect for anyone who wants to integrate a new behavior or new identity in their life.

 


~> MONDAYS. Right Brain Business Planning with my buddy Kris Carey.

~> FRIDAYS. Sacred writing days. The Do Not Disturb sign is up.

~> Celebrating the 4th of July with my family.

 

 

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Your Precious Time

May 3, 2011 by 14 Comments

I’ve been giving a lot of thought lately to enjoying my life more.

Part of my Life Purpose is to be a Lover of Life — a Venusian goddess of fun, play, delight and savoring. Not something that comes naturally to me.

Instead, I’m more of an all work and no play kind of girl. I easily fall into a more “masculine” approach to my life and my business: I’ve inherited a strong delayed gratification mentality. I push myself hard to get to the outcome I want, delaying rewards. I’m better (there’s always more) at not neglecting the self-care the way I used to, but I don’t get around to the really fun, delicious, Life Savoring that I want to be enjoying. At least not until recently.

In part because of my work with my Artist’s Way Accountability and Support Group and in part because of my own calling in this direction, I’ve been paying close attention to spending my precious time wisely in work or at play.

Here’s what I’ve been putting my focus on, and I’d love to hear how you’re inspired by this and how you decide to use your precious time:

1. Enjoying what I’m actually doing, no matter how simple or mundane.

As an Enneagram Four, it’s all too easy for me to get all dramatic about doing “special” things (you know, grand sweeping gestures and the like) and to poo-poo the ordinary and the mundane.

But those seemingly “little” moments are what add up to the beauty of life — watching my son run around with other kids on the lawn. Folding laundry while listening to my husband read to our little guy. Snuggling up watching a movie together. You know.

2. Prioritizing “Real” Life activities.

As a creative entrepreneur who operates largely in the virtual world (blogging and writing on my computer, speaking with clients by phone or Skype), I’m making a point to emphasize more Real Life experiences too, like spending time in the garden with my hands in the rich soil, creating community experiences in our neighborhood like the fabulous progressive dinner we had over the weekend, or simply sitting in the sunshine on my front porch while holding coaching calls.

3. Turning off the virtual world.

I’m also making a point to unplug more from the iTouch, Twitter, Facebook, and my computer. They are seductively engaging, but I find my time swirling away from me into a vortex of web searches and information indulgences.

4. Taking small daily steps to move me towards my Big Dream rather than looking for single massive actions.

This is a big pitfall for me — I look for giant blocks of time to do one project, but then never QUITE get around to it. I’m learning to take “turtle steps,” as Martha Beck trained coach Jill Winski calls them, consistently. And consistently again.

I received a reminder of this on Twitter via @AdviceToWriters over the weekend from Anthony Trollope (a 19th century novelist):

For me, this includes taking small steps to take care of the business of living, like keeping up with my book keeping and paperwork, as well as the business of living my Life Purpose. That way, I don’t get overwhelmed and feel unable to keep moving ahead with my Big Dream.

5. Choosing a grounded approach.

There’s a lot of conversation around integrating the masculine with the feminine. About being goddesses in our own lives. I agree.

I think it’s also about being grounded in remembering what really matters. For me, that is my inner sense of well-being, my connection with my son, my relationship with my husband, my connections with the communities of people I care about, and fulfilling my Big Dream.

Despite what my mind and ego like to say to the contrary about achieving my Big Dream, it’s not ONLY about “making it happen” or “getting it done.” I want to ENJOY my life along the way, have FUN while I’m doing it, no matter what my current circumstances are — no matter how much money I have or don’t have, no matter how much sleep I’m getting or not getting, no matter how many clients I have or don’t have, etc., etc., ad nauseum.

How are you spending your precious time?

I’d love it if you’d share with me the most powerful way this article has inspired you to think about enjoying YOUR precious time.

 

Coming Attractions

~> May 3rd, 2011. My Artist’s Way Accountability & Support Group continues. Details.

~>June 9th, 16th, and 23rd, 2011. Mark your calendar! My brand new Life Purpose Breakthrough Group event series for getting you back on track with what you were put here to do will be happening on June 9th, 16th, and 23rd — only 4 spots available in each group. Find out more here. Three groups are available: Intuition & Inner Wisdom, Creativity and Big Vision. Which one is yours?

~>May 26th to May 28th, 2011. Attending Andrea J. Lee’s Wealthy Thought Leader event via simulcast.

~>May 28th, 2011. Next broadcast of my Dreamification Radio show on Radio Lightworker. Details. Listen from anywhere in the world to this Internet radio show.

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