What an amazing week! I talked in my daily podcasts how I have been utilizing Michael Nobbs’ trick of working in 20 minute chunks of time. This week I have been utilizing my Dilettante’s Diary to write down the creative tasks I want to focus on and then setting my timer for 20 minutes to work on them. Some of the projects are things that I want to do, love to do when I am doing them but somehow they always get pushed aside when life gets busy. When I sit down to do my work, I may sigh and think, “but I don’t know what to write!” Yet I quickly remind myself it’s just for 20 minutes and then I can move on to something else.
The sense of accomplishment that is coming from having a book coming to fruition, an online store that is growing and a creative life that is expanding is indescribable. In the past week I have been able to give attention to all the ideas that whirl around in my head, give them a place to come out and dance and look back at all I have done at the end of the day!
I do know that I am fortunate to have the time and energy for 20 minutes but I cannot express enough how 5 minutes would make a difference! We all have 5 minutes within our day to do something that moves us-and aren’t we worth it? I can tell that this idea is becoming quite addicting for me and I spoke in a podcast this week about how I wondered if I could overdue this concept. (I am really, really good at overdoing!)
I imagined myself, with a daily list of 100 items all chunked out in 20 minutes each. I would be frantic, rushing from one to another, timers blaring!
Then I grounded a bit and had another thought.
I looked at the “20 Minute Magic List” as I am now calling it, as a special list reserved for all the amazing things I want to invite into my life. Things like walks in the woods, painting, music, reading, sitting on the front porch swing. Things that allow me to pause, reconnect and grow. These are the things that make be better at the BIG things in my life. (Work, friends, family)
To get on the list, I imagine myself handing out little tickets and only the exciting things, the things that light me up or the things that I know are for my highest purpose get on the list. So for example, I can assure you that 20 minutes of kickboxing will not be on my list. 20 minutes of yoga and stretching though is. And the best part is that it changes from day to day. Each morning I can wake up, take an inventory and decide what gets a ticket into my life.
And then, like magic it’s there!
Why not give it a try? You will be amazed at the time you can find in your day (even 5 minutes!). However if you find that you just cannot find the time then maybe a different exercise is for you.
Write down every single thing you do during the day and how long you spent doing it.
Do this for 1 week and at the end of the week take inventory.
Rank all the items on your list with a coding system. You can use whatever you like but here are some examples:
HT: (Have To)-things ranked as a HT would be: sleeping, eating, work, paid bills
OT: (Obligated To)-these are the things that you do because it’s expected not because you want to do them. The things that if they never came up you wouldn’t do them.
WT: (Want to) hopefully you have lots of these!
Once you see how you are spending your time you may realize that you do in fact have space for some magic. If you only made a little room 🙂
Until next time…
-Michele aka The Dreaming Dilettante