Getting Our Shit Together This Season

Do less, accomplish more - with a tool to help!

Hi friends,

As I change gear into the new season after a wispy, juggly summer, I hold all the same dreams, a little chaos, and a lot of love, though with a marked shift in energy.

We are excitedly getting my daughter ready for Uni. I have had to spend more time on the back end of my jewellery business this summer (which pays my bills) - visit Grace and Flora Handmade Jewellery to explore.

I love having two creative businesses, though both tug at me like demanding toddlers, whilst I address personal things like hospital and vet appointments and all that goes with my lovely daughter leaving home.

I am not naturally organised, often laughably the opposite. Life is sometimes like being a kid in a sweet shop, and I’m wide-eyed at the front with a bursting bag. At other times I can feel like I’m buried under a piles of rocks.

You have your work too, and we forget to count the unseen places our energy goes, like caring, maintaining healthy relationships, friendships, homes piled with life-lived laundry, nourishing groceries present or absent, cooking, botch-job cleaning, messy personal admin, all while protecting our health and sanity.

Makings our Dreams Happen

Our dreams sparkle on the ordinary, peppering us with inspiration and hope. We gaze as we fold. We stir our desires into the pot. We battle the admin so we can be free. We stare out of the window at the clouds, despite the deadline. (You may also like these posts: The Road Less Travelled, Setting Intentions to Reclaim Your Power).

It has become the norm in western culture to be too busy. To pile it on.

‘How are you?’

‘I am soooo busy. You?’

‘Yes, soooo busy.’

Then we feel we are failing. We can hardly keep up. All you need is unforeseen problems at work, illness, death, something going wrong in your home, relationship strains, a cost-of-living crisis. Pressures that send the plates we spin flying all over.

When we live in fire-fighting mode for too long, we create a nervous system under threat. This causes anxiety, burnout, poor sleep, more pressure on relationships, poor quick fix groceries or ‘treats’ that only cause more harm like booze, fast food, or excessive shopping.

These are your body’s wake up call for change. Listen.

I don’t want to turn my joyful businesses into a treadmill of doom, and keep turning up the speed. I sometimes have to take a view of my life from outer space to get perspective.

This September, I have to re-establish my boundaries after a messy but lovely summer as I settle back into a routine. I got this useful tool below out to help me.

Put First Things First

“Do less, accomplish more.” Indian proverb

Let’s Establish Priorities

What lifestyle do you want? What matters most? What is there too much or too little of in your life? What are you spending too much time or energy on? Why does everything feel so urgent?

Paid subscribers can download the Life Audit Workbook on the Members Therapy Tools page if you haven’t already. And have you understood your values yet? Knowing these can bring so much clarity.

Problems Preventing Getting Our Shit Together

Avoidance

There is always something else to do, so we need to focus. The grid below keeps our eyes on the prize, bringing the courage and strength to plough through. Let a sense of meaning light your way.

Procrastination into Flow

I am one for writing a to-do list, then doing something totally different as if my life depended on it. I need a little procrastination time, and allow myself to wander in circles before I settle down. The grid helps with this too.

Creating Your Routine Riverbank

Routine reins in procrastination, and we humans crave structure, so we don’t have to reinvent the wheel every day. Rather than feeling routine as a restrictive dam around our body of water, let’s create a riverbank. The boundaries of routine we give ourselves allows our river to flow. Contained and flourishing, our river whirls with a wealth of life and energy. Birds may swoop in over the riverbank’s reeds because we gave our waters edges, and they can fish in our waters.

Do Less, Accomplish More

We want our best work in the world, because the world needs it. We want our homes to feel relaxed. For our bosses to eye us for promotion. For your life to fill with ease and joy. Your kids will look at you in awe. Customers will queue up, and people as cool as you will want to sip tea with you - and you’ll have time.

Let’s embrace these lines and squares for a moment, with open arms and a full heart. Let those dreams sparkle up your life so it shines.

Paid subscribers get transformative journaling prompts, empowering exercises, tools, meditations and workbooks. If you’re ready to embrace your true self with compassion and to flourish, join is!