3 Scoops of Life vol 4

Experiment

This month I tweaked a few things that weren’t quite working. And I’m happy to say the tweaks worked.

Before we get into it, though, what is 3 Scoops of Life? It’s my monthly series where I simply highlight three good things in my life.

• One is professional.
• One is personal.
• One is an encouragement.

Watch on YouTube:

Scoop 1: Professional

I’ve been struggling to fit in my B project each day, and I finally acknowledged it’s because I’d been ignoring the basic premise of the block schedule. When I assign a task to a block of time, I have to quit doing that task when the time is up. Groundbreaking concept, I know.

I decided to experiment with it.

The problem for me was having word count goals AND a set block of time to achieve them. I told myself I could only work on my A project in the blocks I’d allowed. Then I forced myself to switch to my B project and later to my Block C tasks.

Basically, I had to let go of my word count goals. I trusted I would get enough done each day to justify working on my B project. And you know what? I did. It’s still a little scary for me to work for X amount of time each day rather than writing X amount of words each day, but I know it will pay off in the long run. My A and my B projects will get done. Nice!

Scoop 2: Personal

Sticking with the time management theme…

I’ve had a rotating list of dreaded chores I’ve been avoiding for a long, long time. Near the top? Deep cleaning my kitchen. Since last month’s success with “Effortful over Effortless” (a concept I learned from Laura Vanderkam’s book, Tranquility by Tuesday–you can read about it in “3 Scoops of Life vol.3“), I decided to brush off an older concept that had worked for me long ago.

This one is the “Power Hour.” Gretchen Rubin came up with it, and I can’t remember which book of hers I read it in. I’ve read all her books, except for her latest on the senses, and I highly recommend them all. Anyway, she talks about choosing a time and setting a timer for one hour to work on one of those dreaded chores. Then keep chipping away at them for an hour at a time until they’re done.

I listed all the yucky things I’d been putting off, and I set a timer and picked one. I’ve been doing this for about a month, and in that time I’ve deep cleaned my entire kitchen, dropped stuff off at Goodwill, filed paperwork I didn’t want to deal with and even made a small repair that took all of seven minutes.

It feels really good to cross these things off my list. All because I experimented with the Power Hour.

Scoop 3: Encouragement

Experiment. Yes. Experiment.

The reason I was able to make progress on my B project this month was because I was willing to experiment with how I was approaching my day.

The reason I was able to make progress on completing dreaded chores was because I was willing to set aside an hour once a week. I figured if it didn’t work, no biggie. But it DID work. And I feel so much better!

I hope you’ll experiment with whatever needs tweaking in your life, whether professional or personal. And enjoy this gorgeous time of year! I know I will

‘Til next month…