Spontaneity in Structure: Attaining Goals with Flexibility

Ever felt that your extreme planning, or lack there of, is turning into a hindrance? In today's episode, we journey through my experiences of how rigid planning curtailed my decision-making prowess. We'll discuss how the right balance of structure and spontaneity in your scheduling can enhance your daily routine and help you avoid the pitfalls of missed deadlines and lack of focus.

Find out how to shape your schedule around your goals and plan on a quarterly or yearly basis. Discover how aligning this practice with your business and personal life can result in increased confidence and goal attainment. We also talk about crafting a flexible yet robust plan that can adapt to the unexpected twists and turns of life.

RESOURCE MENTIONED:
Schedule Accelerator: theproductivityimpact.com/schedule-accelerator

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:51

Hello, hello, amazing humans, welcome back to Neurodivergent Bites. I am your host, Cara Lee, and today we are going to be talking about the extreme importance of planning ahead, and I'm going to share with you a little bit of my story and then also some fun action steps that you can take to be able to start planning ahead. So I used to be an extreme planner, like if it wasn't on the calendar, it didn't happen. If I hadn't thought it through, it didn't happen. But I actually realized that was a little bit over the top for me and what I realistically needed in my life and in my business. And so, in being an extreme planner, I actually personally lack spontaneousness or the ability to make decisions quickly and feel confident about them. And so through my journey, I've actually became what I call a planner mixed with spontaneousness, and so this allows me to have a forward motion. Right, I have a plan, but I also leave enough room for spontaneousness, right. So the flexibility to move things around, you know having fun and, like I said, spontaneousness that I never had in my life, and so that actually helps with the dopamine and like all the fun stuff, because things changing no longer put me in a panic, because I have created enough space that it doesn't Alright. So blank space on the calendar is huge. I'll be talking more about blank space in your schedule and on your calendar in a future episode, so I'm super excited about that one. So make sure you subscribe, if you haven't done so already, because we because I drop one amazing new podcast episode every single freaking week. Okay, so we're gonna get right into it. So I'm not a person that likes to focus on the negative, but we're gonna start there, because I want you to acknowledge and become aware of some of the patterns in which you might be experiencing because of not planning, you know, setting in place a plan that will allow you to know what has happening for the future, right, and so some of these things that you might be experiencing if you are not a planner at least in business or personal, really either is you're probably missing deadlines. Now, I understand we are neurodivergent and missing deadlines. It's just a part of it and I understand that, and we can also hit a lot more deadlines when we have a plan, and so missed deadlines can be a thing of the past or very rare, alright. So this means that when you're missing deadlines, you don't have enough time to actually complete the task at hand. Alright, that's normally what that would mean.

Speaker 1: 3:42

However, there's also a lot of other things that could be in that. It could be a lack of motivation, so you're not even you know putting, you're not even implementing things. It can be that you have very little focus right. Focus and motivation, I think, are very similar in terms of, like, actually doing the things right. You might even lack some confidence in your ability to do the things, and so it's crushing your focus, it's crushing your motivation, it's not allowing like, not enough time, you know, whatever, I'm not confident in my abilities anyway sort of thing like that, and so we don't want to do that. But also, if you have a team or you're wanting to outsource anything, not having proper time to be able to delegate tasks means that it's probably either you're gonna have to end up doing all yourself, or that person or that team is not gonna have enough time to properly execute what you desire, and so that leads to improper delegation, and so you could also feel very stressed. You could feel very rushed, right, when we don't have a plan. You could also feel like you're wandering.

Speaker 1: 4:54

Okay, someone once told me it's not necessarily the how. It's the what, what or where are you going. Okay, what or where are you going? And the how will figure itself out. And, as a planner, the how is very. It's hard to figure that out. But as, mixing that with spontaneousness, now I'm like, okay, it is all going to fall into place, it's all going to feel in alignment, and as long as I know my desired outcome, then how I'm going to get there is going to work itself out. And it's by asking the right questions, it's by, you know, actually starting the plan, because when you start the planning, you actually end up starting to see all of these other things that could be potential problems, potential content, potential, like so much potential period around what you are working toward, this goal, right, they could even identify how this goal might be unattainable or unrealistic.

Speaker 1: 5:52

Okay, the planning process is so important for business and personal gain. Okay, and so when you have a plan I'm going to talk business, but this can also be applied to personal right, your personal life, because they're intertwined whether we like it or not, right? So planning, having a plan for your business, whether that be the next lunch, whether that be how we're going to reach out to people and gain more clients. You know whether that be. You know from what coaching program do we want to be a part of? Like what is happening in the future? Like, plain and simple. And so when we have a plan, it allows for flexibility. Okay, as an order of origin, we need flexibility because, like more than your typicals, our energy is constantly going up and down, and so flexibility needs to be a thing, which means we also need to have blank space in our schedule and in our calendar.

Speaker 1: 6:56

Like I said more on that in a future podcast episode, having a plan reduces stress because at least we know where we're going, at least we know where we should be focused. Right, what do we have to create? What do we have to do? Who do we have to bring in? Right, it reduces the stress. Do we have enough time? Do we have to scale it back Because we don't have enough time? It answers and brings up so many questions that we get to be the problem solvers for and solve before they even become a real problem. Having a plan boost your productivity tenfold. Okay, and that's because you know where you're going and, as you're taking one step after another, the how of how you're getting there is revealing itself, okay, which it's boosting that productivity through you just simply taking action, you're not just spinning your wheels. This also allows you to have, plain and simple, more time to execute there.

Speaker 1: 8:05

I used to be one of those planners, especially early on in my business, but I was like, oh, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna launch something on Friday. It's Monday, like I'm just gonna launch something on Friday. But as I've gained more knowledge about how business and the consumer and all that stuff work and my own brain, that is completely unrealistic. It's almost guaranteed to flop in many of them have. But now that I do it much more planned out and there's real strategy behind it and you know like it has been, and there's more time right, there's more time to actually execute it the right way I've had far better results. So in that I contribute that to learning, but also planning. Okay, literally, with that said, you're more likely to hit your desired goals. You're more likely to, you know, not be stressed out during a launch. You're more likely to have those humans signed up because you made a plan.

Speaker 1: 9:06

Okay, this also involves a lot of other things, right, like a content strategy, you know, maybe testimonials, you know how much do you? Are you relating to your audience Like? It's not just in the plan, it's in the execution of the plan, it's in the research of the plan right? A plan has many steps right, many, many different sections in the plan right, and so when we actually execute all of those right, we make the plan. It's a lot easier to pivot if the plan doesn't quite go how you thought it was going to, when we've done the research and when we've planned ahead and we've allowed enough time, and when we have this plan, like I said, it allows flexibility. But it also allows flexibility. It reduces the stress, it allows you to have more time right, you're more likely to hit goals, but it also allows more focus because hello, shiny object syndrome is a real thing and it happens quite frequently. So at least we have a plan and we have the motivation and the desire and, oh my gosh, this is super exciting. A hell of a lot easier to focus when it's a hell of a lot easier to focus. It's a hell of a lot easier to have motivation. It's a hell of a lot easier to actually implement the things right. It's a hell of a lot easier to not have things make you panicked and stressed out.

Speaker 1: 10:20

One of the biggest things about actual planning is that you're not left with weeks that are like so packed full with everything that you can't focus on what you actually need to do, right. So you're planning out launches. You're planning out when you want to be on vacation. You're planning out holidays. You're planning out you know slower times of the year. Maybe you know you're able.

Speaker 1: 10:48

This this allows you to shape your schedule in your business and in your personal life around what your goals are, and that's simply by planning ahead. This could be quarterly, this could be a yearly, this could be both right. How I tend to do it is I go what do I want to do for a year? What where I want to start there. Sometimes I just go what do I feel like doing this next quarter? Because sometimes a year is too far away. I'm like I don't know so many things could change, right.

Speaker 1: 11:19

So you can have a rough outline for the year or maybe some things you want to do throughout the year and then actually plan it by quarter. That's actually how I usually do it. So I let's say, like what I want to do for next quarter? Right, I'm gonna look at my schedule first what's already on there, like, if I got a big vacation one of those weeks, right, I'm gonna have to take that into account. Right, if I've got holidays coming up, like we do right now, I'm gonna have to take that into account. What I'm launching, what I'm having on my plate, what I'm saying yes to so many things, it's going to shape your schedule by planning things out. Okay, I'm not gonna have a big launch the week on vacation, because that doesn't make sense, but it might end up being that way if we're not careful.

Speaker 1: 12:01

And then my favorite part about this okay, about having a plan and a strategy is that it allows me to feel confident that I am genuinely serving my clients and all the people that love me and my vibe, that I'm genuinely serving them because I have a plan and I've taken the time to take it seriously and actually then execute it. Okay, I have learned this. Okay, I have learned that I feel confident and I feel amazing and I feel very in alignment and genuine when I actually take the time to plan and I'm not just throwing things up there. I'm not just throwing things out. I'm not worried about. You know, insert what you're worried about, right, I'm not worried about things because I have a plan, my plan allows flexibility, my schedule allows flexibility and I don't have to be so stressed out. Plain and simple. I feel like I'm a recovering planner. Right, I said I'm a planner mixed with spontaneousness. Those two things do not go together like that's just be real, but has been crazy valuable for me. To see how a planner turns spontaneous type of person has actually been the best thing for me, especially because I'm married to someone that's definitely not a planner and is totally spontaneous. So it allows our two personalities to collide and that we've been able to support each other and that respect. But that's a whole another topic.

Speaker 1: 13:43

So planning ahead is all in the strategy and the actual plan Okay. If we don't take the time to do it, things are going to pass this by. We're not going to feel confident. People are going to see that we're not going to have time. We're gonna be super stressed out. We're not gonna be focused. We're gonna lack motivation. Okay, but when we actually do the plan, we're gonna have flexibility. We're not gonna have as much stress. We're gonna be motivated Like, we're allowed to be able to focus. We're gonna have a schedule that doesn't make us like pass it out at night because we're so exhausted. Okay, that is the goal when we have this plan and we're taking into account the other people that are influencing the plan, the other people that are taking part in the plan Right, if you have a team, you have kids, you have a spouse or partner right, we're taking into account all these things when we create the plan.

Speaker 1: 14:52

What is your capacity as you create this plan for the next month, quarter year? What does it look like? Right, how much flexibility does this plan allow? There's so many things you can take into account, and a lot of people talk to me. They're like great, like, how do I create the plan? Like, how do I even put blank space in my calendar? Like, how in the world do I do this thing where I'm not so stressed out and I can actually, you know, feel good and confident in my business?

Speaker 1: 15:24

Well, for one, it does take time, but the first step is to actually sit down and try to create a plan. But even before you can do that, before you can create a plan in your business, you have a plan in your calendar, right In your schedule. What do you already have on there? Now, how are we going to actually do the work. If you have those things down first, creating the plan becomes so much simpler, and so I'm inviting you today to the Schedule Accelerator, where you're going to learn my T3 Flex framework that I use and I have passed on to my clients, for actually being able to get your schedule organized, feeling good and you being able to sit down and actually execute these tasks, actually check those things off, check that box on those tasks, and feel really, really good about it.

Speaker 1: 16:19

Okay, we're not forcing, we're allowing flexibility, all of that fun. Okay. So if you want to check it out, go ahead and head to the show notes and go ahead and sign up. It's free, and I would love, love, love, love for you to be able to join us. Yes, there'll be a replay, as I always get asked. It'll be a limited time. Replay Like this is the first step for you to be able to actually create this plan because, as with a lot of things, there's always something else standing in front of your goal and it's never it seems to never be the thing that we think it is. So you might be like, well, I can't plan things, but in reality, it's because your schedule is such a hot mess that you can't Like. You literally can't. You're right, but we don't want that. We want it to be where you can Take that time, create that plan and be able to feel really good and confident and amazing about it. Right, until next time you're amazing.