I want to thank Jess, the creator of Jess LC and Make Under My Life for providing the inspiration of Design Your Life. I happened to stumble upon her blog a few weeks ago and since, I’ve been hooked. Design Your Life is a once a month series that encourages you to share 5-7 intentions for your life with specific examples of how you “Design Your Life” around these intentions. With Jess’s permission, I’m taking a slightly different approach to this opportunity. Instead of sharing 5-7 intentions once a month I’m going to just share one each month. I know that I’ll have a higher success rate by focusing on one area verses several at once. So check back every month to check out my new action item and see the results of how the previous month’s intention was achieved. Please feel free to make comments below and share with me! ~Jess
My first intent is: Healthy living; my battle against time
Eat well. Make time to sleep. Practice {bikram} yoga. Keep running. Value friends. Sounds easy, right? One of my biggest challenges is time. I feel like I never have time for anything (so I think). And I’m really good at coming up with ways to justify the lack of time that I have. Here are a few examples, I can’t cook a healthy meal because i just don’t have time to find a recipe, go to the store, cook and clean up. I can’t get more than 6 hours of sleep because there’s just to much to-do for my business after getting home from my 8 hour day job. I can’t ever get to the yoga studio or hit the road with my running shoes because it takes too much time away from my business and the ever-growing to-do list. I feel that every time I’m invited to join my friends doing something I always turn them down because there’s always a shoot to edit. Time. Time. Time. I’m always wishing I had more of it.
Let’s be honest.
The real problem isn’t time, it’s time management. In order for me to live a healthier life style I must manage it better. Yes, my business is my priority, but if I want it to succeed, I need to be living a healthy lifestyle otherwise it will suffer. So my goal this month is to manage my time better. How am I going to do that? I’m going to start by shutting off my social networking and iChat while I’m editing. Second, I’m going to buy fresh, not frozen, meats so I’m more inclined to cook it right away instead of just sticking it in the freezer when getting home. Same goes for vegetables. As far as time management, instead of weighing myself down by thinking I have to edit every night until my eyes go crossed, I’m going to set a time limit for each session. That way I’ll be more productive while editing because one, I’m not being distracted. Two, I’ll be more motivated to work efficiently because I know that I’ll also be able to have some time for the other areas of my life, like yoga and spending time with friends.
June’s Check In
06|23|11 ~ So far, I’d say things are going really well! I’ve been passing by the pre-made, frozen food at the grocery store and adding more fresh fruits, vegetables and meats to my cart than I normally would. Last night I made a delicious chicken salad topped with shaved almonds, snow peas and white beans, yum. I’ve also noticed that because I shut off my social networking while editing I’ve been able to edit more photos and achieve other general business tasks in a more efficient workflow. Last night, I completed a session that I had scheduled to be finished this weekend. What a great feeling to have accomplished it three days earlier than anticipated just by turning off my social networks for a few hours a night while I edit! Overall, I am very pleased with the progress I’ve made in the past couple of weeks having joined Jess’s Design Your Life challenge. I’m excited to continue with June’s intentions and start July’s. Stay tuned for more updates!
by Jessicahannon
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