by Elyse | Dec 22 | Leadership
One predicted trend for the next year is making space for joy.
There will be increased interest and focus on prioritizing and cultivating a mindset of joy.
How much would your life be improved if you made space for joy?
Would you be calmer, and more present with your family?
Would you be more resilient when it comes to challenges at work?
Would you be friendlier, more agreeable, and have more harmonious relationships?
To make space for joy, here are some things you can do:
1. Clean out your space
To make room for something new, you need to get rid of whatever is in its place now. There is a great analogy about needing to move your old couch out of your home before you bring in your new couch.
This is making space for something newer and better by letting go of the things that are no longer serving you.
You can do this with your physical space by cleaning out your closet and junk drawers. You can also do this with your mental space by letting go of old thought patterns that are no longer serving you.
Take an inventory of what is going on around and intentionally decide on what you want to keep with you for the new year and what you want to let go of.
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2. Spend time doing something you love
Taking the time to pick up an old or new hobby can be a great practice for cultivating joy. By doing something that you love, you can engage yourself in new and creative ways that feel good.
By taking the time to do something that you love, you will spend more time automatically in a state of joy.
3. Practice the feeling of joy in your body
Making space for joy in your life will lead to other positive outcomes as well. But, it is not always easy to feel joy or to sustain the feeling of joy.
When you feel unadulterated joy, it can bring a sense of foreboding. Brené Brown calls this foreboding joy. It is the familiar pattern of being uncomfortable feeling joyous because of the fear that is it not going to last and something bad is about to happen or that the other shoe is about to drop.
By making space for joy, you can practice holding the feeling of joy for longer and teaching your body that it is safe to feel this way. This way, you will be able to feel joy for longer periods of time and be able to enjoy the feeling of experiencing joy instead of being fearful that something will happen that will take the feeling away.
4. Reminisce about times in the past that you have felt joy
One way to experience joy now and also get your body used to feeling joy is to remember times in the past when you have felt joy.
By recalling those memories, you can re-experience the joyous feelings in your body and you can practice feeling joy without the fear of what will come afterwards.
5. Honor Your Decisions
Making space for more joy in your life by honoring your own decisions. Take some time to think about what you want, why you want it, and get to know yourself on a deeper level so that you can be more comfortable making decisions that you truly want.
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This means listening to your desires for your life instead of doing what other people want you to do or doing things out of guilt or obligation. By doing things that you want to do and honoring your own decisions, you will naturally feel more positive emotion in your life which will help cultivate joy.
A Final Note
Joy is a feeling that is currently available to you right now in this moment. My hope for you is that you take these suggestions and find a way to make space for joy for yourself this year.
by Elyse | Dec 16 | Leadership, Planning
Leaders need to reflect on the past year as the year ends. If you are planning, strategizing, and setting intentions for the next year, it is essential to reflect on the past year before making new plans for the future.
Why Reflect on the Past Year
There are many reasons to reflect on the past year. Some of those reasons include the following:
- creating space between this year and next year
- addressing things that need to be changed
- celebrating what has been accomplished
- planning for next year
Reflecting on the past year creates a separation between the current year and the following year. It is a crucial distinction in your mind to close one year before going into the following year, especially if you want to make significant changes.
Reflecting on the past year also helps you decide what you liked about this year and what you want to change moving forward.
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Reflecting on the past also helps you pause and recognize the things that you have accomplished and take a moment to celebrate those accomplishments. It also gives you a framework for creating a plan for the new year.
How to Reflect on the Past Year
You can use this exercise to reflect on the past year of your life, the past year for your company, your team, or your career.
You can start by just thinking about the past year. The things you did, the places you went, the people you saw, who you spent time with regularly, what your habits are, just anything but keep it contained to within the past calendar year.
If you need help jogging your memory or more specific questions, you can use some of the journals prompts from 75 Leadership Journal Prompts for Career-Driven Women. Or you can use your calendar to remind you of what you have done in the past year.
Then, start asking yourself specific questions to reflect on the past year. Ask yourself:
- What went well last year?
- What am I proud of?
- What didn’t go so well last year?
- What do I want to improve?
- What things do I want to continue doing next year that I am already doing?
- What do I want to let go of?
- What was the most significant accomplishment in the last year?
- What was my favorite memory of the last year?
- What brought me the most joy in the last year?
- What brought me the most pain in the last year?
- What do I want to try in the new year?
- If it was one year from today, what would I be happy with accomplishing?
- How are things different than they were one year ago?
Could you spend some time thinking about specific answers to these questions? It can also be helpful to list out what you know to be true about your circumstances as separate from how you feel about them.
Example: I’m in a job I hate with people who don’t respect me. This would be your thought versus the facts of the circumstances: I’m an account executive at X company. I have worked for this company for three years and have yet to get a promotion or a raise. I feel resentful.
Plan for the Future
After you have taken time to think about the past year, your accomplishments, what has changed, what has stayed the same, what you want to continue doing, and what you want to change, you can start planning for your next year.
- What is my vision for the new year?
- What is my current plan for reaching my vision?
- What will stop me from reaching my goals?
- How can I put a plan in place to overcome the things that will stop me?
A Closing Note
Reflecting on the past is important for all leaders. It is important to take some time to think about what is working, what is not working, what you want to change, what you want to try to do differently and how you could go about making those changes.
If the past year didn’t go the way you wanted it to, that doesn’t mean that next year has to go that way too. You are capable or making a plan or changing and of reaching your goals.
Make sure you grab the free guide: 3 Ways to Feel Less Overwhelmed at Work if you want to think differently about your role at work.
by Elyse | Dec 9 | Planning
You might be thinking, “why would I ever want to keep a time journal for 24 hours? What good would that do me?” And I’m here to tell you; it will do you great. This is why you should keep a time journal for 24 hours.
First of all, what is a time journal?
A time journal records how you spend every minute of your time for a set period of time. In this case, 24 hours. Yes, down to the minute. Not just the chunks or hours or estimates of what you think you have been doing with your time (or what you are planning to do with your time) but down to the actual minute by minute record of how you spend the next 24 hours of your life.
What are the benefits of having a time journal?
Having a time journal can help you be honest with yourself about where you spend your time. It will give you an accurate representation of how much of your day you spend working, eating, scrolling on social media, taking care of household tasks, commuting, socializing and anything else that you do.
Click here to download the free guide: 3 Ways to Feel Less Overwhelmed at Work.
It will help you see visually if the way that you are spending your time reflects the values and goals that you have. If you want to have a value of spending time with your partner every night but instead see that you spend seven minutes with them and two hours scrolling through the newest videos on TikTok, a time journal will help you see that.
Another benefit of using a time journal is for tasks that you feel like you are just too busy to do, like loading the dishwasher, sending that one follow-up email or putting something away. When you are creating a time journal down to the minute and you are timing how long it takes you to do these tasks, you can see in concrete, hard numbers how long they actually take. Case in point, washing the dishes typically takes me 3 minutes, even though I always feel like I don’t have enough time to do them right now.
A time journal also helps you feel more productive and less busy. It shows you how much you are actually getting done every day. It can show you how few minutes certain tasks do actually take and the sheer amount of stuff that you can get done in a day.
It will also show you if you are spending way too long on a task. If you have a report that you need to create every week and it is taking you three hours when it should really only take you forty-five minutes, a time journal will bring some awareness to how long it is actually taking you. This can be the first step to either getting rid of the task completely, delegating it, automating some part of it or changing it in some way so that it is not taking up so much of your time.
So, how do I create a time journal anyways?
There are two ways to do this. The first one is to write down your day and how you spend your time minute by minute by hand.
7:00-7:05 get out of bed and make coffee
7:05-7:25 have coffee and scroll through social media
7:25-7:39 take shower
7:39-7:42 get dressed
7:42-7:47 pack up work bag and leave apartment
7:47-8:10 commute to work
You want to include everything you do in a day in a time journal.
The other way to do a time journal is to use an app. I use the app Toggl Track for this purpose. Toggl Track is an app built for tracking workflow time for different projects. I set up different projects in Toggl to account for different ways I spend my time during the day. There is a project for working, commuting, health, family, excess, household management, neutral, planning, personal, sleep, social, and reading.
Household management is anything that has to do with keeping a household running: washing dishes, doing laundry, making the bed, tidying up.
Neutral is for things that I do everyday: showering, getting ready, etc.
Personal is for things that I want to do like exchanging a pair of jeans for another size or engaging in a hobby.
Excess is for anything I am doing that I want to cut back on like scrolling social media or watching too much tv.
You can create projects as you start to enter tasks you are doing into your time journal and group things together as you see fit into different categories. Depending on what you do, you may want to split your working time into different categories such as meetings, admin work and revenue-generating work.
Make sure that you log every minute of a 24 hour period. Also, pick any day to do this. It doesn’t have to be a work day or a weekend or a special day or a day where you think you are going to be most productive. The best day to pick is right now because doing a time journal will give you so much insight.
Once you have completed a time journal for 24 hours, analyze it.
If you did your time journal by hand this may take a little longer but if you used Toggl Track you will be able to see a visual representation of how you are spending your day grouped by the different projects that you created.
You may be surprised by how much time you are spending on social media or how few minutes it actually takes you to fold your laundry.
Awareness is the first step to change so if there is any way that you want to be spending your time differently, a time journal is a great first step.
A Final Note on Time Journals
A time journal is a great way to see how you are spending your day, to see how long things actually take you and not how long you think they take you, to see if you are living according to your values and to help you plan your future.
by Elyse | Nov 29 | Planning
With the end of the year upon us, it is crucial to prepare for Q4. There will be end-of-year reports, time off of work, and holiday parties. Preparing ahead of time can help make Q4 go more smoothly and allow you to enjoy the time away from the office instead of feeling overwhelmed and busy. Here are 5 ways to prepare for Q4.
1. Set aside time to plan
Planning is an integral part of reaching goals and reducing overwhelm. Yet, it can feel like with so much to do, there needs to be more time to set aside and make a plan.
Making a plan allows you to work out mistakes on paper instead of making mistakes while doing the work. Planning also forces you to make decisions ahead of time which will help you make better decisions and reduce daily overwhelm.
2. Prepare for time off work.
Make sure you put in your time-off request early and take care of any issues. Once your time off request is approved, plan for the time you will be away from the office. Prepare ahead of time, ensure that your colleagues know you will be out of the office, and take care of any contingencies that need to be put in place.
3. Decide ahead of time what you will be doing during Q4
The more decisions you make ahead of time, the less overwhelmed you feel in the moment. Remember, you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. So, if something is on your to-do list out of obligation, you can choose not to do it or not attend.
The other decisions you can make ahead of time are where you will be spending your time, how much money you will be spending, and how much you will be eating and drinking.
Decisions ahead of time can also be used for who you will be getting gifts for, how much you will spend on gifts, what you will bring to parties, and even what events you want to attend. Having it all on your calendar will help you be in the moment for the things you choose to do.
It is much easier to say no to eating just one more cookie when you plan only to have two cookies that day. Planning these decisions ahead of time also help you feel in control and like you are the director of your life instead of feeling like overeating or busying is something that happened to you.
4. Spend time reflecting on what went well over the year
It is important to reflect on what went well the past year so you can bring those positives with you into the new year.
The end of the year is a great time to reflect on what went well and what didn’t. You can make better decisions for the upcoming year by reflecting on the past year.
5. Carve out extra time for overflow
In the schedule, you make for yourself, ensure you add more time if you run into a problem requiring more time than you set aside.
For example, maybe you decided you would get your aunt a pair of slippers from Target for a Christmas gift and allotted 40 minutes on your calendar for this. But, when you drove to your closest Target, they were out of slippers. So, you had to go fifteen minutes to the next Target to find them, and the task took you an hour and a half instead of the initial 40 minutes. If you didn’t build in buffer time and are already supposed to be on your next task, you will feel chronically behind and like there needs to be more time to get everything done.
That is why creating specific overflow time is crucial so you can take care of things that took longer than initially expected.
A Final Note
These are five ways to prepare for Q4 and lessen the overwhelming and busyness that is typical at the end of the year. I hope that at least one of these tips helps you have a more calm and enjoyable Q4.
by Elyse | Nov 21 | Leadership
Journaling can help to increase your self-awareness and emotional intelligence. It can give you insight into what you excel at, where you struggle and where you want to improve. It can provide insight into your mind and emotions and show you patterns you keep repeating so you can choose to change them. That’s why I’ve created this list of 75 journal prompts for career-driven women about leadership.
Journaling can be a powerful tool for creating the future you want instead of letting life happen to you on autopilot. This can be especially important when going through a significant life change, like getting a new job.
It can help you reflect on the past and decide what you want for your future.
Journaling can also help you process uncomfortable emotions like insecurity, doubt, or hesitation so that you can show up empowered and confident. It will also help you think more critically about what is in front of you and can help you discover solutions instead of focusing on problems.
75 Journal Prompts for Career-Driven Women
- What did I succeed at in my last role?
- What did I struggle with in my last role?
- What method of communication do I prefer to receive?
- What form of contact do I like to use?
- In what way do I like to receive feedback?
- What qualities or things did I like about my favorite manager?
- How well have I separated myself from my last role in my mind?
- Am I aware of any blind spots I may have come into this new role? What are they?
- How would I describe the leadership style I hope to encompass?
- Am I more prone to being very detailed-oriented or thinking big-picture?
- Will my preferred method of thinking hinder me in my new role?
- What are my thoughts about time?
- Am I good at managing my time?
- How would I describe the relationship I have with myself?
- What are my biggest time wasters at work?
- What do I turn to at work when I am uncomfortable or out of my depths?
- What is my process for making decisions at work?
- What qualities do I value the most in myself when it comes to working
- What qualities do I value the most in my colleagues when it comes to working?
- What qualities do I value the most in my managers at work?
- What projects am I least and most excited about in my new role?
- How do I interact with others when I am stressed, frustrated, or busy?
- What are my current thoughts about managers and bosses in general?
- Who do I want to be as a manager?
- Who am I as a manager now?
- Who do I want to be as a colleague?
- Who am I as a colleague now?
- Who do I want to be as a leader?
- Who am I as a colleague now?
- How can I get from where I am to where I want to go?
- What are my thoughts about meetings?
- Are meetings purposeful or a waste of time?
- Here’s how I think meetings should be led and run…
- What are my thoughts about one-on-one meetings?
- How do I feel about conducting one-on-one meetings?
- What was the most impactful one-on-one meeting I’ve ever had?
- Are there any past experiences I had as an individual contributor that I want to ensure I don’t recreate for my direct reports?
- What are my general assumptions about people on the whole?
- How do I feel about work in general?
- How do I feel about my company in general?
- If I could change anything about your company what would it be?
- What kind of culture do I enjoy at a company?
- How is the experience of culture I enjoy at a company created?
- What am I hoping to accomplish in this new role?
- In what ways am I am uniquely qualified for this position?
- What new initiatives would I like to implement in this new role?
- How do I handle people who try to push their problems onto me?
- How do I handle telling people no?
- Where do I struggle to make decisions?
- Where do I struggle to plan?
- Where do I struggle to get organized?
- Where do I struggle to follow through?
- Where do I struggle to stay on track?
- Where do I struggle to communicate?
- What do I currently know about my new team?
- What have others told me about my new role, team, and company?
- What observations have I made about my new team, company and role?
- Are any of my observations of my new team in any way an assumption?
- How did my current team get to where they are now?
- What system do I have or use for capturing information that comes my way?
- How do I handle other people when they express that they are stressed or frustrated?
- How adept do I feel at conflict resolution?
- At what scope am I most comfortable planning: hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, yearly, or longer?
- Who are my allies in my new role?
- What do I need to learn before I start my new role?
- Is there anything I need to do before I start my new role to make it a smooth transition?
- What do I want to create in my new role?
- How can I create more time?
- How can I overdeliver in value for my company in my new role?
- How do I want to show up every day?
- How do I want to feel about my new role?
- If things at my new role were going well, what thoughts would I be thinking?
- What leadership skills do I already possess?
- Do I think of myself as a quick decision-maker or indecisive person?
- Am I someone who can stand behind my decisions?
If you are looking for more support around feeling less overwhelmed at work, grab this free guide: 3 Ways to Feel Less Overwhelmed at Work.
A Final Note On Journal Prompts for Career-Driven Women
These 75 journal writing prompts are designed to help you get to know yourself, reflect on what went well in the past and what you want to intentionally bring with you to the future. You are capable to becoming the leader you want to be. I believe in you.
