Where Do You Spend Your Time and Focus

clock-time-focusDo you have an intentional method you regularly utilize to determine what you will spend your time on?  In other words, what will your attention and focus be on and which items take priority over other items?

This spans the spectrum from personal care, to family, to community to business and more.  How do you determine what is going to be done first, second, third or in the ‘to do’ pile? 

For example in the personal category – do you shave first and shower second or shower first and shave second?  Do you go through this same exact routine all of the time? Why?

In the family category do you begin each day giving your spouse a hug and a kiss and tell them you love them?  Every single day?

In business do you answer your email first thing in the morning or later in the day? Is it at approximately the same time every day or do you answer email all day long?

These are examples for you to utilize in order to consider your own reality. Write the out here for your reference.

ITEM DO FIRST DO SECOND
Personal

Why?

Family

Why?

Community

Why?

Finances

Why?

Career/Business

Why?

 

Let’s now look at focus especially in career and business. Do you carry through all the way to completion?  At what point do you take a break and possibly walk around outside of the office for a five or ten minute ‘clear your head break’?  You might say ‘no break’or you might say ‘at least every 90 minutes’. Do you take this action step all of the time? Some of the time?  How do you handle this area – focus?

The entire point of these questions and the thinking you are being asked to do is to have you consider if there are other behaviors you might consider which would make you either more productive or free you up to be more creative?

Potentially you will come up with other questions or other thoughts which will take you along a path to follow toward achieving the stated goal.

Try it out and let me know what you find out about yourself.

Intentional Living begins with 10 minutes a day. Learn how to live a life that matters. Learn more by clicking HERE.

Mitch Tublin is an advanced certified executive coach, speaker and trainer based in Stamford, CT.

How Do You Feel About Thanksgiving?

This year we will have a few guests for Thanksgiving who are exchange students. They live in Copenhagen or nearby to there. For the Fall Semester they are attending the University of Wisconsin – Madison. Since we live within a relatively short train ride to New York City the added attraction for them visiting us during Thanksgiving is to tour and visit NYC – the sites and sounds.

The fact that our guests this year have never experienced Thanksgiving has us thinking more about the Thanksgiving Holiday itself and what it means to us as a family. We already feel this is our favorite Holiday of them all.

Probably the best way to move through and explain our view on Thanksgiving is to use the:

F – WORDs

FAMILY

               FOOD

                          FOOTBALL

                                               AND FUN!

FAMILY

A friend of ours, Gary, told us about an idea he had started to implement. He and his wife started their family a few years before us. His idea was to have a shirt with each child’s name on the shirt.  Each year on their birthday to take a photo of the child laying on the shirt. Then as they grow older and larger in size they begin to actually fit into and wear the shirt for the photo. We started our tradition with red football jerseys. We take a new photo each year on Thanksgiving.

footballfamily

FOOD

The one time each year my wife actually cooks a meal has been Thanksgiving. Now that our four kids are older and know everything this does not work any longer. Plus the introduction of the book, “It Starts With Food” has changed our eating patterns for good.

In addition, two of our four children are big fans and followers of the Whole 30 model of eating as well.  What this all means is, well it is all how you look at life… Either it is much more complicated now to purchase and prepare our Thanksgiving Meal or it is much more fun and enjoyable to know we are eating healthier food and preparing many of our dishes from organic and locally sourced providers of natural food.

Photo Credit flickr.com @arfsb https://www.flickr.com/photos/arfsb/

Photo Credit flickr.com @arfsb
https://www.flickr.com/photos/arfsb/

FOOTBALL

The games will be on TV throughout the day. How much of the games we watch, who knows. It is something we enjoy and if it is true about the amount of total minutes are actual action during a football game then we probably see half of those action packed minutes live and the rest either by replay or ESPN later on that night or the next morning.

FUN

We all have fun!

smile-face

Thanksgiving is about all of these F-WORDs and most of all giving THANKS.

Being thankful for what we have:

  • Our Health
  • Our Freedom
  • Our Lives

Many of us volunteer our time or donate to charity or both for those in need. All of this should be top of mind throughout the year. Not only on Thanksgiving. Since it is Thanksgiving, we must make it top of mind today.

How do you feel about Thanksgiving?

Mitch Tublin is an advanced certified executive and personal coach who resides in Stamford, CT.