HOW TO STAY EFFICIENT BOTH AT WORK AND HOME

by Annika Sorensen | | Leadership & Corporate, Physical Activity, Positivity, Stress, Stress Management, Tips and Advices, Your Health

You may be asking, is there a way that you can stay efficient both at work and at home, without compromising either?

You are tired, you feel worn out.

These days, you’re also fed up with all the “what’s happening in our world” talks as it’s ruling everybody else’s life, including ours.

Like you, I had my hands full before and just did not need any other extra burden. It was a never-ending story with tasks waiting to get done.

You still have many hours left at work, and a pile of tasks but you just want to sleep and be able to forget everything. And stress? It’s already taking a strict grip on your brain.

HOW WILL YOU SURVIVE? Recognize.

Everything that’s happening in our world today makes us a little more uncertain, and uncertainty’s naturally a threat to our brains so stress creeps up on us without us noticing until everything just becomes so heavy and hopeless. 

WILL UNCERTAINTY HURT YOU

Not really if you take the time to rest and rejuvenate from time to time, or prevent yourself from constantly ending up n that situation by acting at first signs.

To help you, I’ll give 5 proven EASY tips that give you calm, energy, better structure in work, and in the end when all combined, better life or revenue business-wise.

1. The Breathing Anchor

What other BESt here and NOW tool than your ability to take deep breaths??

Admittedly, others see breathing as just breathing – but believe me when I tell you, and as a Doctor, that IT IS NOT. It’s the basic source of life. No breathing, no oxygen = no life!

In a workshop with a group of businesspeople, I was teaching them this tool. One man went almost crazy stating that he was absolutely not doing any breathing exercise – it was just all wo-wo. 

I had to calm him down. He even told me not to play games with him. I said, well then by normally breathing he was halfway there – he just needed to start seeing it as a tool.

We showed the whole group how to do the breathing in a good way and off they went for 4 weeks. The guy did not look happy when we parted.

4 weeks later at the next workshop session, this man comes up to me – apologizing for his behavior the last time. 

He had – behind closed doors – tested the exercise and noticed that he did feel better – less stress and got better flow in his work and realized it was a good thing!

So, if you start to use breathing as a tool, you will have a friend for life.

Make it your first automatic thing to do when you feel the stress come creeping up your back.

Just stop and breathe..

I heard someone call it your 10-second vacation – and that is a very good way to see it – that is just what it is. 10 seconds of peace of mind – and that can make all the difference.

Someone else calls it your airbag – to release when stress hits you.

Whichever of these analogies you use – don’t forget to utilize this free, effective, and readily available tool.

2. PHYSICAL MOVEMENT

Stand up, jump, stretch, walk around! Movement generates energy in both body and mind by improving cell connections in the brain.

Angry, upset, or stressed out? Walk around the block and you’ll be surprised you’ll feel calm.

Notice how when people fight and someone who doesn’t like talking much when full of emotions just walks out, and then comes back ready to talk calmly? That’s what I’m talking about.

Wayback 200,000 ish years ago we were equipped with 3 main ways to react to threats: flight, fight or freeze – combined with a 4th tool – the ability to move.

Moving plus thinking has a connection. Lost a thought? Move and you’ll remember it easier.

Physical movement gives us clarity, and when we’re thinking straight, we can do great unexpected things.

3. A BREAK.

Our brains don’t like being active for too long. They need to rest and reorganize every now and then.

Sprint 20-50 minutes of work, then squeeze in a 5-15 minute break. Get a coffee, breathe, exercise, stretch, jump, sing, dance… Do crochet, sew – whatever makes your heart happy!

4. Delegate!

Have someone else do the work! Repetitive or routinary tasks that can be taught one time? A task that follows a specific process you can teach? Boring easy tasks?

True enough, not everyone has somebody else to delegate to, but buying a service from someone who in no time can do what takes you ages is always an option! In return, you’ll get more time at your hands and focus on things you do the best.

5. MAKE A STRUCTURE.

Get your working routines in order. Get help from systems and structures that already exist. It may take a day or two to do these organizing changes to get a system that works.  But you will soon get all that time back and lots more upfront when your work is much more effective in your daily routine. 

Once you have a structure for everything, it can easily be taught and passed on, and implementing #4 above will be waaaay easier!

I know all this sounds too much to take but coming to think of it, they’re all easy, and once all set, make your lives so much easier!

I have received questions before about taking a pill instead to calm down… but, let me warn you on that:  Yes, it is true that if you take it all will seem good because you’ll feel calm and better but NO, you’re not done with your “stress problems” and your problem is NOT SOLVED.

Just like alcohol… it helps in a day but certainly only offers temporary relief and solves no root cause of a problem. In fact, can even cause an additional one – alcohol addiction.

So no, I say do not succumb to these temporary solutions because quick fixes never work.

MANAGE TASKS TO BE EFFICIENT

Making a list of things to do or tasks at hand plays a crucial role in this journey, as well as prioritizing them in order.

When you don’t have anything that requires urgency, then that’s your excuse to just go pick random tasks because it’s obvious that the one that you pick is also the one that you like the most to do. 

Although we tend to pick the easy ones first, I suggest doing it the other way around because ticking off the hard ones from the list can put your mind at ease.

Nobody for sure would like the hard ones getting piled up… or it becomes unmanageable. 

CATEGORIZING YOUR TASKS

If you get confused about which task goes first while making your list, I advise you to break them down into these 4 categories:

1. Urgent and Important

Examples of tasks that fall under this category are those that you cannot always predict and require immediate action or attention to stop further harm if any. These tasks give you the feeling to drop other tasks and do only these tasks NOW. 

Both things that include preventing conflicts or making you lose an important opportunity go here.

2. Not Urgent But Important

These tasks, since they are not urgent… sometimes mean that you need to have the time to ponder about them. 

Sample tasks that fall here are the tasks that could be something big for your business and need plenty of time planning and doing.

“Why does it come second if it is not urgent”

Because if you don’t start doing them now, sooner or later THEY BECOME URGENT. They may be crucial to your business moving forward – but your mind puts them off – because they are time-consuming and often also energy draining.

Most often selling comes here and all the development of new products. It doesn’t have to be done today – but if never done your business will die.

3. Urgent But Not Important

These are the tasks that require urgency looking like they could be preventing you from achieving some of your goals or proceeding to the next step/s. 

But since they are not important, ask yourself if they can be rescheduled or outsourced. 

Often we also find all the things from OTHER people’s list here – we are asked for things that we don’t have to do – but since someone is asking for it we think we need to answer. But if we reflect we can see they are not important to us at all.

4. Not Urgent and Not Important

Yes, they do exist. Some examples that fall here are those that other people told you that you need to do or tasks you see other people have so you also thought you need to do the same but don’t probably have to do at all.

Avoid these tasks as much as possible as they only serve as a distraction. Reflect and ask if these tasks are really necessary or just a waste of time.

If they turn out to be somewhat necessary after you ponder about it, then figure out if they fall under any of the first three, or again, just delegate.

Learn more efficiency techniques in my leadership guide!

To being efficient,