Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: episode is going to be a longer one part of
Speaker 1: the theories where I interview fascinating people about how they
Speaker 1: take their days from great to awesome and any advice
Speaker 1: they have for the rest of us. So today I
Speaker 1: am delighted to welcome Charlie Guilkey to Before Breakfast. Charlie
Speaker 1: is the owner of Productive Flourishing. He is also the
Speaker 1: author of the book's Team Habits and Start Finishing. So Charlie,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Laura, thanks so much for having me. I'm excited to
Speaker 2: be here today.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, why don't you tell our listeners a little
Speaker 1: bit about yourself?
Speaker 2: So I'll try to keep this brief. I am one
Speaker 2: of those polymathic folks that like fall in a lot
Speaker 2: of holes and figure out how I fell into it
Speaker 2: and tell people how not to do that and then
Speaker 2: get back out of it. You know, I've been I'm
Speaker 2: kind of a dinosaur now on the only Internet. Turns out,
Speaker 2: been doing this since the mid two thousands, you know,
Speaker 2: writing about a variety of things from personal productivity to
Speaker 2: teaming better to leading better, and so the span of
Speaker 2: my work actually goes through all of those, and it
Speaker 2: may or may not come up today given the format
Speaker 2: of the show. But at heart, I'm more of a
Speaker 2: philosopher figuring things out than an entrepreneur or sort of
Speaker 2: writer in that sort of way. So most of this
Speaker 2: sort of stuff is just me grappling with paradoxes and
Speaker 2: hard problems and trying to make sense of it all.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, how did you land in this field of productivity?
Speaker 2: Though?
Speaker 1: I mean, one can follow all sorts of rabbit holes,
Speaker 1: and I want maybe you can weave into this because
Speaker 1: I understand you also had a military career before all
Speaker 1: this as well. I wonder if that had any anything
Speaker 1: to do with all this.
Speaker 2: Well, that was very definitely how I got into this.
Speaker 2: So I deployed in Supportive Operation I RACKI Freedom in
Speaker 2: two thousand and four and two thousand and five, and
Speaker 2: I was a logistics officer, and by the end of
Speaker 2: my tour, I was, you know, the plans officer and
Speaker 2: coordinating like lots of convoy movements in the theater, right,
Speaker 2: And so I'd gotten really good at doing big things
Speaker 2: and getting good stuff done in in tight timeframes. But
Speaker 2: then I came back and got back into grad school.
Speaker 2: So I'm a near PhD in philosophy, and after about
Speaker 2: about a semester or two, I was like, you know,
Speaker 2: here's the problem. Like I can do all this really
Speaker 2: great stuff on the military side of things, but this
Speaker 2: five thousand word essays kick to my butt, like what
Speaker 2: is going on here? And so, like any good scholar
Speaker 2: and officer would do, I was like, I'm not the
Speaker 2: only person that has this problem, Like, surely someone else
Speaker 2: has figured this out. So I started reading you know,
Speaker 2: the classics the seven habits that getting things done, and
Speaker 2: found that I was doing so much work translating them
Speaker 2: for someone who was a polymathic creative person that I
Speaker 2: was like, you know what, I'm just going to start
Speaker 2: sharing this sort of stuff with other people. So, like
Speaker 2: any good you know, you know, old millennial or young
Speaker 2: gen X or what do I started a blog about it, right,
Speaker 2: And so started writing about it, and you know, started
Speaker 2: it really started helping people, and so more and more
Speaker 2: people started asking me like, hey, will you help me
Speaker 2: with my team, will you help me with my own
Speaker 2: personal productivity? Will you help me in my business? And
Speaker 2: it took off from there. So where I am now
Speaker 2: was nowhere on the map in the mid two thousands, Like,
Speaker 2: I had no idea that I could do it or
Speaker 2: people like me could do it, And so yeah, it
Speaker 2: just has been this emergent, fascinating adventure. Then I'm still
Speaker 2: figuring out as go along.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, Well you said something interesting there. You use
Speaker 1: the phrase personal productivity, and I understand from some things
Speaker 1: you've written that you say that's a bit of a misnomer,
Speaker 1: that productivity is kind of more of a team sport.
Speaker 1: I mean, certainly that's the case, and you're, you know,
Speaker 1: doing leading a lot of people in the military, for instance,
Speaker 1: But that's the case in other context as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really is. And so unless you are you know,
Speaker 2: Henry David throw living on Walding Pond or something like that,
Speaker 2: you work with other people, well, you live with other people.
Speaker 2: And fundamentally, productivity, in my view, is about becoming the
Speaker 2: best version of yourself for thriving in the way that's
Speaker 2: uniquely you, right, And to thrive you have to do
Speaker 2: that in a social, economic, and political context, right, And
Speaker 2: so I think so much of the personal productivity conversation
Speaker 2: when people come to us, like people are taking a
Speaker 2: lot of onus on themselves to sort of adopt a
Speaker 2: hero complex that their own actions will change a lot
Speaker 2: of things. But the reality is working and learning how
Speaker 2: to work in teams, learning how to lead teams, learning
Speaker 2: how to work with your family is actually where the
Speaker 2: secret sauce of thriving and productivity really is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny. Even throw I believe was having his
Speaker 1: mom do his laundry or.
Speaker 2: Something like that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, well so with productivity, you know, another topic
Speaker 1: you've you've talked about is like time blocking and the
Speaker 1: different types of blocks people might put into their days.
Speaker 1: So I remember reading something about like focus blocks and
Speaker 1: administration blocks and social blocks. I mean, because those are
Speaker 1: you know, also we do and recovery blocks. Let's talk
Speaker 1: about those.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so thanks for bringing that up. So a focus
Speaker 2: block is you know, if you're familiar with cow Newport's work,
Speaker 2: you might call it a deep work block, but it's
Speaker 2: really that block of time where you focus on one
Speaker 2: thing at a time and really worked that third. Now,
Speaker 2: the misnomber or the misconception people have is that they
Speaker 2: can only do that one thing. So it's like I
Speaker 2: can only be staring at the screen writing for that
Speaker 2: amount of time. It's like, no, it's really all of
Speaker 2: the processes that support that. So if you need to
Speaker 2: get coffee and go to the bathroom make out lines,
Speaker 2: that's still part of the block. And usually these blocks
Speaker 2: are ninety to one hundred and twenty minutes long, because
Speaker 2: that's really how long it takes to get into something
Speaker 2: and make some substantial progress and then get out smoothly, insanely, right,
Speaker 2: So ninety to one hundred and twenty minutes. There, social
Speaker 2: blocks are what you are. What we're talking about. There
Speaker 2: is like times in which you're open, available and sort
Speaker 2: of in a good place to be peopling, right, And
Speaker 2: that's not a universal thing. Some people are not. I
Speaker 2: don't talk to them in the morning. Some people are
Speaker 2: don't talk to them after three thirty, so you kind
Speaker 2: of kind of know that. And again those are ninety
Speaker 2: to one hundred and twenty minutes because what people forget
Speaker 2: about is for any sort of one hour meeting, there's
Speaker 2: about fifteen minutes ahead of time where you're sinking and
Speaker 2: transitioning and getting into it, and then there's almost always
Speaker 2: admin that comes on the back end of it that
Speaker 2: you need to sort of process and get clear with right,
Speaker 2: And if you don't schedule that or you don't think
Speaker 2: about it that way, you end up with this wall
Speaker 2: of admin and loose thoughts and scatteredness because you didn't
Speaker 2: actually contain that time right. Admin blocks what they sound
Speaker 2: like is where you're doing the emails, you're making the
Speaker 2: quick phone calls, you're doing those types of things. Those
Speaker 2: are thirty to sixty minutes long. Because one, most of
Speaker 2: us don't want to spend all afternoon doing them, and
Speaker 2: you'll start to rebel and jump to social media or
Speaker 2: whatever your distraction is. But also it helps you focus
Speaker 2: on what are the key things that I need to
Speaker 2: be done and be proactive about it. Last, but not least,
Speaker 2: are recovery blocks. So, Laura, when I started this gig,
Speaker 2: I just assumed people would schedule recovery blocks and schedule
Speaker 2: downtime and schedule stretch breaks and lunch. But then we've
Speaker 2: done the work, you and I have done the work.
Speaker 2: You know that's not happening. So it's like, okay, people,
Speaker 2: let's make the obvious explicit. You need a recovery block. Now.
Speaker 2: The thing about recovery blocks is that there's no set
Speaker 2: amount of time and there's no set activity. It's what
Speaker 2: it does for you that matters. So Laura might think
Speaker 2: that CrossFit is recovery for her. Charlie does not.
Speaker 1: Laura doesn't think that, Okay.
Speaker 2: Well, you're the superstar here, so I have to build
Speaker 2: up this myth that you're this superhuman. Right, so I'm
Speaker 2: playing along, right, you know. But Laura might think, Charlie
Speaker 2: might think, actually, just sitting down and outlining for five
Speaker 2: minutes is a recovery block, just to get things out
Speaker 2: of my brain. Right, So it doesn't matter what the
Speaker 2: activity is, is what it does for you that matters.
Speaker 2: And when you really think about time blocking, you have
Speaker 2: to balance these in a way that fits your internal
Speaker 2: and external demands and requirements and what fits your aspirations.
Speaker 2: And what I'll say real quick is the limiting factor
Speaker 2: to career and personal growth are going to be how
Speaker 2: many focus blocks you have, because that's where you do
Speaker 2: the work that matters most. And if you have zero
Speaker 2: or too few, you're not going to be doing those things,
Speaker 2: and you're going to get caught on that at on
Speaker 2: that wheel where you're just getting through and you're getting by,
Speaker 2: but you're not really getting ahead.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I'm curious what are your recovery blocks, Like,
Speaker 1: what do you do to rejuvenate yourself.
Speaker 2: I have a coffee shop that's about point nine miles away,
Speaker 2: so I'll walk down to the coffee shop and get coffee,
Speaker 2: and it's a forcing function for me to get away
Speaker 2: from screens. I ride motorcycles because when I'm riding motorcycles,
Speaker 2: I can't do anything but ride motorcycles, right, one hopes
Speaker 2: I do. I have a like a rucksack that I'll
Speaker 2: walk around and play video games, sort of mindless video
Speaker 2: games that don't require a lot of thinking. Reading. I
Speaker 2: have to be careful about writing, because writing is one
Speaker 2: of those things where it very quickly turns from like
Speaker 2: a soothing journalinge activity to all of a sudden, I've
Speaker 2: been braining for three hours and it's backfired on me. Right, yeah,
Speaker 2: so hiking outdoor stuff usually. The rule for me is
Speaker 2: all my recovery blocks are away from screens as much
Speaker 2: as possible in nature and as much as possible integrating movement.
Speaker 1: Excellent, excellent. All right, We're going to take a quick
Speaker 1: ad break and then I'll be back with more from
Speaker 1: Charlie Gilkey. Well, I am back talking with Charlie Gilkey,
Speaker 1: who is the owner of Productive Flourishing. So I want
Speaker 1: to talk with you a little bit about to do lists.
Speaker 1: I think you have talked about how people often get
Speaker 1: to do lists wrong. So maybe we can talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about the problems and then how we can
Speaker 1: we can solve those problems.
Speaker 2: Oh, the many problems of a to do list. I'm
Speaker 2: going to start with some non obvious ones. Y'all use
Speaker 2: a verb noun construct in your to do list, Like,
Speaker 2: start it with a verb and have some now noun
Speaker 2: on it. So don't just be like podcast podcast, What
Speaker 2: what do I do with that podcast?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Start the podcast, record, podcast, edit, podcast, whatever that is.
Speaker 2: Don't just be like Jane, what are you doing with Jane?
Speaker 2: Is it call Jane? Walk with Jane's like put a
Speaker 2: verb in front of those And that's one of the
Speaker 2: key things people do. Like when I see a list
Speaker 2: someone's to do list and it's just a bunch of
Speaker 2: nouns and random stuff, I'm like, I can't do this right,
Speaker 2: I don't know how you're doing this. Verb noun constructs
Speaker 2: win the day. The second thing is be careful that
Speaker 2: you're not mixing too many sizes of action items on
Speaker 2: the same to do list. So I'll also look at
Speaker 2: people to do list and I'll have like a year
Speaker 2: sized project and a month sized project in like three
Speaker 2: five minute calls. And like, I'm like your brain and
Speaker 2: every time you do that, can't really understand what needs
Speaker 2: to happen. And our brains actually do not process multiple
Speaker 2: spaces of time at the same time very well. Right,
Speaker 2: So this is like your today's list. Keep it focused
Speaker 2: to like two hour blocks of time and task that
Speaker 2: you're going to do, right, don't have the bigger project
Speaker 2: segment on there. The other thing I'd say here is
Speaker 2: on your to do list. And I'm realizing how obvious
Speaker 2: this may sound to many of your listeners. Lord, given
Speaker 2: what you're doing, be very clear about like what you
Speaker 2: must do versus what you might get to right, be curtical,
Speaker 2: and usually it's like for most people, three to five
Speaker 2: things on that to do list are going to happen.
Speaker 2: Anything else above that is probably magical thinking unless you've
Speaker 2: done a really really good job of like stacking six
Speaker 2: admin blocks behind each other and you're really on top
Speaker 2: of that. But that sort of unstructured seventeen things to
Speaker 2: do list, it is a for failure. And I think
Speaker 2: the last time, the last thing they'll say here is
Speaker 2: write your to dos your action items is if you're
Speaker 2: writing them to someone else, right, because odds are a
Speaker 2: lot of those to do's aren't going to get done.
Speaker 2: Odds are what you wrote Monday three weeks ago. You
Speaker 2: might not remember Thursday, right three yeks later. So if
Speaker 2: you write it as if you're writing it to someone
Speaker 2: else when you come back to that to do list,
Speaker 2: when you come back to that action item, it will
Speaker 2: actually still make enough sense for you to push it forward.
Speaker 1: So I also saw that you, I mean, you had
Speaker 1: a list on your website of productive flourishing of verbs
Speaker 1: that are associated with different time frames. And I found
Speaker 1: this fascinating because it's you know, when you have a
Speaker 1: verb that's a project that's really a month long project, right,
Speaker 1: like launch something, right, That's that's probably not a today
Speaker 1: kind of thing, whereas call somebody is a today thing?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: So I mean, like, what are what are the big
Speaker 1: verbs for big chunks of time and how can we reckon?
Speaker 1: And small ones?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so if you wanted to google that, wan, it'll
Speaker 2: be thirty seven verbs for your action items. So if
Speaker 2: you type productor flourishing thirty seven verbs you'll find it.
Speaker 2: But yeah, that was the brain gasm that I had
Speaker 2: while writing Start Finishing. I was like, wait a second.
Speaker 2: There are certain verbs that just tell you what size
Speaker 2: the project is, right, so call email right ship, right,
Speaker 2: those types of things. Those are probably task related verbs
Speaker 2: of something that you could do and probably twenty minutes
Speaker 2: or less.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Great, But whenever you get to like, you know, publish
Speaker 2: with the big p like publish my book, you're you're
Speaker 2: already talking about meaning quarters in years, right, as opposed
Speaker 2: to publish a blog post, which, if you're in that
Speaker 2: groove and you have that competency, may actually be a task.
Speaker 2: But if it's you know, published the ultimate guide to
Speaker 2: you know, productivity, that might be a month long project, right,
Speaker 2: really might. So launch is one of those words. Initiate
Speaker 2: is one of those big project words. Research can sometimes
Speaker 2: go either way, Like if you're researching on a big product,
Speaker 2: that's probably I am on side of things, you know,
Speaker 2: I would just say, like, be very look at the verb,
Speaker 2: whatever verbs you use, because there's only really like the
Speaker 2: other thing about this is in the English language, there
Speaker 2: actually aren't that many task verbs right or action verbs.
Speaker 2: So if you really look at the verbs that's on
Speaker 2: your to do list, ask yourself how big of what
Speaker 2: size of work is that telling me that this is
Speaker 2: how big is this chunk? And a just accordingly.
Speaker 1: Excellent good advice. So, Charlie, I'm wondering if you have
Speaker 1: any routines that help make you more productive. I know
Speaker 1: you advise lots of people, but what do you kind
Speaker 1: of swear by in your day to day life.
Speaker 2: Okay, so I have to start that one with the
Speaker 2: fact that I'm a lion chronotype, which consider that's the
Speaker 2: early bird right there in the old models. I'm an
Speaker 2: early riser, and so that means morning routines are going
Speaker 2: to be really important for me. And my morning routine
Speaker 2: this has gotten pretty long by the time I careporate,
Speaker 2: physical recovery and just all the sort of things. And
Speaker 2: so you know, by the time I listen to a meditation,
Speaker 2: by the time I sort of reflect and contemplate on
Speaker 2: the day, by the time I journal, and then by
Speaker 2: the time I go on the coffee walk, all like,
Speaker 2: all that's part of my morning routine. It might be
Speaker 2: ninety minutes to two hours right of just doing that. Now,
Speaker 2: listeners y'all know, Laura is way better about productivity when
Speaker 2: you have kids. So that might not work for folks
Speaker 2: who have a lot of kids, but it does work
Speaker 2: for me. And that's the question, right. I also have
Speaker 2: end of day routines, like before I just sort of
Speaker 2: slide out and say I'm done, Like what did I
Speaker 2: get done? What didn't get done? What do I need
Speaker 2: to kick tomorrow? What can I just let go of?
Speaker 2: And so those end of day routines. I talk about
Speaker 2: it as the ten to fifteen split, whereas you stake
Speaker 2: ten minutes in the morning to review the plan that
Speaker 2: you made for yourself in the last fifteen minutes of
Speaker 2: the day prior. Because it turns out that end of
Speaker 2: day you it's probably the more sane and discerning version
Speaker 2: of you, especially if you're a lying rightly, so it
Speaker 2: actually does a better job of making priorities and plans
Speaker 2: for the next day. Then early morning you that's got
Speaker 2: all the energy and all the coffee and all the
Speaker 2: exuberants for forty five minutes and then reality creeps back in. Right,
Speaker 2: So if you do that sort of process, yes, yes
Speaker 2: it's twenty five minutes a day, but it's a way
Speaker 2: better activity to do than just default into email or
Speaker 2: social media, and it helps you get ever better about
Speaker 2: seeing what you can actually do in today versus what's
Speaker 2: delusional thinking, Yeah.
Speaker 1: People have that first cup of coffee, they can conquer
Speaker 1: the world, and then discover later in the day that
Speaker 1: that might not be the case.
Speaker 2: The world is formidable. It turns out the.
Speaker 1: World will kick back by the end end of the
Speaker 1: day for sure. Is there anything you've tried that hasn't
Speaker 1: worked for you?
Speaker 2: Ooh yes, Like usually I'll let it go very very quickly,
Speaker 2: So let me see if I can think of This
Speaker 2: is a hard one because I move on very very
Speaker 2: quickly from things that don't work, So I can think
Speaker 2: of a lot of tools that don't work for me.
Speaker 2: And why so I'll flip this because this actually came
Speaker 2: up today. I have returned to the fact that I
Speaker 2: need persistent visual cues for my goals. So actually that
Speaker 2: would be a good way of saying it. Just keeping
Speaker 2: my goals and priorities in a digital to do list,
Speaker 2: and I have like, I actually have an app for this,
Speaker 2: like does not work for me? Right, I need it
Speaker 2: on a whiteboard, I need it on a sticky note.
Speaker 2: I need those sort of month size, quarter size, year
Speaker 2: sized goals to stay persistent and in my visual field
Speaker 2: and not just in some app that I got to
Speaker 2: remember to go look for. So that does not work
Speaker 2: for me at all. May just be because I'm gen X,
Speaker 2: but like I just think our brains were diluted with
Speaker 2: so much we are in a day loage of digital
Speaker 2: information that we don't retain it anymore. But those persistent
Speaker 2: goals aspirations value is that I will place around the
Speaker 2: house are really important to me. And the reason I
Speaker 2: don't have them is actually earlier this year, my wife
Speaker 2: and I switched switched home offices, and so I took
Speaker 2: everything to the essential and minimal to see what actually
Speaker 2: worked and what didn't work. And have realized seven months
Speaker 2: into this experiment that not having those goals, of not
Speaker 2: having the whiteboards was one of those things. Was like, oh,
Speaker 2: that's why I'm scattered and more unfocused and don't know
Speaker 2: where I'm going. Just didn't have it in my visual
Speaker 2: field all day. Now.
Speaker 1: That's fascinating though, that you guys switched home offices. I'm
Speaker 1: so curious what led to that, because I'm guessing a
Speaker 1: lot of people don't do that you kind of claimed
Speaker 1: your spot, and especially if people like started working from
Speaker 1: home during the pandemic, each of you chose your home
Speaker 1: office spot and it never gets changed. So what led
Speaker 1: to this?
Speaker 2: Environmental factors? So my wife is much more sensitive to sun,
Speaker 2: and I'm in the office that gets the most sun,
Speaker 2: and it's an annoyance for me most days. And so
Speaker 2: we just had this sort of simple idea. It's like,
Speaker 2: why don't to take the south facing office right that's
Speaker 2: got the sun and you can do your work there,
Speaker 2: and then I'll take the back when that's darker and quieter,
Speaker 2: and you know, seem to be more of a nook
Speaker 2: sort of thing. I love working in sort of libraries
Speaker 2: and sort of tight spots, and so we tried it,
Speaker 2: but then just realized there were other environmental factors that
Speaker 2: we didn't consider, like all the kids that play in
Speaker 2: the backyard surrounding ours and how loud they are all day.
Speaker 2: She's able to tune them out. I am not right. Also,
Speaker 2: it turns out that her office, she doesn't work in
Speaker 2: her office as persistently as I do. She works around
Speaker 2: the house. I root in the office, but it's right
Speaker 2: above the kitchen, and so all day, there's like, you know,
Speaker 2: kitchen noise and all sorts of things, and I turns
Speaker 2: out I didn't know how sensitive to noise I was
Speaker 2: in that way, and I don't want to be like
Speaker 2: having headphones all all day. So we tried it for
Speaker 2: about six weeks. Both hated it for different reasons and
Speaker 2: switched back, But that was just what it was, and
Speaker 2: so it was actually a really good process for us
Speaker 2: looking at where we are in this season of our
Speaker 2: life versus where we were fifteen years ago when we
Speaker 2: moved into this house, to really reassess what works for us,
Speaker 2: what doesn't work for us, and really can claim that
Speaker 2: and stop experimenting with stuff that we know that works
Speaker 2: and find other things to experiment with.
Speaker 1: Good advice, Yeah, No, I mean we do a lot
Speaker 1: without thinking about it, and looking at our everyday processes
Speaker 1: can be important. Or We're going to take one more
Speaker 1: quick ad break and I'll be back with more from
Speaker 1: Charlie Guilkey. Well, I am back talking with Charlie Gilkey,
Speaker 1: who is the owner of Productive Flourishing and the author
Speaker 1: of the book Team Habits and also Start Finishing. So Charlie,
Speaker 1: I always ask my guest, what is something you have
Speaker 1: done recently to take a day from great to awesome.
Speaker 2: So my view at this point, like having done this
Speaker 2: work so long, is that part of what we mistake
Speaker 2: in personal productivity is how much it's around action and
Speaker 2: doing versus how much it really is about being and
Speaker 2: feeling right. And so to a t what I will
Speaker 2: do to make my days go from great to awesome
Speaker 2: is really used well. Part of it is using what
Speaker 2: I call the five projects rule, which is no more
Speaker 2: than five active projects per time horizon, which normalizes the
Speaker 2: fact that if I have four or five meetings in
Speaker 2: that day from a work perspective, that's all I'm going
Speaker 2: to do, period. And why that takes it to awesome
Speaker 2: is because it removes that additional anxiety and overwhelm and
Speaker 2: sort of thinking about everything else, and I can just
Speaker 2: enjoy being and doing the work at hand and not
Speaker 2: thinking like, oh I got to do something else, there's
Speaker 2: something else. No, no, no, no, just be where you are
Speaker 2: and enjoy what you have created and what you're co
Speaker 2: creating with others, right, And so that always pushes it
Speaker 2: that way. So it's just always normalizing, like, Okay, what's
Speaker 2: essential for today? How do I want to be how
Speaker 2: do I want to feel and what else can I
Speaker 2: let go of so that I can center in that moment.
Speaker 1: I think we spend a lot of time and waste
Speaker 1: a lot of time thinking we should be doing something else.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're doing what you're doing regardless. That's one
Speaker 1: of the problems of long too long to do lists, right,
Speaker 1: Like you know people are not going to do everything
Speaker 1: on it, but there was no point in putting it
Speaker 1: on the to do list and then not doing it precisely.
Speaker 2: And that's where, like going back to what I said
Speaker 2: about the to do list, get real, folks, you're only
Speaker 2: going to do three to five things. And if you're
Speaker 2: in a situation like what I was just talking about,
Speaker 2: where like the things are actually on your schedule I
Speaker 2: either meetings or all those different types of things that
Speaker 2: is work. Let's get out of this idea that like
Speaker 2: I know, I need to get out of this meeting
Speaker 2: so I can get back to the real work. So
Speaker 2: that you don't have this dual streak of this reality,
Speaker 2: this sort of delusion that you started the day with
Speaker 2: a full blank set of time and you didn't do
Speaker 2: all the things that you said you could do in
Speaker 2: that amount of time. Time you never had that amount of
Speaker 2: time like most of the time. When I'm coming in,
Speaker 2: especially in the teen context, I'll level set and I
Speaker 2: say the reality is from the very start until you
Speaker 2: prove me wrong, I'm assuming that about sixty five percent
Speaker 2: of your time is just filled up with routine stuff
Speaker 2: and meetings and all sorts of other stuff, and it's
Speaker 2: probably higher than that. So anything we talk about has
Speaker 2: to be what goes into that thirty five percent that remains.
Speaker 2: But let's actually start there, and let's get out of
Speaker 2: this idea that we have a blank slate of time
Speaker 2: to work with, because we don't. So, yeah, you're only
Speaker 2: going to do three to five things. And if you're
Speaker 2: in a bunch of meetings, you're taking your kids to school,
Speaker 2: you got to do a PTA conference, you're caretaking. Those
Speaker 2: are things, those are projects. Claim them and just be
Speaker 2: real about what you're going to do and do the
Speaker 2: best you can to let go of the rest and
Speaker 2: don't fall into the pattern of comparing your actual life
Speaker 2: to the manicured life that you see on social media.
Speaker 2: Every One on social media is showing you the sanitized
Speaker 2: version of their life, even if they're telling you that
Speaker 2: it's the real thing. It's not right. You don't know
Speaker 2: what they did, you don't know everything like that. Just
Speaker 2: watch your own lane, honor your actual commitments, honor your
Speaker 2: actual capacity, and do the best you can with the discretionary.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah. One thing I was especially with all the
Speaker 1: influencers on social media, and it's professional photography, which means,
Speaker 1: right there, there's somebody else, like, you know, this beautiful
Speaker 1: scene of their family, there's somebody else there, you know,
Speaker 1: So keep that in mind, you know, that's the first thing,
Speaker 1: first thing to realize. So Charlie, what are you looking
Speaker 1: forward to right now?
Speaker 2: It's going to sound really basic, but just I've been
Speaker 2: focusing more over the last three or four quarters just
Speaker 2: on writing, Like I've got some books I don't want
Speaker 2: to get out, and so just getting those next, you know,
Speaker 2: four at this point books out over the next few years,
Speaker 2: and sticking to the knating in that way. I'm in
Speaker 2: the season of my career where I've looked at a
Speaker 2: lot of the distractions and performances that I don't want
Speaker 2: to do anymore, and just really getting excited about, you know,
Speaker 2: writing more great books and doing more of the you know,
Speaker 2: advising and teaching with clients, pretty basic on that front.
Speaker 2: On the life front, my wife and I do a
Speaker 2: lot of road trips and a lot of motorcycle riding,
Speaker 2: and so like I think next year we may be
Speaker 2: able to do a long Alaska trip, right, Well that's great, yeah,
Speaker 2: but it's you know, six to seven weeks figuring out
Speaker 2: how we're going to do it in that amount of time. Like,
Speaker 2: so those are the types of things that I really
Speaker 2: look forward to on that side. So, you know, at
Speaker 2: this point it's kind of like the low the slow burned.
Speaker 2: Long adventures are really where it's at.
Speaker 1: Where it's at for me absolutely, and Charlie, where can
Speaker 1: people find you?
Speaker 2: All roads lead to Productive Flourishing dot com. So if
Speaker 2: you're interested in whether it's personal productivity, teamwork, or you know, leadership,
Speaker 2: go to Productive Flourishing dot com and you know you'll
Speaker 2: see what we have there available.
Speaker 1: Sounds great, well, Charlie, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 1: Thank you to everyone for if you have feedback about
Speaker 1: this or any other episode, you can always reach me
Speaker 1: at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. And in the meantime,
Speaker 1: this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making
Speaker 1: the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast.
Speaker 1: If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach
Speaker 1: me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast
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