Speaker 1: Good morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is to make a list of a hundred dreams.
Speaker 1: When it comes to time management, a lot of people
Speaker 1: think it's all about saving bits of time here and there,
Speaker 1: and so the internet is full of these kinds of tips.
Speaker 1: I will confess that I read these tips like everybody else,
Speaker 1: hoping I'm going to find hours in the day that
Speaker 1: I didn't know existed. But then it's always stuff like
Speaker 1: clean the shower while you're in it. Or one of
Speaker 1: my favorites, which somebody said in all seriousness, is that
Speaker 1: if you send a lot of emails where the answers okay,
Speaker 1: you should just type kay instead of okay, because I
Speaker 1: know the only thing keeping me from greatness is typing
Speaker 1: the letter oh and all my emails. Right, If you
Speaker 1: think about it, it's kind of silly. We don't build
Speaker 1: the lives we want by saving time. We build the
Speaker 1: lives we want, and then time saves itself. I think
Speaker 1: it's so much more effective to think about what we
Speaker 1: want to spend more time doing. What great things would
Speaker 1: we like to put into our lives. The best way
Speaker 1: to answer that question is to make a list many
Speaker 1: years ago, career coach Caroline Sneeze O Levine shared an
Speaker 1: exercise with me that she calls the list of a
Speaker 1: hundred dreams. This is a completely unedited list of anything
Speaker 1: you want to do or have in life. It can
Speaker 1: be travel goals or hobbies, or things you'd like to
Speaker 1: do with your family, maybe professional goals too. You can
Speaker 1: think of it as like a bucket list, but most
Speaker 1: people's bucket lists don't have a hundred items on there.
Speaker 1: It's actually really hard to get to a hundred. The
Speaker 1: first third is pretty easy because most people want to
Speaker 1: travel more, so they put the thirty three countries they
Speaker 1: want to visit. After that it gets more complicated. Random
Speaker 1: items have put on my lists over the years have
Speaker 1: included visiting the Greek Islands, seeing Perth, Australia, building and
Speaker 1: furnishing a doll house with my daughter, writing a collection
Speaker 1: of sonnets, getting a good rain jacket, and singing in
Speaker 1: a performance of Box B Minor Mass. You'll probably have
Speaker 1: to come back to this list several times. Don't second
Speaker 1: guess your answers. You're not actually holding yourself to any
Speaker 1: of this, and you don't have to show it to
Speaker 1: anyone either. Though you can if you want. It's just
Speaker 1: fun to think about things you want to spend more
Speaker 1: time doing. You'll learn more about yourself and about what
Speaker 1: makes you feel excited and energized. Because here's the thing,
Speaker 1: I promise, pretty much everybody has some discretionary time in
Speaker 1: their lives. Unfortunately, if you're building a career and raising
Speaker 1: a family, this free time seldom comes gift wrapped and obvious.
Speaker 1: It doesn't always look like a day at the spa. Instead,
Speaker 1: it appears as an hour after the kids go to bed,
Speaker 1: or when you're waiting for the car pool to bring
Speaker 1: them home from soccer practice, or maybe it's a half
Speaker 1: day on the weekend when the groceries are bought and
Speaker 1: this with meat is done. Because we think we don't
Speaker 1: have free time, we don't ask what we'd like to
Speaker 1: do with it. So when free time does appear, we
Speaker 1: spend it in the most effortless way as possible, scrolling
Speaker 1: around online watching TV, or puttering around the house doing
Speaker 1: housework that doesn't really need to be done. With a
Speaker 1: list of a hundred dreams, though, you get ideas. If
Speaker 1: I've got an open hour, I can write a draft
Speaker 1: of a sonnet on a weekend afternoon, I could find
Speaker 1: a doll furniture store and go visit. Then this time
Speaker 1: will feel more rejuvenating then if I lose it to
Speaker 1: stuff I don't care about. So at some point today,
Speaker 1: start making your list of a hundred dreams. Maybe you
Speaker 1: can get to twenty five over your lunch break, maybe
Speaker 1: you can add fifteen more tonight, or maybe you'll surprise
Speaker 1: me and get all the way to a hundred. I'd
Speaker 1: love to hear how far you get. I'd love to
Speaker 1: hear what you put on there too. Feel free to
Speaker 1: send me your lists at Before Breakfast podcast at i
Speaker 1: heeart media dot com. In the meantime, this is Laura.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
Speaker 1: our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 1: You can send me your tips, your questions, or anything else.
Speaker 1: Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast pod that's B the number four then breakfast
Speaker 1: p o D. You can also shoot me an email
Speaker 1: at Before Breakfast podcast at i heeart media dot com
Speaker 1: That Before Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much. I look forward to staying in touch.