Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - How to Form New Habits - Productivity Bootcamp Part Two | Clutterbug Podcast # 69

Episode Date: February 26, 2019

Welcome to part two of our Productivity Bootcamp! Today we are talking about how to form new habits and some easy techniques to make habit forming really easy.  Some of the techniques I cover are:  Self motivation using "The Four Tendencies" by Gretchen Rubin Habit Stacking "The Five Second Rule" by Mel Robbins Prioritize with the "Eat That Frog" technique Parenting Yourself Be sure to follow me for more productivity podcasts in the future.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey clutterbugs and welcome back to the Clutterbug podcast. Today is part two of our productivity boot camp. So thanks so much for joining me. I'm Cass from Clutterbug and we're talking more about productivity. If you missed the last podcast, go back and find that one. It's called Productivity Boot Camp where we talk all about the first step. to leading a more productive life. Not a more busy life.

We actually want to get less busy. I want you to spend less time working and just reaching your goals faster by being more productive. And again, a little refresher. The way to do that is first to identify the goal, to break it down, and then to prioritize those tasks and schedule yourself a to do list every single day, making it a manageable to-do list though. Like, I want you to pick just five things that you have to do in that day.

Maybe it's laundry. Maybe it's, I don't know, go to work. Maybe it's go grocery shopping. But pick one of those five, a small thing that you can do that's working towards your goal. If your goal is to have an organized home, pick, organize the junk drawer, or pick up some drawer dividers at the dollar store, or, I don't know, purge 21 things. I want you to every day schedule some small step that you can take towards your bigger goal. And that is how we are really productive.

And then obviously going through that list and prioritizing, what on here is really the most important thing? What is going to have the biggest impact on my life? Does that mean that I skip a day of grocery shopping and go tomorrow? Does that mean that I let the house get a little messy, but I work on writing my booktips? today. Those are the questions we have to ask ourselves every day in order to really achieve the bigger goals in life. So now it's part two. We're getting into the second half of that, which is habits. So it's really great to write down our goals. It's great to have to do lists. But until we can make following those lists an absolute habit, it's going to feel like work.

We're going to procrastinate it. We're going to put those. things off and maybe not do them at all. I mean, sometimes we're the master of the best intentions and we actually don't follow through. So today we're going to talk about some different techniques to form new habits so that you can get in the habit of writing a to-do list every single day. So you can get in the habit of actually accomplishing the things on your to-do list every single day. So obviously writing it, putting it in a visual spot, that's so important. But I'm just going to go over a couple of really great techniques that you can try. And again, everyone is different. So what works for me might not work for you. But I know that there's something that will. So the first thing I want

to say right off the bat is I really recommend the book, especially for motivation and productivity, called The Four Tendencies. It's called The Four Tendencies by Gretchen Rubin, who I love. I loved all of her books. but this book in particular helps you identify your own self-motivation. So what motivates you? What can you do to help yourself set up new habits and change behaviors? And for me, I'm what's called an obliger, an obliger, which means I don't, if I set a goal for myself, I won't, I don't care, right? I just, I won't listen to it. But if I set a goal for myself, I don't, I don't care. But if I set a goal and if I have somebody else holding me accountable, then I will accomplish that goal.

So a really good example of this is, I mean, I can tell myself every single day, I'm going to lose weight, I'm going to be healthy, I'm going to stop eating, and I never follow through. I don't usually even follow through for the first day. But if I know that I'm meeting somebody, if I'm going to a meeting like a Weight Watchers meeting or I was a part of another group where we were meeting every week, I was holding myself accountable to them, to the group. Accountability partners really, really work for me. And so even in my business, I hired someone to be accountable to so that I would get up and work every day.

There's little tricks that you can do. Maybe you have a friend or a partner, and that's what works for me. You might be a rebel. You may be an upholder. There's lots of different techniques within the book, the four tendencies. that can work with your style to help you overcome some of your obstacles and really have success when it comes to forming new habits and motivating yourself. Another great habit forming technique is called habit stacking. And so this is when you want to create a new habit. You stack it on top of a

habit you already have. If every single morning you make yourself a coffee, put your notepad and your pen right beside your coffee maker. So while it's filling, that's when you write your to-do list. Or maybe put it beside your toothbrush in the toothpaste. So while you're brushing your teeth, you can jot down five things that you want to accomplish that day. This is called habit stacking. So every time you take, I don't know, you brush your teeth, put your vitamins right beside your toothbrush and then take your vitamins at the same time. So you're already in the habit of doing something, whether it's making your bed or brushing your teeth or brushing your hair or putting on your makeup or making yourself a coffee, stack another habit that you want to do on top of that to have success.

So the habit I really want you to start forming is writing a daily to-do list. So like I said, put it with your toothbrush, put a pad of paper and a pen with your coffee mug or your coffee maker or whatever it else is that you do in the morning. I want you to think of something that you automatically do every morning, and I want you to keep a pad and paper right there. So you remember and you can stack that habit on top. Another habit stacking or a habit forming technique that really, really works is a book called The Five Second Rule by Mel Robbins. This is an excellent book, but the truth is you probably don't need to read the whole thing to get the basic concept of this. what Mel Robbins says is for some reason we want to do something but we find it hard to actually get started

so when that thought comes into our head like I'm going to write a to-do list we count down from five we can't count up to five for some reason that doesn't work we count down so oh I don't want to get out of bed I want to just lay here and have five more minutes but like a rocket you five four three two, one, and you spring out of bed. Or you think, oh, I should write a to-do list, but I don't really feel like it. Five, four, three, two, one, do it. Don't give it a second thought. And that simple act of counting down from five and bursting can really motivate us and get us over that little like, ooh, procrastination thing that we struggle with. I find that this really does work for so many people. I forget to use it. That's my... I don't. I don't.

of ADD brain. So when I do use the five second rule, it's actually really, really effective. The truth is, I forget to use it, which is why I prefer the habit stacking technique where you look around and you're like, what's the new habit I want today? And you place those things by a habit you already have until you just do it second thought without thinking about it. Another great book for overcoming procrastination and starting new habits is called Eat Your Frog. And again, not really necessary to buy this book. I can break it down for you in five seconds. It is when you're in the habit of writing a to-do list.

You look at that to-do list and you prioritize the one thing that you kind of don't want to do or the most important thing, which let's be honest, is probably the thing that you don't want to do. You look at that and that's the thing you do first. Before you do anything fun, before you do anything else, before you parent yourself, before you get distracted, you eat your frog. And the reason they call this technique,

Eat Your Frog, is Mark Twain said, if the first thing you do when you wake up is eat a live, disgusting frog, you can guarantee that that's the worst thing that's going to happen to you that day. Obviously, I don't suggest you eat some frogs. That's disgusting. I think he was using it as a metaphor. But the point is, if you do the thing you're dreading the most first, the rest of your day is going to seem awesome.

Another technique for habit forming and for motivating you is to keep what it is that you want to do your new habit visual. So post sticky notes as remit. reminding you all over the place. If you're doing a to do list, I want you to keep it out, visual on the fridge. I want you to maybe have audio reminders on your phone reminding you to do these habits. Things fall out of our brain very easily, especially if it isn't already a habit. We can have the best intentions to accomplish things, but without constant reminders, whether it be visual or audio, we forget, especially if you're like me and

have total ADD brain. So keep it on the fridge. It's just temporary ladybugs. Don't stress about it. But put your to do list somewhere really, really visual. And don't forget to set yourself a reminder to actually not only write the to do list, but actually take time to accomplish those things. Last but not least, I really want you to parent yourself. And I say this all the time, but what this means is you would not let, or we shouldn't, let our children, watch TV before they have their homework done. We wouldn't let them eat dessert before they've had their dinner. We wouldn't let them wake up and have cookies for breakfast.

So why are we allowing ourselves to get away with the same bad teenage behavior, right? Why are we allowing ourselves to like let the dirty dishes sit in the sink while we sit and watch, I don't know, the Bachelor reruns or something? I don't know what you watch on TV. but my point is before we have to parent ourselves a little bit, before we get to have fun and do the things that we enjoy, we should adult a little bit. We should do a couple of our chores and get them done every day.

And when we look at it as it's good for us, you know it's good for your children, that's why we're making them do it. It's good for us as well. And we really remember that it's still our job to parent ourselves. We're still those little children inside. Those kids haven't really grown up. And they still need someone to care for them, look out for them, and make good choices for them.

We are the parents to those children inside of us. So it's our responsibility to make good choices for them. And so parent yourself. And when we look at it like that, coming from a place of love, not from a place of negativity, it really is easier to get up off the couch and actually accomplish the things that we want and then reward ourselves after with a treat. Like sitting down and watching reruns of the bachelor, whatever it is that you want to do.

So these are some little techniques that you can do to create new habits, especially the habit I want you to focus on, is writing a daily to-do list. Of all the things in my life that have had the biggest impact, writing a daily to-do list is the top one. It really is. A daily to-do list is not only, the reason that I transformed my host from crazy cluttered to clean and organized. It motivated me

to do that. But it was also how I accomplished things like starting a business, writing a book, all the things, all the things, looking back, I look back at the last seven years and I think, holy crap, like I'm a hot disaster mess. How is it possible that I was able to achieve things? And I'm not working hard at them. That's the honest truth. It's pretty lazy. to be to be completely honest. But the things that I'm doing, when I am spending time on something, I'm making sure it's productive time. So maybe it's only 15 or 20 minutes a day, but it's going towards a bigger goal.

It's going towards a bigger accomplishment. And so that's really where the success is coming from. And I want the same for you. And I don't know what your goal is. Maybe it is to write a book. Maybe it's just to clean and organize your home. Maybe it's to be a better parent. maybe it's to get healthy, whatever it is that your bigger goal is, remember that a daily

to-do list that you've prioritized and you've made it a habit to actually accomplish those things on the list. Don't forget to make the list attainable, like five things, easy things. We're not saying, like, we're not moving mountains, man. It's a small chip every day. That's how we accomplish things. But that's the secret. It really is the secret. And so I want you to gift it to yourself. I really want you to see the huge impact that just a simple list can have. So thank you guys so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed and I will see you guys next time.

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