What are your plans for this week? A big presentation, a dinner with friends and some celebrations maybe? Take each day of this week to free yourself up from clutter in your home. It’s a simple as 1-2-3!
What are some easy areas for you to declutter this week? Here are our 7 inspirations for you:
“Penguins are strong in numbers. Who’s in your colony?”
How often do you check your inbox and cringed? On Sunday, I felt like most of my emails were rubbish. Maybe it’s still the result from this month’s full moon (my excuse for everything over the weekend). Maybe it’s time to take control of my inbox again. If you’re anything like me, you’ll love these tips to take charge of your emails again:
“Wanting less is probably a better blessing than having more.” (Mary Ellen Edmunds)
Do you love books? Are you reading a new one every week? Don’t even know where to put all your books?
We’ve met a number of expats in this region who just love, love, love reading. For them, there’s nothing better than escaping into a different world after a long day at the office. While many started using their Kindle more often, reading a book with real paper pages to turn is a different experience. Are you one who also prefers the paper over ebooks? Yes? Then this post is for you!
Today, we’re sharing 4 tips on decluttering and organising your books:
We all want to be productive but how many of us are that? Living in a region where planning or the lack thereof is often criticised, productivity may be hard to achieve. Yet, there are ways you can set yourself up for a productive day.
We’ve gathered our top 3 tips for your productive day here:
1. Be intentional.
Decide how you want to spend the day the night before it actually starts. Yes, that’s right! The night before! Planning your day is often ignored. I’ve met many folks who, if they plan, they do it after checking their emails, listening to voice mails and catching up with colleagues. By then, your day has been decided for you and not by you.
2. Define your 3 top priorities for the day.
Look at your deadlines, requests and workload to establish your top 3 priorities for the day. Work on the first one, the most important priority, before you move to the second one. Once you’ve completed the second one, you move to the third one and only then would you start other work.
Your priorities can be short activities like requesting information in order for you to continue working on a report. It may be something longer like setting the strategy for the next 3-6 months for your team.
It’s all too easy to change your day based on external influences. Now, I don’t say you need to ignore your boss’ or your clients’ request. Yet, you can identify the urgency and importance of handling their requests. In this region, many requests are made out to be emergencies and everything else needs to be dropped. In reality, they may be far from it. For me, I consider an emergency a person dying and they need immediate attention.
3. Take breaks.
Taking breaks has nothing to do with being productive you say? Think again! How productive or effective can you be after 7 hours of straight work with not a single break? No cup of tea, no bathroom break, no snack break. Your productivity declines.
Various studies found it’s better focus for a short time, get lots of quality work done during this time and then take a break. One example of this is the Promodoro Technique. Set a timer for 25 minutes and zoom completely into that activity. Once the alarm goes off, take a quick break of 5 minutes. Repeat this 4x and take a 25-30-minute-long break after this cycle.
Your eyes and mind will thank you! Re-energise by going for a quick walk around the office, grabbing a drink (remember to stay hydrated) or catching up with a colleague in the cafeteria.
To follow my own suggestions for staying productive, I’m now having my break. A nice cuppa with an apple. Today feels like one of the days where I’d like to eat more fruits. This first break for the day will be ideal to beat flies with one stone.
How do you stay productive whether at work or at home? Share your tips with the Organised Life and Mind community. We love to hear about your experiences!
Wishing you a productive day and week,
Until next time,
Agni
“Simplicity boils down to two steps: Identify the essential. Eliminate the rest.” (Leo Babauta)
Do you ever review how your day, week or month was for you? Last week was particularly energising for me. Things fell into place and one meeting left me in awe. I was almost mesmerised by it and stepped back to see how last week was different. Also, I wanted to see what I can take from it for the future. If you’re anything like me, you too would like to see how to multiple the feeling of amazement and super motivation.
This special meeting was a planning workshop. You’re probably going “Planning? Not again!”
We love creating and have used chalk paint for a number of smaller projects. We love how versatile chalk paint it. It’s easy to apply, adds a lovely touch and you can write on it! Over and over again!
Because of that, we’ve searched for the cutest and most functional organising with chalk paint ideas. Here’re the best projects which you can easily recreate at home and continue your organising journey:
“Learn to say ‘no’ without explaining yourself.”