Today I want you to own why your priorities are the key to results, not time management.
I’m encouraging you to change how you think about time. Change your language and the words you use about time. This is the start to changing your choices. All this leads to a big positive change in your results.
One key to becoming the leader you need to be is how you view time. Your beliefs and viewpoints about time will make a significant difference in your results.
Many high achieving women in network marketing tell me they used to say to themselves “I don’t have time!” And yet they admit it was a lie they were telling themselves because they were making time for other things. The number one thing they acknowledge was too much screen time.
I want to take you beyond screen time to the next level on this topic today. Yes, we can all probably benefit from regularly taking inventory of screen time usage from tv to our phones.
If you haven’t checked in with this in the last month, now would be a good time to look at how much time you’re spending on screens.
Predetermine what’s necessary for your network marketing results. Dedicate time for screens so it doesn’t overlap into time with your kids or loved ones.
Today, beyond screen time, I want you to think about four things that will make all the difference in how you use your time.
One, Change how you think about time in your network marketing business.
We have a lot more autonomy with our time and what we do with it than we realize. It’s so easy to get into the habit of routines. We can get locked into tasks simply because those are things we routinely do. They become habit.
It’s easier to do it ourselves than train someone else. It’s easy to get stuck in the fear that it won’t be done right or someone else won’t do it as we would. I know I’m not alone in that. Neither are you. It’s incredibly common.
It’s time to take a fresh look at what you’re doing in your business, and what you’re doing at home, where you can get some time back.
Let’s use the life-changing example of grocery delivery & pick-up services. If you’re already using these services you know how much time it saves you.
If you’re not yet, it’s time to sit down and take a real look at how you can add this. Maybe you don’t start with every grocery run? But even once a month, it will give you time back that you can spend with your kids or on your business, on anything more impactful.
I have a mantra I adopted when I had my son. If there is a job anyone can do, have anyone do it. I want to be decisive about when I have someone else care for him and what I’m doing with the time I spend away from him.
Don’t get me wrong, every mama needs a break. I’m referring to the routine, weekly, keep the business and household running tasks and where I can have help with those.
With your business, take a hard look at what tasks anyone can do and what the things are that can only be done by you.
Two, Change your language in regards to time for your network marketing business.
One of the top areas of improvement high-achieving women talk about to me is their time management. I’m here to tell you time management is a misnomer. You cannot manage time. It ticks away minute by minute, hour by hour, day after day. You cannot manage it.
Every individual on the planet has 24 hours in a day. When you catch yourself saying you need better time management I want you to pause. Change your language to “I want to choose my priorities.”
Time management is truly priority management. You can manage your choices. You can determine what’s important to you. You get to decide how to use your 24 hours in a day.
If you catch yourself saying “Ugh, I have no time for that.” I want you to pause. You’re feeling conflicted about what you “have to” do and what you “want to” do. It is a perfect opportunity to look at what directions you’re being pulled in and why.
By changing your language you’re giving yourself a gift of opportunity to true up where your time is going.
This brings us directly to my third point in how to better use your time.
Three, change your choices about how you’re using your time in your network marketing business.
When you feel that pull, when you feel pulled in different directions like you simply can’t be multiple places at once, maybe you’re feeling like ‘how am I possibly going to get everything done’.
It is time to make a choice that aligns with your priorities. You may be overcommitted. You may need to re-look at what season of life you’re in and what’s important to you now. Decide what can wait.
Determine what is still important, but doesn’t need the urgent time stamp you’ve put on it. Delegate the things you can when you can for the things you can’t during the times that don’t allow for it.
Changing your choices about how you’re using your time requires you to be crystal clear on your priorities and what is of utmost importance to you.
Finally, fourth, take a hard look at what you are emotionally attached to keeping on your schedule.
This will look like those tasks and jobs where you feel like no one can do it like you can. You feel like it’s simply easier for you to do it. There’s a bit of control sneaking in here.
Yes, it takes time upfront to pass things off to others, but when you are clear on training and expectations, you give regular feedback, you praise and reward with jobs well done, this gives you time back that will be spent on jobs that only you can do.
I love doing this exercise with my clients. When I challenge why they are keeping something on their schedule sometimes it’s important they do so. Often, it’s an emotional attachment.
They just don’t want to give something up. They don’t want to take the energy and thoughts required to hire an assistant or train a high school neighbor to do their mailings or errands or other admin duties.
Take a look at all the many things you did last week and what’s on your schedule this week. Identify the jobs that anyone can do. Pick one or two to make a plan on how you’ll hand it off, who you’ll hand it off to, and when.
When you spend time on the jobs only you can do, you’ll feel less conflicted and overwhelmed and you’ll enjoy being much more present in the moment with the impactful areas that receive your time and attention.
So, if there is a job anyone can do, have anyone do it because the best is yet to come! Always.
