How to be more productive by optimizing your energy, not your time

Welcome to all our new community members from Quility and beyond! It was such a joy to keynote at the Women’s + and mainstage events last week at the Bellco theater in Denver, CO. 

Here are a couple of behind the scenes pics from the event:

(It was fun being in the greenroom, knowing all these famous comedians like Tina Fey, Jerry Seinfield and Amy Poehler were in the same dressing room!)

For those of you who haven’t had a chance to sign up, don’t forget to register for tomorrow’s (Wednesday) Visioning Workshop 9-11am PST. 

I’ll be leading a longer future self guided visualization, then you’ll be joining breakout groups with visioning circles of 3 to share and expand each other’s visions. It’s a powerful, interactive process that you’ll want to join LIVE.

Today, we wanted to offer you a new way of thinking about productivity.

Most of us think of “productivity” as getting more tasks done. Checking things off a To Do list.

But this mindset can leave you feeling depleted, exhausted and as though you never get it all done.

What if, instead of thinking of productivity as “time management,” you reframed it as “energy management?”

Meaning, anything that increases your energy is productive.

Read that again: Any activity that gives you quality energy is productive. 

This is what psychotherapist Katherine Morgan Schafler asserts in her new book The Perfectionist’s Guide to Losing Control.

“It’s not really because we run out of the time to do them (important tasks),” Katherine says. “We don’t do them because we run out of the energy to do them.”

According to Schafler’s definition, sleeping is productive. Laughing on the phone with a good friend is productive. Going on a walk or doing yoga in the middle of the day is productive. Talking to your aging parents on the phone is productive (well…sometimes). 

You get the point.

This is all well and good, you might say, but I have a lot of responsibilities. 

If you’re building a business, you may have 12 hours of work to get done in 10 hours. If you don’t, things break, deadlines are missed or people are disappointed.

We can’t just abandon all the things we have to do every day, can we?

Here’s what Katherine says to that objection:

“What’s the point of building something if you can’t maintain it?”

Really let that gem of wisdom land.

What’s the point of building something if you can’t maintain it?

We must build a system that sustains us, rather than a system we can never keep up with.

The key is managing your energy, not your time.

This week, my kids are going back to school (we start school crazy early in NorCal!). 

At first, I thought; “Great! I’m going to be so productive. I’ll finally have a quiet house to get things done.”

Then one of my clients shared how her kids went back to school last week. And she almost had a meltdown. 

She put all this pressure on herself to get a ton done at work. But she forgot how exhausting it is for the whole family when kids start school. There’s a lot of emotional and psychological labor to get everyone on a new schedule, deal with anxiety about starting a new class, get back into the routine of packing lunches, aftercare schedule, etc.

This client told me; “So, I ended up taking a morning off for self-care, had lunch with my husband and just rested. Then I was able to show up for my family the way I wanted. But I didn’t get anything done that day”

That last part struck me.

Didn’t get anything done today? 

You supported your kids emotionally. 

You took time to prioritize intimacy and connection with your partner over lunch. 

You took care of your body and mental state. 

Those are literally the most important things! 

What’s more important than that? Checking email?!?

Our culture tells us that we’re “not getting anything done” unless we’re sitting at a computer cranking. 

And yet, if you were on your deathbed, the things that matter – like really matter – are the things that bring you energy. 

This new definition of productivity = energy management helps us align with our values and focus on what truly matters.

So this week, as my kids start school, I’m going to be very productive.

I’m going to clear my schedule (aside from Wednesday’s Visioning Workshop!) and spend several hours hiking in the redwoods, talking to friends, doing yoga and ceremony in my backyard, and lying down in the middle of the gosh darn day. 

Now, I’d love to hear from you! What will you do this week to be more productive? I really would like to know. 

You can leave a comment on the blog here, I’ll read every single comment and would love to hear what you think of this new approach to productivity!

May you create work and a life you love,

Vanessa

P.S. Don’t forget to register for tomorrow’s Visioning Workshop! 

Can’t join us live? No problem, we’ll send the recording afterwards. And, I highly recommend you join us live because you can only do the visioning circles LIVE. Since we’re doing breakout groups, there won’t be a recording for that part of the workshop.

Hope to see you tomorrow! Until then, may you find lots of ways to be even more productive today and every day. 🙂