Image by Howard Walsh from Pixabay
Years ago I took an Envisioning Workshop hosted by a friend. It was the first time I had seriously sat down to plan out a big project, and I instantly saw how it was a far superior way than I had experienced in professional ‘strategic planning’ workshops that my employers had paid thousands of dollars to host and for each of us to attend. Backward planning from a dream vision back to the present moment uncovered some steps that were essential for success that would have been overlooked otherwise (e.g. the training needed to complete a step could be added as a sub step and the money needed for childcare or to pay for the materials necessary to succeed at the next step were revealed through this process).
But it was missing something. The last step. The step that turned the vision into actionable reality.
After taking a couple of hours to really think through all the steps, I have to admit that I didn’t wind up doing even the first task in my plan.
And when I missed that first task, I never found the time to re-do my plan and change the timelines for everything, and the project never happened.
But over the past ten years I started taking a different approach to taking that first step that has meant I have been able to accomplish some important goals without fussing with a complicated plan or milestones that got missed.
I started to use ‘ chunking’, and let go of deadlines and milestones completely.
I have created a whole course that reimagines the ‘Envisioning’ process I learned years ago using my chunking strategy to kickstart the project, and keep everything flowing and eventually reaching the end goal.
But in this article, I’m just going to explain chunking so that you can see how it is a gamechanger that will allow you to get to the finish line instead of abandon the race along the way.
What do I mean by chunking?
I mean first looking at your calendar instead of the task at hand.
Identify the next available 15 minute amount of time when you could realistically sit down and work on a small part of your plan. The smaller the better to start off.
If you want to realize your dream, and it seems impossible to find the time necessary to do it all, just focus on the next necessary step and keep plugging away at it until that task is done.
Forget planning out dates and deadlines for each step along the way. Only take the time to book yourself for a 15 minute chunk to do a small thing towards your goal.
And the second secret to chunking is to keep at it like a beaver, planning another 15 minute block of time within48 hours – and perferably every day, or within the next 24 hours- to build momentum.
Reward yourself for keeping your appointment with yourself and putting in the time to make it happen instead of only reward yourself for completing a task.
After all, life happens and if you only get a reward for completing a task, you will most likely feel like a failure if you don’t complete it in the amount of time you imagined it would take. Missed ‘deadlines’ take an emotional toll and make it twice as hard to get back at it and keep trying until you finish that task. And then start and finish the next one.
I have found that, as a single mom, the only way I get serious work done is by booking time to do it using a co-working app like focusmate.com. It’s amazing how much more productive I am, and how much more accountable I am to myself and my projects and goals, when I see an official email confirming my time and the time of someone else to keep me company as I beaver away at my task.
Just seeing someone else in work mode, hunkering down to do some work, is enough to get me in work mode too. And if a real person is counting on me to keep them company too, I find the time to commit and stick to it. The cleaning and other daily things are easy to put to the side until my focusmate session is over, instead of giving in to temptation and putting my project work to the side.
If I book a 30 min focus mate session, but only have a plan to do 15 minutes of work on my task, then I feel like a total hero when I do a full 15 mins. And I get enough ‘noodling’ time to settle in and do that 15 minutes of task time without feeling like I am wasting valuable time.
It’s a win-win .
Let me know if this process works for you!