energisers and energy drains

Energisers and energy drains
By Marcia Francois
First published in June 2003

I was on a course this week and all of us were asked to think about a situation that brought us immense joy and happiness. When analysing the accompanying feelings, I realised that when thinking about this situation, I also had a huge amount of energy and I felt free! It wasn’t a bind or a burden to do this. In fact, I felt like I wanted to clear my life so that I had more time to do this.

For me, this was speaking in front of big groups of people, motivating and inspiring them to take action in their lives.

If I had to ask you to put yourself in that situation, a couple of you would feel as I did. The majority of you would cringe, get tense and experience all sorts of negative characteristics. Why is that?

Probably because people get energised by different things. (Okay, I do know that the number 1 fear most people have is public speaking. More people fear public speaking than death!)

Think about a situation that does energise you.

Are you alone? Are you at home or at work? Who are you with? I want you to feel what it’s like to be energized so that you’re clearer about what drains you.

I’m sure you’ve noticed how sometimes just thinking about certain things can absolutely drain you of energy. Maybe these are unfinished tasks you have to do around the house or phone calls/ emails you’ve been delaying. You can also experience this same energy drain by being with certain people or by doing certain things you hate doing. Surely the idea of life is to have fun and to be energised?

Now think of an example from your own life that drains you of energy and answer the following questions.

1. Do I have to, or really want to do it? Yes or no?

If your answer is no, then why are you doing it? Is it because you feel pressure from family or friends to do it? Or even worse, in my opinion, is it because of self-imposed pressure? This is a biggie for me. Just asking yourself this one question immediately roots out things that you shouldn’t even be thinking of doing. Instead, tell yourself that you’re not going to do anything you don’t want to. It is okay to do this – don’t feel guilty J

If your answer is yes, then go on to the next question.

2. Why is this so draining for me?

Maybe you’ve allowed too little time to do something and the thought of having to rush is stressing you out! Do you fear confronting people? What’s the worse thing that could happen if you tell people that you don’t want to do something? Most people won’t have a problem and if they do, so what? Maybe they shouldn’t really be in your life if they don’t like you being honest with them…

3. What can you do to eliminate this drain from your life?

This is definitely the easiest part as it simply involves taking action. You can eliminate energy drains by thinking up some action plans to get it over and done with, or you can decide once and for all that you don’t want to do it anymore.

All this involves is communicating it to relevant people and that’s it! It is not a sin for your priorities to change. Maybe something that you thought was important to you three months ago is no longer important. For example, maybe you decided that you weren’t giving enough time to your friends and that you needed to spend four evenings a month with them. If it’s starting to be a drain, communicate! Remember that other people can’t read your mind. And decide on something that works for you.

When I was looking at my diary for the last month, it seems as if a lot didn’t get done. It started being a huge energy drain for me. When I started asking myself these questions however, I realised that a lot of my “to do items” were just habits but actually were no longer important to me.

This month I will let go! Repeat after me – I will let go, I will let go, I will let go.

Download the energy drains worksheet and get cracking :-)

Until next month…

Enjoy love and success

(C) Marcia Francois
Marcia Francois is a personal life coach and professional organiser who teaches busy people how to have more time, less stress and a more organised and fulfilled life. Visit http://takechargesolutions.org/ for your free Organise your Home e-book and other helpful tips.

8 steps to conquer your paper

8 steps to conquer your paper
By Marcia Francois, 2007

Remember a few years ago when we all got excited about a paperless society? Well, I don’t know about you but I seem to have more paper now than ever before.

But where does it all come from? Mail, magazines, newspapers, printed emails (I don’t do this but I know there are lots of you who do), birthday cards, takeaway menus, brochures, notes from school teachers, e-books, and the list goes on and on.

If you don’t have a system, you are going to get overwhelmed. And you know what happens when you become overwhelmed? You don’t do anything and things get worse.

Here are my steps to organise your paper:

1. Start by throwing away as much as possible
Paper should earn the right to be in your life. Don’t just hoard everything. Before you hit PRINT, ask yourself if you really need to print it.

Tip – if you’re in the habit of just printing everything, then put a post-it note on your computer to remind you to STOP AND THINK BEFORE PRINTING.

2. Decide what needs to be stored near and what can be stored further away
Items that you use on a daily basis should be stored near you while those you use less often should be kept further away.

My Household Organising File is literally at my fingertips while my old tax returns are filed at the back of my filing cabinet. See?

3. Determine your organising style
If you’re a visual person, you might need your accounts visible until you’ve paid them but if you like the minimalist look AND you will remember to pay it, you could file it away. If you work with your style instead of against it, you will be much happier and you’re more likely to keep up with the system.

I write the due date in my planner and file the account in a temporary place until paid, and then permanently file it. Until decluttering time, that is!

Tip – Go to http://www.letstalkorganizing.com/ebooks.html for a great resource on organizing your home office. I've read it and it is fabulous!

4. Decide on a home for each type of paper so you’ll know exactly where to find it later
You should have a system so that everybody in your family knows how to find any documents.

Magazines go in the lounge until the next one arrives, newspapers (once read) go in the recycling bag, children’s artwork goes in their scrapbook, all financial documents go in the study, etc.

5. Sort into categories – first broad and then narrow
File so that YOU can find it. It’s no use filing by name if you think by category.

For example, I remember by category, like coaching, organising, writing, etc. So I don’t have folders that say Jenny, Susan, Lisa. If I’m coaching Jenny, her emails go under coaching. Susan is a personal friend so her emails go under personal. Lisa and I are working on a joint venture so her emails go under… joint venture. That’s it :-)

6. Then do the actual filing
This can be fun if you play to your personality.

I like bright colours and nice, clear dividers and pretty files. It does help to have cute files so you're more likely to keep up your system. Let’s face it – would you rather file documents in boring, grey files that are falling apart or in lovely, colour-coded files? Of course you’d rather have the beautiful files.

Make sure you label clearly and keep your system simple. If you decide to change the categories, you don’t want to have to buy whole sets of stationery.

7. Maintain
This is the most important part of any organising project.

You have to set aside some time every week to get the paper under control.

Schedule 15 – 30 minutes every week for filing and throwing away newspapers, magazines and notes from school. If you run a business from home, I’d suggest that you schedule 15 minutes a day.

Remember the old saying, a stitch in time saves nine. This is so true for paper. Ignore the paper for a month and see how it takes you hours to sort out.

8. Control the clutter
If you are serious about getting a handle on the paper in your life, put some personal rules into place. For example, each child gets a clean pizza box for all their art every year. When that box is too full, they have to go through it and decide which to keep and which to toss.

I have a memory box for all love letters, birthday cards, anniversary cards, notes and so on. When it starts getting too full, I go through it and see what I can declutter. It’s amazing how each time you look though it (every couple of years), it is easier to decide on what’s most important to you at that point in your life.


As with everything else in life, it is always more work setting something up than maintaining it. It will probably take you a couple of hours to do steps 1 to 6, and then 15 minutes a week for steps 7 and 8.

You will save time by not looking for things and money on interest charges from missing invoices and by not buying duplicate items.

(C) Marcia Francois
Marcia Francois is a personal life coach and professional organiser who teaches busy people how to have more time, less stress and a more organised and fulfilled life. Visit http://takechargesolutions.org/ for your free Organise your Home e-book and other helpful tips.

take time for your self

Take time for self-care
By Marcia Francois, 2003-2007
First published 2003

I've been battling quite a bit with time management since the middle of February and have only just come to grips with my time a bit better. It seems like I'm not the only one though!

Many people have recently said to me that they're feeling quite tired and burnt out, very busy but not accomplishing much. I call it "doing the hamster thing". You know what it is that they do - they run around on those little wheels in their cages, going nowhere fast. And that’s not a very pleasant feeling. Trust me – I know!

I really believe that in order to manage your time better, you need to decide what's important to you and what's not. If you don't decide, you can be sure that other people will decide for you.

If something is important to you, you will make time for it. I used to say things like, "I don't have enough time for exercise because I get home from work too late." One day I realised that that's absolute nonsense. Obviously I was making work a higher priority than having a fit and healthy body. It's as simple as that. Hmmm…

So this month I want you to take time to focus on yourself. I can just hear all the busy mothers out there saying things like, "but my children need me." Listen, it's not a selfish thing to do - instead, it only makes you a better person. I'm also very driven and have hundreds of things on the go so I do know what it's like. But you can’t give what you don’t have.

There are seven areas to everyone's life - spiritual, work, financial, family, friends, health/physical and personal. We constantly give and give and because we all lead such busy lives, it's very easy for that last section to slip. Hopefully that will be changing soon.

This year I decided that because my personal development is extremely important to me, I need to start scheduling time just for me. What I've been doing is scheduling two nights every month to focus on me. If I find interesting worksheets, quizzes or e-books on the internet, I print them and do or read them in this self-time too. I don't know about you but sometimes I read a book and at the time I'm too lazy to fetch some paper and do the exercises. Now I note them down and do all these exercises during my self-care time.

my favourite type of self-care!

You can enjoy your time pampering yourself with a lovely bubble bath, paint your toenails or read a favourite book. Or buy a favourite magazine and read it over some coffee and cake at a quiet coffee shop. Or book yourself on a workshop. I do regular talks and workshops and while I love it, I do enjoy receiving now and again. So every year, I attend at least two workshops.

For all the unstructured people out there, you're probably thinking, "where's the spontaneity?" I'll do a Dr Phil and ask you this, "how's the spontaneity been working for you?" I also tried the spontaneity thing and I never seemed to get around to things that were important to me!

I've really found this time of self-care very useful and I know that you will too. You'll be able to really think about what's working for you and what's not. I suggest that you buy a pretty notebook, and write it all down. There's something very special about committing things to paper instead of having it all milling around in your head.

My sister calls her personal time "Shelley time". Repeat three times: It's not a sin to have (insert own name here) _____________ time. Very good!

Download the worksheet but more importantly, take some action. You are so very worth it!

(c) Marcia Francois
Marcia Francois is a personal life coach and professional organiser who teaches busy people how to have more time, less stress and a more organised and fulfilled life. Visit http://takechargesolutions.org/ for your free Organise your Home e-book and other helpful tips.

The power of habits

the power of habits - by Marcia Francois
first published in Feb 2003

I’m going to start off with a really powerful quote by Mike Murdock, which goes, “the secret of your success is hidden in your daily routine”. I saw another good one too the other day that said, “successful people do what unsuccessful people are not prepared to do”. And that’s exactly my point; there are hundreds of little things we either are doing or not doing that affect the degree of success that we’ve achieved.

A habit is an action done so many times that we don’t even have to think consciously about doing it anymore.

Most people agree that it takes 21 days to form a habit and only 3 days to break it. For example, when we were very small, we were all trained to brush our teeth every morning. The toothbrush with toothpaste was given to us and we dutifully brushed our teeth every day. Now, I don’t know anyone at my age (!) who has to really think about brushing his or her teeth. I know that I stumble to the bathroom, half-asleep, and brush my teeth automatically. Why? It’s a habit.

If you take time to think about your daily routine, you’ll notice lots of good habits like driving within the speed limit, drinking 2L of water daily, etc. A few years ago, I decided that I needed to start drinking more water. So on 1 January 1998, I started forcing myself to drink 2L of water every day. This habit took hold in only 14 days because after the first two weeks, it was easy and it’s been that way ever since.

Now, in the same way that good habits are formed, bad habits are also created just as easily. I know of people who start saving, say R100 every month, and everything goes well for three or four months. Then they decide to go on holiday and stop saving for one month. The snag is that it doesn’t end up being just one month, because the habit they were creating has been broken. The next month it’s easier to spend that R100 on clothes, and after the third month, they’re back to square one!

So this month, I want to encourage you to think about some good habits you want to start implementing and some bad habits that you need to replace with good ones.

If you currently have a bad habit at work of shuffling paper around and not dealing with it, start this month by being disciplined and either filing it, working on it or throwing it away. When you’re tempted to just throw it back into your in-tray or start making a pile on your desk, STOP!

Remember that you have the power to break that bad habit and start creating some good ones. And the same goes for driving – if you’re like me and let other drivers on the road irritate you, stop and tell yourself that you’re going to replace all that negative behaviour with something positive. Maybe you need to start saying things like, “I am perfectly calm and stress-free in traffic.”

Action challenge
1. Print out the habits worksheet.
2. If you work outside the home, copy it so that you have one at home and one at work.
3. Read through your list every day to remind yourself of the habits.
4. Start implementing it. Make like Nike and “just do it”


By the way, this ties in really nicely with a blog post I wrote recently, my daily steps to success. If you haven’t already read it, go on over and see what I wrote.

© Marcia Francois 2003-2007
Marcia Francois is a personal life coach and professional organiser who teaches people how to have more time, less stress and a more fulfilling life. Visit http://www.takechargesolutions.org/ for your free Organise your Home e-book and other helpful tips.

Make your life easy with effective systems

make your life easy with effective systems
by Marcia Francois


Life is such a whirlwind, isn’t it? If you’re anything like me, it often seems like the weeks go by in a blur of activity…and then it’s weekend again. Or the weekends go by so quickly and when Monday comes around, you feel like you’ve just started to relax and the week is upon you once again.

The problem with this is that we never have a sense of peace, calm and control. A feeling that we are directing the course of our own lives.

I go through patches of hectic too so I thought I’d share some of the systems I’ve set up to make our lives easier:

Household calendar
We have one household calendar in our kitchen where we mark off any commitments like church, other ministry commitments, meetings, gym, socials, and so on. We use a sticker system with a different colour for each area of life. The nice thing about this system is that when there are too many stickers, we know we’re too busy. I also mark off the recycling pick-up days, when the meter reader is due and of course, things like birthdays.

I couple this with diary planning for the week ahead. I look at my diary on a Sunday and put in my appointments for the week. I also add any tasks that I need or want to work on, like writing articles, e-courses, newsletters and so on.

Meal planning
I love meal planning because it saves me time. When I say this to people, they think I’m crazy because “how can all that planning save you time?” It’s quite simple – a twenty-minute planning session on the weekend saves me time from Monday to Friday, when I need it most. No more standing in front of the open fridge wondering what to make for supper.

And you can still be spontaneous within the plan. I plan meals for the working week but if I don’t feel like a particular meal that day, I change it around and cook another day’s meal. Like if it’s very hot and I planned to have baked potatoes with a topping, I’ll postpone that to another day and make a pasta salad instead.

Regular decluttering and organising
I tackle an area in our home every weekend. Let’s face it – if we are constantly buying things and bringing them into our homes and lives, clutter is constantly building up unless we get rid of some of it.

It doesn’t have to be a huge exercise. While you’re busy cooking or baking, you can sort out a cupboard or two. I don’t trust my oven timer (it is erratic) so I stay in the kitchen whenever I bake to make sure my muffins don’t burn! I then use the time constructively to sort out the cupboards, plan my menus, write out my shopping list, etc. You can see the fruits of my labour on the organising blog at http://organisingtips.blogspot.com/

When you factor in just 15 minutes’ decluttering and organising every weekend, you can easily maintain your home if it is already organised. Of course, if your house is nowhere near where you’d like it, I would suggest 15 mintues every day. Sign up for Beth’s declutter calendar at http://encouragingcoach.com/ and start the process now.

Launch pad
Do you know the place in your house where you dump your bags as you enter? Flylady calls this a launch pad. I like that term because it reminds me of action. We have an interesting, little corner in our entrance hall that I use for my launch pad and my husband uses another section near the kitchen.

Mornings are one of the worst times in most families – you can’t find your keys, wallet, bag, etc. Frantic running around and screaming happens and that is just not fun.

The point is that we use our launch pads to ready ourselves for mornings. Every evening I pack my handbag, work bag and keys, and they are all left here. In the mornings all I do is grab and go. Literally once I leave the bedroom, I walk to the fridge to get my cooler bag with my lunch, set the alarm, grab my bags from my launch pad and I’m out of there. And that’s two minutes tops!

Now, over to you. Which systems can you implement to make your life easier?


© Marcia Francois 2007
Marcia Francois is a personal life coach and professional organiser who teaches people how to have more time, less stress and increased productivity. Visit http://www.takechargesolutions.org/ for your free Organise your Home e-book and other helpful tips.

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how I can help you
Virtual organising session
I can help you with an objective opinion and lots of good ideas via a virtual organising session.

Hands-on organising session
I will come to your house for a 2 or 3-hour hands-on session. We will do a needs analysis and then get stuck in - decluttering, organising and setting up systems to help you with your time and space.

I also offer wardrobe organising sessions. You will fit on everything (either when I'm there or beforehand) to decide what you love wearing and what must go. We will then declutter and organise your clothes, shoes, accessories and so forth.

Email me for available times.

Eat that frog!

this month's article

Eat your frog!
By Marcia Francois


Eat your frog? By now you’re wondering if I’ve gone stark raving mad! No, I’m not mad.

I first learned of this principle from Brian Tracy.

Your frog is the most important task of the day. It is the one thing which, if done quickly and effectively, will ensure your greatest success.

You see, when most people get to work, they already have some idea of what they have to do for the day. Let me give you a specific example.

Okay, imagine that these are the 5 tasks that await you on a particular day:

1. Read and respond to emails.
2. Phone somebody to resolve a query.
3. Set up a meeting.
4. Compile monthly report.
5. Draft a process email and send out.

Most people would probably do the tasks in this order – 1, 3, 2, 5 and 4.

Why?

Because that’s the easiest way to get through the list. After all, by 10:00 nearly all the items can already be ticked off the list.

But then a “typical day” happens – client phone calls, queries left, right and centre, you’re called into a couple of meetings and before you know it, 4:30 has rolled around and you still haven’t done that monthly report.

Sound familiar?

That’s because you haven’t eaten your frog. Your most important task is still undone.

So let’s change it all around.

What if you walked into the office and did nothing else until your report was done? You’ve eaten your frog. And it’s only 9:00.

You then catch up on emails, and draft the process email to send out. The “typical day” still happens but because the most important tasks are done, you can squeeze setting up the meeting and phoning the other person into the tiny five-minute slots you do find during the course of the day.

You see, it’s what I’ve been teaching my time management clients for years when I tell them to ask themselves, “what’s the most important use of my time right now?”

If you get used to eating the frog first, the rest of your day can only get better. Your most horrible task is over and done with and you can almost…but not quite…relax!

And if you have TWO frogs, then you eat the ugliest one first!

My challenge to you is this – just try it for a week and see how your productivity soars. You know I’m the go-to gal if you want to increase your productivity so I made a worksheet to help you get into the habit. Download it now. Page 1 has Mon - Sun and page 2 only has Mon - Friday.

I can’t wait to hear how it works out for you.

By the way, I thought I ought to practise what I preach. So this month, I did exactly that. I wrote this article a week earlier than I usually do so that it’s done. And I feel great!

© 2007 Marcia Francois

Marcia Francois is a personal life coach who teaches people how to have more time, less stress and increased productivity. Visit http://www.takechargesolutions.org/ for your FREE success pack, articles and helpful tips.

2006 - My year in review

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THIS MONTH'S ARTICLE
2006 - my year in review

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Spiritual
This year was probably not the best year I've ever had spiritually but I've realised in my Christian walk that this is a marathon, not a sprint and there are ups and downs. As with everything else in life, you have to keep your eyes on things above and just keep moving.

Business
Looking through my goals for the year, I did a lot better than expected in most areas but not as good as I wanted to in other areas.

I got a bit techno-savvy and set up my website and domain name in March. Continuing the techno streak, I set up three business blogs - take charge of your life, organising tips and the newsletter archives.

I ran 9 workshops - 4 Awesome Relationships, Goal-setting 101, Discover more of yourself, Simplify your life, Health and wellness day, and Spring into Organising.

I also interacted on a one-on-one basis with many clients through coaching and organising.

I also developed an e-course, and several e-books which are now for sale on my site.

And I was featured on Kaya FM as a clutter control expert!

I also learnt lots about marketing this year - I now know that marketing's not a swear word :)

I had two sets of business cards printed - I had the reprint done to direct people to the website to get their free success pack, and also to link to the blog.

Financial
This year, I invested a lot of money in myself.....because I'm worth it. Seriously though, I bought lots of e-courses, e-books, CD's and print books to develop myself and improve my business.

Despite all that, I managed to reach my savings goals with almost no trouble at all. Why is it that this seems to be the easiest goal of all for me to accomplish every year?! I don't think I've become extremely self-disciplined over the years so it might just be that I'm addicted to seeing that savings account grow :)

Health
I lost 4kg on Weigh-Less!!! (this year, my goal is to lose another 3 and get to my goal weight). I changed my gym routine to incorporate some dance classes - originally 3 but then I got bored with belly dancing and now only do hip-hop and salsa. I also went to an Introduction to Nia dance workshop.

I have never eaten this healthily in my life, thanks to Weigh-Less, and am faithfully eating lots of vegetables and fruit on a daily basis.

In 2006, one of my main goals was to create more balance in my life and that, I'm proud to say, I really did. Of course, it's a battle when things get busy. But I have learnt to relax my expectations somewhat (for instance, sometimes I chose to spend a couple of hours reading instead of cleaning, or going to gym instead of working late, etc.).

Marriage
Dion and I had lots of date nights this year and of course, we also participated in the first Relationship Boot Camp I ran, to set off our relationship on the right foot.

We also travelled quite a bit this year. We went to Port Elizabeth for our 11-year anniversary at the end of April, then had our big holiday in Thailand and Malaysia in October/ November, and we ended off the year with another long weekend in Grahamstown and Port Elizabeth early in December. Dion and I met in Grahamstown 14 years ago at Rhodes University so it was really special to go back there.

Ministry
Even though this was a really quiet year, I helped around 15 people discover their passion. I also started a new passion-driven ministry called Success Principles, based on Jack Canfield's book. The new ministry had only a few members but each meeting was so inspiring as individual members shared and encouraged one another.

Social/ friends
We always start off the year very well with socials but then as the year progresses and it gets busy, we somehow don't get to see all our friends as often as we'd like. And the travelling didn't help this year either!

I made lots of lunch dates with my friends - isn't it nice to meet up and just be with your girlfriends? (If you haven't spent time with your friends lately, bring them along to the From Drab to Fab workshop. You will have a wonderful time - I promise!)

However, we ended off the year very well and managed to meet up with 3 sets of friends just in December alone, which was just wonderful.

Personal
One of the major things that affected me this year was blogging. It amazes me to see how people's opinion of blogging differs. Some love it, some hate it, some don't understand it but still hate it :)

You might have noticed that I love blogging! I have made some amazing friends through blogging and the internet this year. I even got the opportunity to meet up with Ali and Ricardo on Christmas Eve.

I attended 4 workshops/ courses this year for my own pleasure/ personal development.
I read a total of 72 books this year (on average, 6 every month) - 52 fiction and 20 non-fiction.

And I also saw some really good movies like The Holiday.

Getting back to techno-savvy, we finally got ourselves a digital camera and MP4 players. AND! I'm typing this on my new laptop - yay! Back to the digital camera... oh my word, are those things nifty or what?! I love that camera and discovered another little addiction - taking pictures of food. I know it's weird but it could have been weirder, right???

So that's it - my year in review. (I'd love to hear more about yours in the comments)