🪨Productivity without Burnout. How people get more done and have time for themselves.

TUNE IN TO LEARN:  

Ever felt swamped by to-dos while trying to reach your long-term goals? Also wanting to get fitter, meditate, learn and sleep more? ALL at the same time?

Using the insightful "rocks, pebbles, and sand" theory, together we'll discover practical strategies to help you focus on what truly matters, ensuring your time and energy are spent wisely on significant actions that propel your life forward WITHOUT overwhelm and burnout. 

You can have it all. But you got to work on it in the right order...  

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:00

Hey, guys, and welcome back to another episode of your Brain's Coach podcast. My name is Angela Shurina, I'm your host, I'm your Brain's Coach and it is my job here to bring to you all the best recent, cutting-edge, well-researched, applicable and most effective sometimes also fun brain body work tools so you could take better control of your emotions, of your thoughts, of your work but, most importantly, that drives it all of your actions. So you could get out there and create the life experience that you absolutely thrill to be living. Today, guys, it is Monday on this side and we're talking about priorities. Today, this morning, I woke up and I'm like, oh my God, I have so much to do to hit my goals in 10 years. Like literally, sometimes I wake up that way, but then also you realize there are things that you got to do this week, so you move your agenda forward this month and next month. Weeks, so you move your agenda forward this month and next month. Right, there is this sense of urgency and sometimes it's just like pumping it up too much. I woke up and I'm like all these things got to do, but then I remind myself that all the important things there are not that many, and all the fluff, like answering every single email and doing every single idea that is on my head. That is just fluff, that doesn't matter, and when you give it a little bit of time, the right things persist and all the fluff goes away. You know a few emails not answered. Well, that didn't end up to anything anyhow, and the things that would end up to something would pop up on your path again and again and again. That's not to say that you got a delay, but letting it rest for a little bit.

Speaker 1 1:55

If you are someone like myself who tends to jump into doing things, then this is for you. Let it sit there for a couple of days, sometimes for a week, and if it surfaces again and again, that means there might be something. Things that work have this quality of persisting in life and in the world. Also, advice for a business owner If you have all these ideas all the time and you're jumping from one thing to the other and everything seems to be equally important and attractive, this is also a practice for you. Let it sit, and if you forget about it in a week because you got a ton of other ideas, that's probably for the good.

Speaker 1 2:39

So, as I woke up today thinking about all the things that I got to do. As I woke up today thinking about all the things that I got to do, I realized I need to actually take time and sit down and work on my prioritization, not jumping into doing all the stuff, because doing all the stuff doesn't always add up to all the stuff that you want to have in life. Not only that, but it steals the time, the energy, the resources from things that actually matter. If you try to just jump in and do all of it, attack all of the things on your to-do list without any prioritization, when you prioritize, you have the ability to move the big rocks in your life forward, while all the rest, all the small stuff, very often magically fits in as well, the options we don't consider. That is the theme of today's email and it's all about priorities.

Speaker 1 3:33

You know, there is this famous I believe Stanford, but don't quote me on that a professor who, in front of his students, wanted to make a point about prioritization. One of his students wanted to make a point about prioritization and so he did this experiment, or tripping over the truth kind of learning for his students. By the way, this is the best way to teach adults anything, make them or help them discover the aha moment for themselves. So I'm going to tell you a story about the experiment. It's called rocks, pebbles and sand. So the professor was trying to make a point about prioritization. He brought this big glass jar and a bunch of rocks, small pebbles and sand and he took the jar, put it on the desk and started putting rocks, big rocks in it. So he put all the big rocks to fill in the jar and he asked students, do you think the jar is full? And the students told him yeah, it is full.

Speaker 1 4:42

And then the professor took the small pebbles and started putting them in the same jar with these big rocks. And, by the way, if you want to have the visuals, just google rocks, pebbles and sand or you can join my newsletter, the link to which is in the show notes rocks, pebbles and sand. So the professor filled in the jar with big rocks and he asked if it was full. The student said yes. He put in the pebbles and mixed it up a little bit, shook the jar so the pebbles could go in all the smaller places in between the rocks. So he filled the jar again to the top with the pebbles, as many as he could fit in. And he asked the students again do you think the jar? Is the jar full right now? And the students said yes, it is full. And then he did the third thing he took the sand and started just putting it in the jar and putting and putting in. Quite a lot of sand fit in. And he asked the laughing students again do you think the jar is full now? And the students said yes, it is.

Speaker 1 5:55

And the point that he was trying to make when first we work on fitting in the big rocks of our lives, our family, our work, our health, and then we work on the pebbles, all the emails and certain social commitments that don't really adapt to the quality of relationships, and then when we put the sand in in the remaining spaces that might be your social media or emails that you really don't need to be answering, but just in case, when we put all this stuff, when we start with big rocks first, all of a sudden a lot of things start fitting in. But not only that. You actually start moving your life, your work, your relationships, your health forward in a meaningful way. And all of a sudden you realize, just like I realized this morning, I have the time to do the big things and, yes, I don't have the time to do all of it and work on every single idea and go to every single meeting and answer to every single email. I don't have time for that, but I do have all the time in the world to move the important things forward and it was a good reminder. I watched the video that is also in my newsletter. You can sign up when you go to the end of the show notes. There is a signup link for my newsletter. Also, you can just Google or chat GPT, rocks, pebbles, sand there is a really nice one-minute video on YouTube.

Speaker 1 7:37

So when you work on big things, all of the things tend to fit in Well, not all of them. Some emails still will not be answered, but, most importantly, you will have the feeling of fulfillment and meaning and progress in your life that so many of you might be missing because you do all of these small things. That at the end of the day, at the end of the month, week and year, you will ask yourself where did all my time go? You will ask yourself where did all my time go and all those hours of Netflix and YouTube? They just don't add up to anything meaningful, anything you can somehow touch and remember and see in your life. But then also, I always remind my clients and everyone and all the leaders that I work with and teams you have a lot more time to also move big rocks of your life forward with small things.

Speaker 1 8:32

You might say often or I don't have time, you know I want to exercise, but my schedule is packed. Or I'd love to sleep more, but here is too much to do and I wish I could study and grow my career business, but my days are already full, and grow my career business, but my day's already full. And yet many of us somehow find hours of Netflix, youtube, social media, sometimes in one binge, more often than not snacking throughout the whole day, feeling all the small times when it's hard for you to focus or when we don't have the answers right away. We fill it all in and never actually move the things that are meaningful forward because it requires a little bit of friction, a little bit of push. Then we say we don't have time to meditate and then struggle to focus at work and in our lives while studying and ironically, meditation improves focus and helps you to get more done in less time. Meditation also Sorry for for my voice need to hydrate. Ironically, meditation has been proven to improve the clarity of your thought and your ability to prioritize, so you get more meaningful stuff done.

Speaker 1 9:40

Small shifts, big impact. You can't do big things by going small, like doing 10 squats every 30 minutes or while watching Netflix or whatever it is you want to watch. In fact, a lot of my clients do that and sometimes we have a rule no squats, no Netflix. Packing up some boiled eggs and apples, bananas or beef, jerky or biltong, putting that in your drawer easy to grab or in your bags everywhere, so it's with you everywhere you go, instead of grabbing some candy. Fast fast food Doesn't have to mean bad food. Swiping 30 minutes of YouTube for 30 minutes of learning, which moves your career, your business, yourself, forward. Small shifts add up. That's how you can learn Italian. Doing 20 minutes of day every day that's what I'm doing, and in December I'm going to be going to Italy speaking only Italian, right. In fact, I also finished a lot of my certifications, three specifically doing nothing more than 20 minutes of daily studying.

Speaker 1 10:52

Most of us already have the time and resources to create the future. We want the future, you that you want. It's just a matter of prioritizing and putting the big rocks first and also sometimes creating big rocks out of small pebbles. That is also possible in life For me. I know that now I'll need to get even better at focusing on what truly moves the needle, because the difference between busy and progress is in the choices we make every single day.

Speaker 1 11:26

So what are your big rocks and how can you start small? But now, and that's the question of the day what are big rocks and how can you start small, but now? So, at the end of the day, today, you have a feeling that you know this day was meaningful. You have a feeling that you know this day was meaningful. I invested into something that I know gonna be a big, meaningful thing in my life sooner than later. So what are your big rocks and how can you start small? But now? Let's create fulfillment every single day. You know I love this phrase that I heard a few days back ago If you want to create mastery of your tomorrow, you gotta make today your masterpiece. That's all about the future that you want starts today, and it always starts today.

Speaker 1 12:29

So, big rocks, and how can you start now, even if it's small, because small things in life add up beautifully to big, meaningful things, also for your work.

Speaker 1 12:41

Additional piece, your most important work is not urgent, it's long-term projects.

Speaker 1 12:48

It's long-term projects, it's important goals, it's creative and deep thinking, it's planning, it's prioritizing, learning, strategizing, developing yourself as a great leader, as a great professional right. Those are the things that will move your life forward, not some dealing with crisis that never end, answering all the email and solving all the pressing issues that will never stop until you prioritize the important but not urgent. Hope this helps and it will infuse your whole week with some deep thinking, prioritizing and the right things done consistently. Stay tuned for more. Wednesday is going to be our wellness day and Friday is going to be our day for systems of productivity and effectiveness, and soon we're going to have more guests on our podcast. In fact, I'm finishing editing this weekend for our next guest. We're going to be talking all about change and how make small and big changes happen in our life. So stay tuned for that and also for everything that is coming. Have an amazing big rocks kind of week and, till next time, go big and start now, even if it means going small.