Using Small Templates & Systems In Your Life

What little things can you do now to help yourself next year?

Transcript

00:01 Hi, this is Katie and thank you for joining me on the My Senses, My Space podcast. And I want to say like, welcome back kind of, because I've been on a little bit of a hiatus and after doing a hundred episodes I, and having it timing out to like the winter holiday breaks, I decided to take a little time off and it's mid-January now, so it's not that <laugh> that long.
00:30 And I also have had this like new perspective over the last month that I wanted to share with you. There's some things I'm just really proud of that just fell into place.
00:44 And maybe I'm saying the word just a lot, but it, it just kind of happened. But I have to look back and really see how it happened because I know I find this with, with my son, I, I go, wow, you had such success with that.
01:01 How did that happen? He's like, it just happened. And I think a lot of us can see and feel and hear and all this stuff.
01:11 They, we can sense that there's more going on, but it can happen so quickly and we wanna move on and do other things that we don't look back and see how that actually happened.
01:27 And I think that's what this month of January is kind of all about for me is I'm pausing, I'm noticing things I'm watching other people <laugh>, I'm watching myself.
01:40 I even like talk to my son about like, hey why don't you just watch what mom and dad are doing and just kind of just watch.
01:48 You don't have to, cuz we really don't like force him to do things. It for him being told what to do and having like this authority kind of over him really doesn't work with his autism.
02:04 So it's really about joining in and the first step in all of that is noticing. So that's how that kind of ties into today.
02:15 So when I started out, just even the last few days or started out this month, I noticed some things falling into place.
02:25 I had been working really hard on putting in systems for our financial stuff and had had systems before, but they always had some fail points whether, you know, like all of the transactions were importing correctly, sometimes there's so many of them that we, it's can be hard to pinpoint where it's failing.
02:50 And I was having that problem with one of my systems was like, I don't know actually what I'm missing. And so it can leave you feeling like I, what's the point in putting energy into that if it's not gonna be accurate and correct and, and it's going to be really hard to fix.
03:10 So I took some time the last couple days and went through and we got it fixed. But then I also know this like, maybe this is not the system that I should rely on.
03:23 So I set up a new system and I love setting up systems this time of year because I can try a lot of things out and I give the whole month, especially for financial stuff.
03:35 I give it the month of kind of like setting up like or are these my categories? Cuz it's for my, our business and it's for our personal, like what kind of categories are gonna be successful a year from now?
03:49 And things shift, right? Like for this last year for me, I had a bunch of new health things come up and so we have a whole lot more health categories right now than we did a year from ago, you know, so, and I'm getting to see my chiropractor again.
04:08 I'm getting, you know I've been to the dentist for a while, but, oh gee, I had to have a filling.
04:14 So it's like, oh, these new little categories are creeping in and how do I manage them? So I try just lumping it all under one.
04:26 So I, I look at categories and try to think how simple could I keep all of this so that I can keep moving and then focus on other things.
04:35 Do I need to segment this out or not? And I tried it just saying, okay, health, right <laugh> just having a health category.
04:45 But then after a while I just saw like this lump sum of many different health things, the dentists, the chiropractor, our copays my infusions, other things like all these little things were pulling all into one and there was just like this lump sum there.
05:01 And for me it's important to understand like how often am I, can I look back over my records and see, oh yeah, there's my, my four therapies that I have a month, there is my chiropractic treatments, the here is my, and for me I'm like, okay, no, I need to separate this out cuz I had them separated, then I lumps on them <laugh>, then I separated them again.
05:27 But these first couple weeks in January are for that. Like if I, if I play now and I'm setting up these systems now, and to me I kind of also think of them as templates or is this a template I can stamp on every single month going forward, but also allowing myself grace that it won't be perfect and other things will pop up, right?
05:50 We, we can't plan out every single thing in our lives. But then there's other categories where, you know, I was was like, okay, should I be tracking all of the supplies for the house plus groceries?
06:04 Like should I separate those out? And I found this last year, no, I just gotta lump sum 'em under like groceries.
06:13 Like when you go and buy food and then you also buy detergents and toilet paper and all those things. I, I applaud those who can separate those cuz I was like breaking them down and trying to see like how much we're we spending here so I could budget going forward, but then I'm like, that's making it too complicated for myself.
06:36 I can just say there's one category so I can take one receipt, not split transactions, that kind of thing. Now for business that's a little different.
06:45 You are itemizing things. But then I discovered, I had kind of forgotten, I did this a year ago. I do our taxes every year.
06:54 I've been doing this for as long as I've had my business and even before then. But I had my, I started my business in 2005.
07:01 So <laugh> it's coming up on 20 years and every time I'm just like, well my categories don't match like the general categories I use for filing our taxes.
07:15 And last year, and I am thanking myself so much <laugh> like it becomes clear when I'm doing it. Like, oh, the, this is how everything should be in the categories that the IRS wants and makes sense or the, the software at least that I'm using in, in how I categorize things that they want.
07:36 And I'm fine with that. Like I guess you can move things around and and do it how it fits you.
07:42 But I was like, no, this makes sense and that's the question you should ask, does it fit me? But I'm like, no, I'm, I'm good, I'm good with what they're saying and I directly mirrored everything that they were asking for and I put it into my accounting software like word for word.
08:00 I need exact words because <laugh>, it's kind of like when I label all my spices, I'm looking for that exact word.
08:09 When I'm looking through all the spices, I need to see all the labels cuz I forget words. That's my adhd, <laugh>, I forget words all the time.
08:17 Literally right before hopping on this podcast, I pointed at her washing machine and I said, I don't know what that's called, the thing that washes your clothes.
08:27 And my husband's like the washer. I'm like, oh thank you. It happens, right? I roll with it. Anyway, I directly matched the names and when I went to just, I said okay, the year has wrapped up the calendar year I can.
08:46 And because I worked so hard last year of just, I just putting things in categories, I had a weekly date with myself.
08:53 I went through and I, I would just categorize things. That's all I did along with paying bills, right? <laugh>. And when I went to sit down I'm just like, I'm just curious what the numbers are this year.
09:08 And so I exported the yearly report and I'm like, oh wait a minute, these are the exact names and I could just sit down for 10 minutes and put them all into my tax filing system like right now.
09:24 And I am usually, okay, back up <laugh>, I have filed my taxes many times on April 15th.  Very close to midnight.
09:36 Okay, so <laugh>, I do, I have done that before. I think that was mainly during the toddler days of my my son.
09:44 But and those are hard days I know, but the last few years I'm kind of getting him done earlier and earlier just because I really don't wanna wait till the last minute.
09:57 And I'm just like, well I just, I have like a spare half hour here. Let me just plug these in.
10:04 Now does that make my taxes done? No. But oh my goodness, to think that the process that used to take me hours is done is amazing for me.
10:18 So what did it take to get there? This is where I'm coming back around <laugh>, it didn't just happen, although it feels right in this moment that it just happened, right?
10:32 But I'm looking at it as there was something last year that said, I, you know, in my brain that there was like, I'm kind of sick and tired of these not matching of questioning.
10:46 Like why are my categories different than what the software is? Why can't these match? So that's like one step backward, right?
10:57 I was curious about why these didn't match and then I took action on fixing those. How long did it take for me to rename everything?
11:09 Probably another 20 minutes, half hour just to kind of make sure they all match. But also I love emojis <laugh>.
11:18 So along with renaming these categories, the software I categorize, everything has emojis. And for me, I love this. I put emojis in my business categorization.
11:31 I put them in my personal categorization because when I look at that icon and then also recognize the name after it, it makes categorizing more fun and easier.
11:44 So before that though, before last year I was like, it's, it's been this build up year after year and sometimes we can feel like this will take forever or we don't wanna approach something, something that's just going to be so massive and so hard to do.
12:08 But what I've learned the last couple years is just do the small thing in that moment. Because man, that small thing I did last year has been huge for right in this moment.
12:22 Other examples are like kind of having templates or systems for other parts of my life. Whether I'm wearing very similar things every day.
12:33 So I don't have to make the choice of deciding what to wear. I have kind of a uniform that I use.
12:42 Granted it's usually a sweatshirt and sweatpants cause I'm mostly a home, but then I have like jeans and a sweater in different colors, right?
12:53 That I know I can put on those whatever is the clean ones and go, okay, that's my uniform for leaving the house.
13:01 These are the shoes I use to leave the house. I don't really have many choices. And so I can then focus on, well what am I doing out of the house?
13:10 Instead of what am I wearing out of the house? Is it templatizing like or systematizing what you eat every morning.
13:20 It depends if you are one who needs to have like similar things every morning for comfort or if your palate and your taste and you needs variety to be enticed to eat every day or just to enjoy your mornings.
13:41 Like everyone I think should enjoy food. And have like different varieties of crunch and taste and smells and spices and things.
13:51 But sometimes if you're going through your day and you need to focus your decision making skills on something more important, sometimes we just have to do the same thing over and over to get through a certain point in our lives or just projects or maybe then say, okay, Monday through Friday I have more of an ordinary breakfast of some kind.
14:17 And then on the weekends, that's when I take the time to like really experience life. So what do I mean by all of this?
14:26 I guess I'm coming back around it. What do I mean by this? What are the very, very small adjustments you can make to your systems, to your templates that can kind of create space?
14:41 And that can help you down the road? And I think this can apply to so many different things, but these are the ones that I noticed this January to go, wow, that really made a difference.
14:55 And I'm so glad I did. And it, it's sometimes it's really hard to think like, but I want to have my February really good.
15:04 Why am I doing things in January that's gonna help me a year from now when I wanna focus on February, march?
15:09 And yes, you can do that too. But I, my approach this year and what's really, I guess assuring now because I've been practicing this the last couple years, is take those small tweaks, take those moments to tweak things.
15:27 Take that little moment to just slow down and pause and say, you know what, if I do this, flip a switch, recategorize something.
15:37 Take the time to research something, cancel something, look at something a little differently, adjust something. How can that add up to a successful year from now?
15:53 I think that's it. And I appreciate all of you who have joined in the last 100 episodes and I feel this is kind of a kickoff to a new season, but I'm not gonna call it a season.
16:06 I don't want to have the confinements of a season because I don't know how long this season will be. I can't keep up three a week like I did last year.
16:17 And so it's going to be weekly moving forward. And so how long this season is, I don't know, there may feel like this natural cutoff towards the end of the year, towards the middle of the year.
16:28 I don't know. I don't know yet. So enjoy and I have new artwork up for my podcast now. It felt appropriate with this kind of changeover.
16:40 And until next time, thank you for joining me on the My Senses, My Space podcast.