Noise, Noise, Everywhere the Noise

Summary

Leilani shares her personal strategy for overcoming distractions and increasing productivity by creating a concrete plan with intentional, smaller tasks, which has led to a more successful day.

Abstract

Leilani, the author, describes her usual struggle with a scattered focus, which she likens to her brain going everywhere and nowhere at once. However, on the day of writing, she experienced a significant improvement in productivity, attributing this success to starting the day with a concrete plan. Her morning routine includes personal time, reading, and shared activities with her husband. Despite the challenges of managing a household with small children, Leilani emphasizes the importance of a solid plan to combat the chaos of life. She contrasts the fluidity of her usual approach to tasks with the effectiveness of her concrete plan for the day, which included scheduling and completing a new project and writing before the project start time. Leilani also notes the importance of not overwhelming oneself with large projects, but rather tackling them in manageable, 15-minute mini tasks. This intentional approach to the day's tasks has helped her make significant progress on a project that she had been putting off for weeks, possibly months.

Opinions

Leilani believes in the power of a concrete plan to enhance productivity and cut through the noise of everyday distractions.
She acknowledges the tendency to get sidetracked without a clear plan and the effectiveness of a structured morning routine.
Leilani suggests that the key to managing larger projects is to break them down into smaller, actionable tasks rather than trying to complete them all at once.
She advocates for intentionality in one's daily activities and prioritizing tasks to ensure that what is considered important gets done.
Leilani encourages others who struggle with focus to adopt a similar approach, emphasizing that even significant projects can be tackled in small steps over time.

Concrete Plan

However, the good news is, today I haven’t had as big of a problem is that. Today, it’s been a very productive day so far. I think it’s because I started off with a plan. A concrete plan.

Every morning I have a plan to complete my morning routine. This comprises waking up about an hour before my husband and scrolling around on my phone for a little while. Then I read my poem, my short story, and an essay.

Now it’s time to wake up my husband. Together we eat breakfast, and study our scriptures, listen to a Sunday on Monday podcast and listen to a general conference talk together. We’ve added reading one page from the Doctrine and Covenants. So the first part of our morning is quite productive. And I have a plan. A concrete plan.

Noise

However, the rest of the day will often find its way into a chaos that is life with small children and no plan. Despite none of the small children being first generation for me, they’re all second-generation–this happens when you buy a house with your children who have children. And no concrete plan.

Blargh

I think the problem is my plan is too ephemeral. I don’t say, okay, Leilani, do this and this. Instead, it’s too fluid. It’s more like, Well, you have a class at 11. So this means from 8 to 10 would be a good time to write. Or maybe work on Project F. The time block may or may not get done, whereas I’m great at getting to my classes. Because those are not ephemeral. I set those in stone, so my plan works, because it’s concrete.

Better

This morning, like I said, has been going great. I scheduled the time for a new project on my calendar got it done. And I wrote first thing this morning, before the project start time.

I’m not sure why today is different. Unless it’s because last night, before I went to sleep, I decided I was going to do that one minor project at 9 o’clock this morning. Which, by doing, helped me to work out some other projects I needed to do. Something I kept in mind today, I remembered I don’t have to do the entire job in one fell swoop. It’s a fairly decent size project. I could do it in one day, but I have other things I want to do.

Success

Instead of putting it off for another day, I picked one mini task I could do in 15 minutes. And did it! Now I’m on my way to getting that project completed. Much better than putting it off like I have been doing for weeks. Possibly months…

How did I cut through the noise and get to what’s important? I was more intentional, quite intentional with everything I’m trying to do today. I think that’s the difference. Having a plan. An intentional concrete plan.

You, too, can do it!

So if you are having a hard time cutting through the noise of your own brain, to get to what you think is important, be intentional. Figure out what it is you really want to do. Prioritize. While remembering if it’s a bigger project, you don’t have to do the whole thing in one fell swoop. Instead, cut it up into smaller bite-size pieces or chunks. Rome wasn’t built in a day.