The Time Finder with Paula Eder

Find Time to Set Goals – 3 Ways It Helps!

Paula — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 11:06:18 +0000

This week I’m having a great time putting the finishing touches on our next Finding Time E-zine. (It fires next Thursday at noontime, and if you’re not already a subscriber, you can grab your issue as a bonus for signing up for our FREE MP3 in the sidebar!) To give you a taste, here’s an article from our archive that asks: “Why set goals?”

Many people just assume that effective and successful people always set goals. If this is an assumption that you have made, please put it aside for a moment. Consider how such an assumption might sabotage your ability to realize your dreams. Too many people who set goals and begin to work on them do not complete them. For example, those who make New Year’s Resolutions – which are goals – often never attain them.

Setting goals is not a requirement for being an effective and successful person. If you feel driven to set goals because you ’should,’ then you diminish your view of yourself as an effective and successful person each time you don’t achieve your goals. Instead, we would like to recommend that you view goal-setting as a technique to assist you in 3 areas:

Setting goals helps you define what you want in your life. It does so in clear, concrete, and simple language. Nothing is as useful in determining exactly what you want, and creating a picture of the outcomes in your mind, as the technique of setting goals.
Once you have defined the outcomes you want, it’s much easier to design relevant action steps, through the technique of setting goals, to achieve those outcomes. Setting goals clearly defines your destination and enables you to design action steps that point you in the right direction. You can look at your desired outcomes and measure exactly how well each action step you devise moves you closer to what you want to accomplish.
Setting goals introduces two states of mind that can improve your life, whether you achieve your objectives or not. These two states of mind are “awareness” and “flexibility”. We’ll explore “awareness” today.

Too many people seem to go through life never fully aware of what they want or could have achieved, until it’s too late. Setting goals provides a framework that encourages awareness. Daily, you can look at your goals and consider how you are living your life.

You can become aware of whether or not your life choices are bringing you closer to your objectives. Without that awareness, it is easy to settle for routine rather than choice. As you can see, if you think of setting goals as a technique rather than an obligation, the entire process changes.

Have you considered setting goals as a way of setting your course? Has it been clarifying for you? I’d love to hear what you think!

Want to learn how to set effective boundaries to honor yourself, your time, and your relationships? You can ask for the time and space you need, and get it, too! Claim your FREE MP3, “Honoring Your Time With Boundaries”, and discover tools to move you toward a stronger self and stronger relationships! So, take your next step, click HERE and grab your MP3! When you sign up you will also receive (if you don’t already) our weekly Finding Time Tips, our monthly Award-Winning Finding Time E-zine, and our Finding Time Personal Boundary Template! All FREE – our gifts to you!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time for Calm by De-Cluttering-3 Tips

Paula — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:29:36 +0000

Finding time in the midst of “busyness” for a calm moment can be a little like finding clear space in a cluttered office. It can seem impossible – and I’m here to tell you that it’s a great gift that you can give to yourself – and it’s NOT impossible at all!

Yesterday my friend and colleague Wendy Battles wrote about how Clean Eating and De-Cluttering Support Optimal Health! Reflecting on how overwhelming clutter can be, she wrote:

For years, I’ve been in varying levels of disorganization that have left me feeling anxious, overwhelmed and less than healthy. I would spend my fair share of time thinking about my piles of paper and clutter, I’d obsess over how I could get on top of it once and for all, and I’d easily fall into a state of overwhelm.

Does that sound familiar? It can be a very challenging vicious cycle – AND it’s one that you can step into a break at any point. Remember, you hold the power!

Here are 3 key things to remember, when you decide that you want to carve out a calm moment or some clear space:

Start small. Don’t expect that you will be able to give yourself 2 free hours or a de-cluttered office right away. Go for 5-minutes of meditation or for organizing 3 file folders to start.

Celebrate every success! Validate yourself when you follow through. Pat yourself on the back for each accomplishment. This builds momentum, makes it fun, and reinforces a friendly relationship with yourself – all very important!

Build on what works. As you explore de-cluttering (whether it be your space or your time) you’ll develop systems, ways of communicating, and ‘tricks of the trade’ that work well for you. Be aware of these and use them often, adapting as circumstances change.

And, as you may have surmised, any effort to de-clutter or create space involves creating boundaries.

This goes. This stays.

Yes. No.

As you get better and better at setting, communicating, and following through on your boundaries, you’ll find yourself with more space and less clutter.

Is this something you’re moving toward? I’d love to hear how you are moving toward using time boundaries in your life.

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Give Your Life Shape with Boundaries

Paula — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:15:36 +0000

Finding time to honor yourself, your time, and your relationships with boundaries is one of the most important time choices you can make in your life!

If you’re a reader of The Time Finder, you know that I often explore Time Boundaries here. That’s because boundaries (of any sort) are so fundamental to knowing who you are and what is important to you.

Boundaries define and give shape, wherever and whenever they are employed. Think about it. A person without boundaries has no distinct shape. He or she may seem very agreeable, saying yes to everything, indiscriminately. But what that “agreeableness” means, in reality, is that:

Genuine relationship is elusive at best. It’s difficult to get close to and interact intimately with this person, because you cannot know her/his values or preferences. If the answer to everything is “Yes” the person’s priorities and core values remain effectively hidden.

Disappointment is inevitable. It is impossible to get everything done – so this person’s “yes” is not meaningful. It may sound agreeable, but without the means to follow through, it will often lead to feeling let down.

Unfortunately, boundaries seem to be often seen as limiting. Reframing that, I would say that they are certainly defining. I would not call them limiting, however. They offer you traction as you move through your day (and your “To Do List”). Boundaries provide a very powerful way to take control of your time and your life so that you can live your values and focus your energy on your goals!

Be they time boundaries or relationship boundaries, using boundaries helps to give you shape – in much the same way that bones and muscle do.

The more you practice using boundaries, the better shape you’ll be in and the more stamina you’ll have for whatever life sends your way!

Are time and relationship boundaries a part of your repertoire as you move through your day? I’d love to hear how you are moving toward using time boundaries in your life.

Want to learn how to set effective boundaries to honor yourself, your time, and your relationships? You can ask for the time and space you need, and get it, too! Claim your FREE MP3 of “Honoring Your Time With Boundaries” – a recent teleclass – and discover tools to move you toward a stronger self and stronger relationships! To take your next step, click HERE and grab your MP3! When you sign up you will also receive (if you don’t already) our weekly Finding Time Tips, our monthly Award-Winning Finding Time E-zine, and our Finding Time Personal Boundary Template! All FREE – our gifts to you!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Maintain Your Blog on Cyber Monday – 5 Tips to Get You Started!

Paula — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:33:58 +0000

Finding time to keep up with writing blog posts, as many bloggers know, can be a challenge. In an upcoming Cyber Monday post, I’ll be taking a look at some good sources of content (especially for when you’re stuck for blogging ideas).

Today, however, what I’d like to discuss is even more basic – finding time to keep your blog running smoothly. The Time Finder is a WordPress blog, but the basic concepts apply to any blogging platform.

A blog has a lot of “moving parts”, and if they aren’t all working well, they can spell difficulties for you and your readers. Yet blog maintenance is a task that, like car maintenance, can often be something that we postpone or let fall by the wayside. Sometimes, the consequences of doing that are annoying and sometimes they can be downright dire.

I highly recommend that you set aside time, at least weekly, to devote to blog maintenance. If you work with a Virtual Assistant (VA), this is a task that you can clearly delegate to him or her. If you are technologically inclined, you might find that you enjoy performing some of these tasks yourself. They give you an opportunity to explore your blog in a whole different way!

Whoever ends up taking care of these tasks, here are a few basic maintenance items that I urge you to consider:

Back-up, Back-up, Back-up! This is something you need to do weekly … and if you do NO other maintenance task, do this one! We needed to restore our blog once – and the back-up absolutely saved us! You can set this plugin up so that it performs the back-up at intervals that you specify. (We also have it set to automatically e-mail us the back-up file.)

Check for Spam: We do this daily, so that it doesn’t pile up. WordPress blogs offer a spam-catcher (Akismet) as well as different dashboard plugins that display spam comments and allow you to process them. The one we use (Ozh’ Admin Drop Down Menu) gives a very easy method for viewing and deleting spam.

Keep Your Plugins Updated! WordPress plugins are constantly being tweaked and improved by their developers. The dashboard that we use flags plugins that have been updated, and the process of integrating these updates into your blog is a matter of a few clicks. It’s very easy – and important – to keep on top of this. In addition, set aside time to periodically check on new plugins that can enhance your blog. There are hundreds to choose from – and WordPress has them set up in a searchable plugin directory!

Check your links … it’s so important to not frustrate your readers with broken links! This is another process that is automated by WordPress plugins. We run our Broken Link Checker weekly.

In addition to checking your links, be sure to check your “Blogroll” – that’s the list of links you maintain in your sidebar. Blogs come and go – and you don’t want to be sending your readers to a site that’s inactive! This is a check that we do at least monthly at The Time Finder.

I suggest that you develop a maintenance schedule with daily, weekly, and monthly categories of tasks. And remember – if you do nothing else, back-up, back-up, back-up!! And please drop me a line … I’d love to hear how you carve out time in your busy schedule for blog maintenance!

Want to learn how to set effective boundaries to honor yourself, your time, and your relationships? You can ask for the time and space you need, and get it, too! Claim your FREE MP3 of “Honoring Your Time With Boundaries” – a recent teleclass – and discover tools to move you toward a stronger self and stronger relationships! To take your next step, click HERE and grab your MP3! When you sign up you will also receive (if you don’t already) our weekly Finding Time Tips, our monthly Award-Winning Finding Time E-zine, and our Finding Time Personal Boundary Template! All FREE – our gifts to you!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time by Honoring Yourself and Your Time

Paula — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:32:31 +0000

Is finding time a challenge for you? Do you feel like you give your time away, so that you never get to your own goals and priorities?

This is not an unusual situation. It is not a character flaw. No – it is a predicament that many struggle with, and one that, with practice, time tools, and skills, we can all conquer!

When you find yourself in a situation where others’ needs are usurping your time, take a step back and ask yourself whether you are honoring yourself and your time in the choices that you are making.

Stepping back is very helpful, in that it takes you out of reactive mode and allows you to see that your ARE making choices. This puts the power back into your hands.

Then ask yourself, What does it mean to honor myself and my time?

First and foremost, it does NOT mean being selfish. This is a trap that it’s easy to fall into – especially for women in our culture.

I see honoring yourself and your time as a personal responsibility. If you do not, you will be constantly depleted and will seldom, if ever, have the internal resources to bring your best self to the situations you encounter in your life.

In order to honor yourself and your time, you need to learn how to establish, communicate, and follow through on time boundaries.

Boundaries give shape to your life, and enable you to move from where you are to where you would like to be. Without boundaries, you simply can’t gain traction. Your sense of self will dwindle as your feelings of frustration and overwhelm increase.

Are time boundaries a part of your repertoire as you move through your day? I’d love to hear how you are moving toward using time boundaries in your life.

Want to learn how to set effective boundaries to honor yourself, your time, and your relationships? You can ask for the time and space you need, and get it, too! Claim your FREE MP3 of “Honoring Your Time With Boundaries” – a recent teleclass – and discover tools to move you toward a stronger self and stronger relationships! To take your next step, click HERE and grab your MP3! When you sign up you will also receive (if you don’t already) our weekly Finding Time Tips, our monthly Award-Winning Finding Time E-zine, and our Finding Time Personal Boundary Template! All FREE – our gifts to you!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time by Maintaining Your Time Boundaries with a Timer

Paula — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:08:14 +0000

Your efforts to find time are greatly enhanced when you know how much time you have planned for your activities AND you stick to your plan! If you don’t do that, one activity after another will overrun its allotted time, and you will fall further and further behind. What a recipe for stress and frustration!

It doesn’t have to be that way, though. Not at all!

Try this:

Buy yourself a small timer and, when you can, use it to remind you when the time allotted for a planned task has run out. This is especially helpful for things like computer work, where it’s easy to get caught up in tasks and lose track of time.

I find using a timer to be a very big help when it comes to focus. It allows me to really immerse myself in whatever I am working on, and not worry about losing track of time. I know that the beeping of my timer will bring me right back to the moment when my time is up. Then I’ll move on to my next task.

When I use my timer to help me maintain my time boundaries I am more focused and productive, without a doubt. Sticking to my planned boundaries also enhances my self-trust. I (and the others in my world) know that when I set a boundary I am going to follow through on it. This gives a boost to my self-discipline, self-esteem, AND the cooperation that I receive from others when I communicate a boundary.

There are just so many ways to benefit from using this small, practical tool!

Stay tuned for more, TOMORROW, from Finding Time, LLC about boundaries and the ways that using them can improve things in your world.

In the meantime, I encourage you to give timers a try! Please drop me a line and let me know how it goes for you … I’d love to hear!

What if you could find another hour every day? You can! You are invited to sign up and download The New Finding Time Personal Boundary Template. It’s FREE, and when you sign up you will also receive (if you don’t already) my FREE, weekly Finding Time Tips and my FREE, monthly Award-Winning Finding Time E-zine!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Overcome Overload and Exhaustion

Paula — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 11:30:29 +0000

Finding time for what matters most in today’s busy world can be a world class challenge!

Do you find yourself overwhelmed by the demands of your life?

Are you exhausted and depleted?

Would you like to be able to change all that?

Time boundaries are key! I’ve written a lot about time boundaries here on The Time Finder. They help you make time choices and stick to your time priorities. Using time boundaries, you learn to say “No” to spending time in certain ways, so that you can say “Yes” to the things you have prioritized.

Today I’d like to extend the notion of boundaries, because time is the coinage of our lives: it isn’t really something that you can isolate from everything else. When you set a time boundary, for example, it affects everything that it touches! Most especially, it affects your relationships with those closest to you – your family and friends, your co-workers.

The way you communicate your boundary, along with the quality of your follow-through, will not only define your success in the moment. It will also affect the response you receive when you set your next boundary. It’s a building process. The quality of each step ripples out and impacts both the next steps that you take, and the ways that your efforts are viewed by the people in your life.

For example, assertiveness in setting a boundary is more likely to bring you success than an aggressive, critical or “victimy” tone. (These are likely to elicit a rebellious response.)

When you are on overload, it is especially challenging (and important) to pay attention to your tone. Remember the ripple effect. Something like tone can seem like a small thing … but its impact on you and on others can be very, very powerful. All the more powerful, in fact, because if you are not tuned to it, it can seem very subtle!

Stay tuned for more on boundaries, as we get ready to launch a VERY SPECIAL OFFER here at The Time Finder. We’re excited to share more information with you SOON!

Do you generally pay attention to tone as you set boundaries and move through your day? I’d love to hear how this works for you.

Let’s explore time together …

Finding Time for October’s Time Finder Favorites!

Paula — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:02:55 +0000

Happy November, everyone! As I embark on a new month, I always spend some time reflecting on the month that came before. Please join me as I share the 5 posts that readers of The Time Finder were most drawn to in October.

Topping our list for October was a post about being flexible titled Finding Time by Being Flexible-3 Timely Tips! It looks at the importance of flexibility when dealing with unexpected glitches (like oversleeping). Finding time to be flexible in your response to change helps put you back in charge of your time choices!

Next on our list of favorites was a post about the impact of sleep! Find Time for Sleep – It’s SO Important! looks at some interesting information about the ways that even seemingly small increments of sleep can significantly affect performance … namely:

… A students average 15 more minutes sleep than B students, who average 15 more minutes sleep than C students, and so on. Every 15 minutes can count.

That was eye opening for me! And speaking of eye-opening, the next-favorite post speaks to changes in perspective – a subject I find fascinating. Finding Time to Change a Pattern and Find “New Eyes” looks at the powerful fact that “When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.”

Next on our list come two posts that focus on boundaries – a very timely topic at The Time Finder, as we are on the verge of launching a VERY SPECIAL OFFER to members of the Finding Time Community. It will help you incorporate the power of time and relationship boundaries into your daily life. You’ll want to know about this … so stay tuned for more information this week!

Finding Time by Setting Time Boundaries in Our Ever-Evolving Cyber World is a Cyber Monday post that looks at how vital time boundaries are, as we move toward a world in which we are “plugged in” 24/7.

Last, but definitely not least, Finding Time with Assertive Time Boundaries takes up a theme that is very dear to my heart, as it explores the vital difference between assertive and aggressive boundary-setting.

Did you have particular favorite posts in October? Was there one that was especially helpful or challenging? Something that you’d like to read more about here? Drop me a line … I’d love to hear from you!

Let’s explore time together …

Finding Time for Balance

Paula — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:33:57 +0000

The Finding Time E-zine fires today at 11:45 AM – always an exciting day for me! I love sharing information, ideas, and tips about time. To give you a taste of our e-zine, I’ve been posting archive articles from time to time here, and today I’d like to share an article about Finding Time for Balance.

Oh, and if you would like to receive our monthly e-zine (along with weekly tips) in your in-box, just sign up in the sidebar. If you do so before 11:45 today, you’ll receive our latest edition! Now, on to the article …

Remember when you played Statue as a kid? It was an exhilarating challenge to run around and then to freeze, holding your balance, when the whistle blew. Anyone who moved was “out”.

And have you ever seen the old-fashioned balance scales? The purchase of fruits, vegetables or meat on one side was counterbalanced with lead weights on the other side. When it balanced, both sides became level with one another, and ceased moving.

Notice that both of these examples require stillness, stasis, no movement. Many equate work/life balance with an even split (50/50) of activities for work and those for home. But it’s seldom that simple. And what’s difficult to grasp is hard to add to your life.

Let’s try a short exercise:

Ask yourself what balance means to you.

Quickly jot down the first five to ten words you think of when you think of balance.

Next, write down three times when you have felt balanced in your life. Describe the situations or activities that helped you feel balanced. How do these descriptions match the words you listed? What do you discover?

I approach balance from the vantage point of energy. We have both feminine and masculine energy, or yin and yang, within us. Masculine energy is usually associated with logic, work and taking action. Feminine energy is equated with creativity, intuition, nurturance, and compassion.

The goal to reaching balanced energy is to observe yourself and notice when you are involved with only one kind of energy in your life. For example, are you thinking about work continually? Driving yourself to do more, succeed more? Or do you spend most of your time engaged in creative daydreaming, nesting, and thinking about how you relate in significant relationships?

To achieve balance, you need to build a bridge, joining these two poles. For example, as you combine work activities with self-expression and exploration, you are both creating and doing, dreaming and acting. In this way, you develop balance by integrating both masculine and feminine energy.

I invite you to objectively observe yourself as you move through your day, noticing where and how you integrate these energies. How does that feel different from how you generally move through your day? I’d love to hear how you are moving toward more balance in your life.

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Manage Your In-Box and EMPTY It Each Day

Paula — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:40:43 +0000

Finding time to manage your in-box, let alone EMPTY it, may seem an impossibility.

Not so, says Marty Marsh in an intriguing new post on the Solo-Entrepreneur blog titled “Never Check E-Mail in the Morning.”

His basic advice?

Only check your e-mail at certain times during the day,

Act on every piece of e-mail you receive, and

Have the goal of cleaning out your in-box with each visit.

I know, when I first read that, I thought it was absolutely unrealistic. But read on … this is definitely doable!

Marty suggests that you set up three folders for yourself. One titled ACTION, one titled TOMORROW and one titled REFERENCE. As you check your e-mail (at the time you set for yourself) your commitment is to either act on an e-mail or move it into one of those folders, working through each item until your inbox is empty.

Items in your ACTION folder should be acted on quickly (i.e. today) but needn’t be done right now. (As a rule of thumb, if it will take no more than 2 minutes to respond to something, do it immediately – don’t even move it to your ACTION folder.)

Think of your TOMORROW folder as a way of giving yourself time to respond to less urgent items in your own time. (This is not procrastination. You’ll know the difference.)

Your REFERENCE folder is for items you have already tended to, but want to keep as a record or for reference. Marty suggests NOT creating subfolders here. His advice is to use the search function that is available with most good e-mail managers, if you need to find something in your REFERENCE folder. I have discussed this with my VA, and I know that she finds it helpful to manage her mail with a number of subfolders. You certainly ought to exercise your personal preference in this area, with the goal of keeping it as simple as possible!

Is managing your in-box a perennial headache for you? Consider giving Marty’s suggestions a try – and then let me know what you think. I’d love to hear if it helps you find time!

Let’s explore time together …

The Time Finder with Paula Eder

Find Time to Set Goals – 3 Ways It Helps!

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time for Calm by De-Cluttering-3 Tips

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time to Give Your Life Shape with Boundaries

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time to Maintain Your Blog on Cyber Monday – 5 Tips to Get You Started!

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time by Honoring Yourself and Your Time

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time by Maintaining Your Time Boundaries with a Timer

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time to Overcome Overload and Exhaustion

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Finding Time for October’s Time Finder Favorites!

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Finding Time for Balance

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!

Find Time to Manage Your In-Box and EMPTY It Each Day

Other Posts You Might Enjoy!