5 Tips for Getting What You Really Want Done

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Do you ever find yourself wanting to get your most important tasks done in a day, but somehow, the whole day has gone by, and it seems like all you have accomplished is reading a few emails and laughing at a few funny cat videos? If you have a hard time getting what you really want done in a day, this post will give you tips for accomplishing the things that really matter most to you.

We all want that end feeling of satisfaction and happiness that comes when we have checked off tasks related to our highest goals and desires. But why is it that some days we can get a ton of things done, yet still feel dissatisfied?

You may have noticed this happen for you… You make a long list of things to do. You check them off. But yet at the end of the day, you still feel frustrated and defeated.

This could be a sign that you are really great at being a DO’er, but not so great at self care and mindfulness. It can mean the difference between burning yourself out doing a bunch of meaningless tasks or feeling fulfilled at the end of the day.

It’s not about how much you do, it’s about whether you are intentional

I’ve come to realize it’s not just about getting more done in a day, but rather, getting what you really want done in a day… the important stuff, the stuff that counts.

It’s about defining what is important to you, and then being intentional with how you are spending your time.

This looks different for everyone. Some people will want to get their work tasks done first. Some will want to spend time with family first. Only you know what matters most to you.

My journey to getting more done

Something I am focused on this year is my desire to get more of my highest priority items done in a day. I struggle with outside distractions and find myself doing many meaningless tasks that take up valuable time.

I guess I had come to believe that if I filled up my day with more tasks, and accomplished as many of them as possible, I would feel satisfied. But this was just leading to extreme burn out and dissatisfaction.

Maybe you have experienced this too?

You get so busy in your days, you don’t really take time to slow down and assess WHAT you are doing and whether it is even IN alignment with your desires.

To really have a passionate life, you need to have awareness about the things that make you passionate…

That sounds so simple, but it’s sooooo true.

For the longest time, I was living my life for everyone else. I was doing things out of obligation, guilt, and beliefs.

I was feeling so overwhelmed and dissatisfied that one day, I finally made the decision to figure out how to get into more alignment with what I really wanted.

When I finally turned off the outside noise of everyone else and asked what I really wanted to do in my days, I noticed I was faced with some tough decisions about whether to let certain things clear away from me and my schedule.

Awareness brought positive change

As I let things clear from my life, at first I was terrified because there were so many things falling away… relationships, jobs that were not a fit, food that didn’t nourish me, tasks that were not in my zone of genius….

I started to realize how much those things were actually keeping me held back in life. They were keeping me from allowing the right things to come in. Basically, there was no space for the “good stuff.”

But once I became more clear about what is important to me, and I started intentionally adding in things I align with and love, I noticed a huge change in my satisfaction level.

In this post, I share the key tools that helped me become more intentional and get more of what I want done in my day.

Here are my 5 tips for getting what you really want done…

These are tools I use for myself to help me be more intentional about my days and schedule. They are just suggestions as jumping off points for you. I highly suggest exploring this topic further for yourself and finding tools that work for you. Keeping a journal of the ones that work best and putting them into daily practice can help tremendously!

Know your highest value

My favorite intentional tool is living according to your highest values. Values are the core beliefs that guide or motivate our actions. They help us determine what is important to us.

Your values generally define the sort of person you want to be and how you treat others. Knowing your highest value gives you clarity about how you conduct yourself with the outside world.

Many people are not even aware of their core values, and they live in a kind of reactive or passive state. Living in accordance with your values can provide you with insight about YOUR right direction… giving you a picture into your own desires and passions.

Writing down your values helps you actually SEE on paper what you love and what you don’t. Knowing them can also keep you from giving in and compromising on things that matter most to you.

If you have a tendency to get sidetracked doing things for others or you end up following a path in life because someone else suggested it, you will want to sit down and get clear about your own values.

Having clarity about your highest values gets you back on track with your life and happiness and helps you feel more aligned with your work and life.

We have a values worksheet included inside of the Start Your Online Business Bundle. This bundle includes a number of worksheets and trainings to help you get clear about setting up your own online business.

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Start with the end goal or end feeling and work backwards

A trick I learned recently to help with getting more of what you really want done in your day is to start with the end feeling or end result and work your way backwards. This exercise can help you quickly arrive at what you are truly wanting to accomplish and then map out the tasks needed to get there successfully.

You start off by asking, “What do I want to accomplish?” You could also ask, “How do I want to feel in the end?”

For example, I recently came up with the idea to have a Halloween dance party for my friends.

I used this tool and envisioned how I wanted the space to feel and how I wanted the night to look. I came up with a picture in my mind to help. This served as my “end result picture.”

I envisioned the purple and black balloons as decorations. I saw a table with a few simple platters of food. Fun Halloween music played in the background and people were dancing. I kept building out the picture until it felt complete.

Once I saw this whole picture, then I could work backwards and write down what I saw. This gave me directions about what things I needed to order and buy. I also knew what to plan into my schedule and how to set up my space.

This technique of creating an end goal or end picture works for anything!

You can try it for yourself by writing down an end goal, result, or feeling you are wanting to achieve. Try to see the completed experience or sum it up as an entire picture. Then write out the steps and things you will need to make this happen. This gives you a roadmap to your end result and helps you stay focused on what you are really wanting to accomplish.

Review and reflect on your week

Reviewing your prior week and month can be highly effective when it comes to getting more of what you really want done.

You might be asking how looking at the past week and month can help you accomplish what you want now.

One of my mentors said it best, “You cannot improve anything you don’t measure.”

You need to track your progress weekly to see what is working and what isn’t working if you ever want to make improvements. Without tracking, how will you ever know if something is NOT working?

By tracking weekly, you are also able to take notes about what felt good and what didn’t. I especially like to write a little bit about what was successful and what was unsuccessful.

The key to weekly and monthly reviews is to have review sheets which ask you the RIGHT questions… questions that relate to your happiness and success… Are you achieving the end feeling you are after? If not, why? What needs to change?

You can start with these free weekly review worksheets which you can get by clicking HERE.

Once you have a few month’s worth of those review sheets filled out, you can look back and start noticing what is working, what isn’t working, etc.

The true benefit to self reflection and review is you get to use this information to your benefit to make conscious decisions and choices about what to do next. You get to choose and shift the things that are not working… which leads to our next tip…

Mindfulness

I was fully able to get more of what I really want done in my day once I started introducing mindfulness practices. These practices include things like meditation, reflection journaling, and conscious living.

Being mindful means you are consciously aware of the present moment. It means you are aware of your thoughts, feelings and actions and the impact they have on yourself, your health, your well-being AND others.

Being mindful can have a positive ripple effect because when you live with positive intentions, it can impact you and your environment in a positive way.

A simple mindfulness exercise that can help you get more of what you really want done in your day would be to ask yourself questions like:

What is my highest priority item for today?

Is it serving me to keep doing this?

What is having the most success?

What has the biggest return on investment (time and energy put in for the end result)

Where should I put more of my time and energy?

Once you’ve asked yourself these questions, then make sure to take actions which are in alignment with your highest values.

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Prioritize

My best tip for getting more of what you really want done is to keep a very small list of your top 3 priorities for the day. Then simply try to accomplish them as early in your day as possible.

Make sure one of the tasks relates to your big goal, end feeling, or highest value. This will ensure that you are accomplishing things that really matter to you.

The key is to break your big goal into smaller, manageable steps and pick one to complete each day to get you closer to your end result.

Let’s say your end goal is to own a money making blog. Your small steps might include…

Prioritizing these tasks in your week and month will get you closer to reaching your end goal faster.

Getting what you really want done

Hopefully, these tips help you end the burnout and distractions. Getting what you really want done in your day truly comes down to knowing your highest values and end goals, using reflection and mindfulness to your benefit, and then prioritizing your actions in a way that align with your desired outcome.

Let us know your favorite tip by commenting below, and please share your favorite tips as well!

If you are wanting more clarity about setting up your own online business, you can check out START YOUR ONLINE BUSINESS BUNDLE by clicking here. The bundle is filled with worksheets and step-by-step guides to help you get started today!