10.22.08

homeWork: Productivity

Posted in Proverbs 31 at 4:02 pm by trisha

First things first:Is time yours? Whose is it? Do you try to control your time or are you rebellious to observe time? Time is a gift from God. NO one has more time than you. Time management is a myth. David Allen, of the popular book and productivity system Getting Things Done, says that you can’t manage time, but you can manage actions. I wholeheartedly agree. 

Proverbs 6:6 Take a lesson from the ants, you lazybones. Learn from their ways and become wise! -NLT 

 

This was our proverb for our ‘morning heart journaling proverbs time’ with the kids today. I laughed out loud, because of how fitting the ant is with productivity. Considering the ant in productivity is wise, God says. The ant is an expert with productivity. Productivity is good. However, we must remember that productivity needs to be an outworking of a heart that fears the Lord. Stewardship isn’t just planning and producing; it is a worshipful heart that seeks to honor God with thoughtful work. Please be mindful of your heart as you seek to grow and be productive.Work is a biblical mandate. We need to take that seriously.  Our successful productivity is a worshipful response to God’s blessings. We can enjoy work and feel a godly pride from the productivity, as God enables the job well done!

1.PLAN and Schedule

Proverbs 21:5 The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty. 

 

“The key is not to prioritize what is on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” What are your priorities? Have you written them down? Have you and your spouse talked about what is essential to the vision/mission of your family? Start with a conversation about what is important for your time. We will talk much more about priorities and balancing relationships and tasks in another post; this one is about shear productivity. Keep lists all in the same place: a file, a drawer, an envelope. Write a to-do list, putting the most important tasks at the top. Keep a schedule of your daily activities to minimize conflicts and last-minute rushes.

Incorporate your lists into a schedule. Buy a week-at-a-glance appointment book, use Outlook, or buy a business table top calendar for your desk or wall. Write everything that you need to accomplish in this book or the margins. Differentiate between the urgent and the vital. The urgent may be making a lot of noise to get your attention, but it is rarely vital that it be done right now or at all.

The daily, weekly, and monthly plan needs to be posted in some form. A calendar in your cabinet door, a posted calendar on the fridge, or Outlook for those who are online often. Look at it frequently, as a reminder of what to stay on top of. I have a calendar in my kitchen on the inside of the cabinet door that has the menu plan and our social (guests, visits, playdates, appointments) calendar on it. This is not my household management calendar. I use Outlook for household chores, birthday reminders, project lists, shopping lists, and the activities and events that are months away.

2. Prioritize your tasks Time-consuming but relatively unimportant tasks can consume a lot of your day. Prioritizing tasks will ensure that you spend your time and energy on those that are truly important to you. Urgent tasks take our attention from the important ones. If the important ones aren’t done, they create stress. Being thoughtful and prayerful about planning gives you a little more freedom to respond to urgent things. 

3. Free your brain from “open loops” Learn to say no if it is beyond your priorities. In Getting Things Done, David Allen talks a lot about “Open Loops.” These are the items that go on a list somewhere that swirl in your brain and you lay in bed thinking, “I should do that tomorrow or next week, presents to buy, recipe ingredients, a conversation to have, hopes, and regrets…” – just random thoughts that need to be captured somewhere. Open loops can make us daydreamers or to even lose sleep. Busy brains can rest, if we can prayerfully put most of those swirling thoughts to bed in a plan, list, or prayer. As soon as you realize you are out of peanut butter, put peanut butter on your grocery list, or as you accept a party invite, put the present on a list and the event on the calendar. Otherwise, trying to remember all that will take up brain space. Those “open loops” will start to diminish as we write things down. The “GTD” language calls that “capturing.”

4. Establish Routines. What is your morning routine? What do you try to accomplish before 9am? Everyone dressed, and the kitchen cleaned from breakfast? What is your routine while kids are napping? What is your routine while getting your family out the door for an activity? What is your bedtime routine? Establishing routines makes it easier for you to habitually accomplish what you need to do to run your home well.

5. Break large, time-consuming tasks into smaller tasks. Work on big tasks a few minutes at a time until you get them all done. Get a cheap timer and set it for 15 minutes and challenge yourself to cleaning and organizing one room, top to bottom. Maybe it is the competitiveness in me, but I love this! I do this with my kids and they work on a task while mine is the whole room, and we have fun doing work together.

6. Limit distractions. Block out time on your calendar for big projects. Try to focus on one thing. During that time, silent your phones, and have self-control to not check email. This work will have distractions if you have children around or are in a work environment with knocks on your door. That is ok; don’t be angry. Lovingly respond to ‘people distractions’; they aren’t robbing you. Then after the conversation is had, get back to your planned task or project.

7. Get plenty of sleep, have a healthy diet and exercise regularly. Healthy choices can improve your focus and concentration, which will help improve your efficiency so that you can complete your work in less time. Waking up early gives the opportunity to work out and study the Bible, take a brisk walk, get a few minutes to think about your day with your calendar, pray that your heart would serve and love those near you, and that you would depend on God to give you the courage, endurance, joy, and strength to accomplish what you need to do that day.

When in doubt about your time: Journal your productivity. Keep track of your time by 15 minute increments for 2 weeks to see how you actually spend your time. Compare this to what you should be or want to be spending your time on. It will give you the motivation to make needed changes. This is helpful if you feel frustrated with not getting things done, and feel like you are constantly working. You may find that you are working frantically but not necessarily working with wisdom.

Keep an “inbox” in every floor of your house My mother always said, “Make your trips count.” The basic idea is that if you are going downstairs, take something with you. Having an inbox, bucket, or container that holds various miscellaneous items that go to other rooms can be an important time-saver. My kids are constantly taking things from other rooms and leaving trails. It is helpful to throw those items in the container when you are cleaning up. That way, clutter doesn’t pile up and you can “make your trips count.” You obviously shouldn’t be neurotic about this one, but you will see how much miscellaneous items pile up, and then you can empty the ‘inbox’ in just a few minutes.  Some ideas are to keep a bag in the car for items that go to the house, a container on the stairs, a laundry basket for bedroom items, etc.

Repent of Procrastination Procrastination has a lot of different causes: fear, boredom, perfectionism, an overwhelming task and unclear goals. Sometimes it is plain laziness. Rebellion isn’t new. If you know God wants you to do it and you say no, it is sin. Be thankful for God’s grace! He is patient with us as we learn and consider how to worship in work. I pray that Jesus will show us his grace continually as we work as a reflection of his love, and that our hands would merely express our gratitude by loving him and those in our lives. Work is WORSHIPFUL when we consider our hearts before an awesome God and respond with joy, repentance, and surrender! For more resources: Here is a great article about Getting Things Done.

There is so much more to discuss in this topic of productivity. I would love to have a long list of comments here! Please send your responses and comments. I would love to add your helpful tips, as we all need wisdom in this area of home management! 

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