You will Be Tempted to do MORE. Don’t.

I am a natural born Type A person. For as long as I can remember I have been DOING and STRIVING. Checking things off a to do list and achieving MORE have been driving factors in my life. But as I have gotten older, wiser, and a lot more comfortable in my skin I look at all that drive to achieve with different eyes.

So my word for 2017 is BE.

BE more focused, BE more present, BE more grateful…..a lot less DOING and a whole lot more BEING.

I am back to my daily meditating and my yoga practice. I am doing “Dry January” …..wine free for 11 days y’all, and am very focused on what gets put on my to do list.

And then I see someone achieve something, or be recognized for something, and I immediately think, “I could be doing that, maybe I should be doing that”. Any of you recovering Type As know #thestruggleisreal

and then I got this email today from the amazing Kate Northrup and it gave me a renewed hold on what I feel is critical and important in life:

The options are infinite. And people will never stop asking you to do things.

Opportunity will not stop knocking.

There’s not some distant day in the future when your inbox will stop filling up, the Tweets will stop coming in, and the notifications will no longer be glowing red.

Space will not create itself.

You have to create it.

You will be tempted to do more. Because there will always be more to do. And it will never be done. You will never be done.

The minute you check off the last item on the list, you’ll think of another thing you haven’t yet done. And then another. And then another.

I don’t tell you this to make you anxious (though you may be feeling that way as you read this).

I tell you this because I want to remind you of the truth.

The truth that the temptation of information and possibility and options will never end.

The only way to keep it from burying you is to build a little dam. Or a big dam.

You build the dam like this:

First, take a deep breath.

Then, decide what matters to you.

Then, put things in place so that less things come your way (like turning off notifications, putting your phone on Do Not Disturb, closing your door, and unsubscribing).

Less input + fewer decisions = more freedom.

Lastly, you weigh everything that makes it over the dam it into your awareness against what matters to you.

If it fits with what matters to you and you get a full body yes, then you know what to do. If you get anything less than that, be ruthless.

Your attention is too precious to give to things that don’t really matter to you.

You will be afraid that you’ll miss something if you don’t see every single opportunity that’s available to you.

And you absolutely will miss things. But you’ll miss out on way more of what matters to you if you’re constantly putting your limited attention on making sure you’re aware of all of the possibilities, whether they’re important to you or not.

I promise, when you heavily filter the offers and possibilities that come your way, you won’t miss what you missed out on. Because, first of all, you won’t ever know about most of it. And second of all, because your life will be so full of things that matter to you that you won’t really care about the things you know that you missed that didn’t really matter in the first place.

Get it?

Decide what matters.

Build a dam to keep out what doesn’t.

Do less of what doesn’t matter so you have more space for what does.

Now don’t get me wrong, I still work really hard. But I work hard on things that speak to my heart and soul. Achieving? eh

Connecting, building, supporting, empowering? Oh yeah!

So how does this relate to you and your Stampin’ business?

I guess I just want to share with any of you who are struggling, at crossroads, feeling the mighty pull of shoulds and coulds…..know you are not alone. Know that the pull to DO is real and mighty and can easily take over EVERYTHING. so take a little time each day to BE. To BE honest, to BE true, to BE focused….and then get to work doing the things that matter to YOU! Stampin’Up! has given us a base to build from so build what you love!