Transitions and Time | The Time Finder with Paula Eder

The Time Finder with Paula Eder

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Find Time to Manage Change … Just Ask Paula!

Posted on February 25, 2010 by Paula, under Ask Paula, Transitions and Time.

Finding time for dialogue with members of the Finding Time community is one of my favorite things! We invite readers’ questions and comments – and I love highlighting them here, most Thursday’s. Read on – and please feel invited to join in!

Here’s a question about dealing with sudden change, from Theresa in Chicago:

Dear Paula,

I need your help for a sudden change that my family is confronted with! My partner must relocate to Atlanta within weeks to keep his sales manager position.

He is our main breadwinner, and his saying no isn’t an option in this economy. But I have no experience moving to a new location, and must ready my 2 school-aged children, as well!

My head is spinning, I’ve lost my appetite and I can’t think or sleep. But everyone is counting on me! Can you please advise me how to make it through this ordeal? I hope you can answer this right away.

Thanks so much.

Theresa

And here’s my response …

Hi Theresa

You certainly have a lot on your plate! Here are some ideas for you to consider, as you navigate this challenging time!

The first thing I would suggest is to stop and find a comfortable place to sit, perhaps in a favorite room. Close your eyes and become aware of your breathing. Make sure you are breathing deeply and from your belly.
Next, create an affirmation that you can take with you at all times. For example, “I’ll get through this one minute at a time,” or “Step by step will get me there.” Use this as a mantra and a guide. Also, don’t be shy about changing it as things evolve. You can adapt your tools to your needs at each stage!
Be creative about options, and flexible. Family members may be unsettled for a while. So it may help to relax your expectations a bit until new routines can be established.
Concretize everything in writing, including an ongoing list to record items as they come to you. That frees up your mind for other tasks. Focus on one thing at a time. Validate even the smallest successes. This is key!
Delegate tasks and ask for help. Engage your children in age-appropriate activities. That helps them develop understanding and ownership of the move.

I hope you find this helpful.

Best of luck to you … I’ll be thinking about you as your move unfolds!

Paula

What kinds of sudden changes have you had in your life? How did you cope? Do you have time questions you’d like me to explore here? Please drop me a line at paula@thetimefinder.com – I’d love to hear!

Oh, and don’t forget to join me on Wednesday, March 3 at 7PM ET as I interview Certified Life Coach and Professional Organizer Maggie McCauley, LICSW about moving yourself “From Chaos to Peace—Creating an Inspired Workspace.” Maggie will let you in on the secrets to stop letting chaos and clutter drain your time and energy, sap your creativity, and cost you money! Be sure to grab your free seat and join us!

What if you could find another hour every day? You can! You are invited to sign up for your FREE Finding Time Success Kit. It puts 3 key tools for your time success right into your hands! Grab it and see how you can recharge your energy, reduce overwhelm and frustration, and come to learn that 24 hours really ARE enough!

Let’s explore time together …

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Find Time to Prepare for the “Expected” Unexpected: 3 Tips

Posted on February 23, 2010 by Paula, under Time Management Skills, Transitions and Time.

Finding time to deal with sudden change and the unexpected is a time management challenge that we all face from time to time.

But what about the “expected unexpected”? For example, here in New Hampshire, a wintry mix of snow, sleet and rain is predicted just about every day this week. Some days are expected to be messier than others … but we could have some wintry difficulties ahead, with all of their attendant tie challenges.

Or maybe not. Last week on the strength of the weather predictions many area superintendents closed the schools … only to have the storm wait until pretty much the end of the school day to arrive. The kids were happy, but a school day was lost.

So, what’s the best way to respond when disruption can be anticipated, but isn’t a sure thing? Here are 3 tips to consider:

First and foremost, put yourself into the mindset of acceptance. This doesn’t mean being passive. What it does mean is letting in the fact that “this could happen” and building from there. If you are in denial about the blizzard, it’s bound to disrupt things even more. Acceptance provides a base for moving forward as creatively and productively as possible. It also helps address the anxiety that the “expected unexpected” can produce.
Second, scan your upcoming schedule, prioritize, and develop contingency plans. Having accepted the possibilities ahead, you’ll be able to bring your most creative and proactive self to this challenge. You may find that you make unexpected, helpful discoveries as you do this. Maybe there are ways that you can streamline your schedule … even if the “expected unexpected” doesn’t materialize!
That being said, remember the NH school superintendents, and gather as much information as you can before making decisions. Strive to be agile and grounded in calm acceptance so that you don’t over-react to the possibilities. This can be a big challenge, though. So also be sure to forgive yourself if and when you guess wrong!

Being prepared for the expected unexpected is a challenge that we face with some frequency in our lives. How do you handle it? Drop me a line – I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Expect the Unexpected-5 Tips

Posted on January 12, 2010 by Paula, under Time and Energy, Transitions and Time.

Our world is filled with change … all the time! Finding time to deal with the sudden changes that can present themselves to us is a difficult challenge that is compounded by the fact that, by definition, we are unprepared for them!

What can you do to prepare? You can establish a base so that when the unexpected occurs, you have a toolbox of skills and responses to draw from.

Here are 5 tips to help you keep sudden change from totally disrupting your time choices, your ability to take care of yourself … and manage your life.

1. Remember that your time choices, and the values that drive them, are yours. Even when your established priorities need to take a back seat to the urgent choices you may need to make, remember that the time choices remain yours. The more you can own your choices, the less you will feel victimized by your situation.

2. Establish a habit of defining options. Ensure your resiliency by defining options for each of your daily priorities. This gives you a wider repertoire of priorities, should you to flex in light of something unexpected.

3. Explore adjustments in your personal and work schedules that you can make quickly if you need to. Flexibility is a key skill here! Sometimes our daily list of activities and priorities becomes inflexible. This can be disastrous if sudden change occurs. You can introduce flexibility into your daily habits around time by changing your routines and assessing your reactions to these changes. It’s really helpful and important to pay attention to this when you aren’t being forced into it by circumstances!

4. Re-examine your personal boundaries. In times of sudden change, your usual personal boundaries may have to flex. Take a few minutes and reflect on those you’ve established. Write them down. This keeps them from becoming unconscious or rigid. By remaining aware of your usual boundaries, you are more easily able to adjust them when sudden change occurs.

5. Be willing to tell others about any sudden changes that affect your usual time choices. When sudden change occurs, don’t bottle it up inside. Family, friends and coworkers only can understand, accept, and support you if you alert them with at least a brief description of any sudden change.

Have you needed to deal with sudden change in your life? What have you found helpful? Challenging? I’d love to hear!

What if you could find another hour every day? You can! You are invited to sign up for the Finding Time Success Kit starting with 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 … key tools for your time success!

Let’s explore time together …

Finding Time to Change a Pattern and Find “New Eyes”

Posted on October 13, 2009 by Paula, under Time Boundaries, Transitions and Time.

Finding time to recognize patterns and then make conscious choices about them is one of the most powerful skills that we can cultivate in our lives. Creating systems and templates (both are essentially patterns) can be great time-savers. However, patterns can also become rote responses that may not always be helpful.

On her blog Minding Your Matters, Janice Russell recently wrote a very helpful post titled breaking up is hard to do. In it, she addresses the challenge and the promise inherent in changing patterns and quotes Tuli Kupferburg:

When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.

What if one of your patterns is to always say yes when a co-worker interrupts you to ask for help with her project? You like feeling helpful, but you never complete your own tasks. So what if you said a firm and friendly “No” the next time she asked?

Learning to recognize and change patterns needn’t entail a big time commitment. Rather, it requires a simple willingness – even an eagerness – to see. Then, the possibilities become endless! Setting a time boundary for yourself (essentially that is what you did when you said “No”) is a choice with life-changing ramifications. As you begin to explore this time management skill for yourself, everything will begin to look different!

As Marcel Proust has pointed out:

The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.

Choosing change is transformative in so many ways. Have you looked at your patterns and made changes? Are time boundaries a familiar tool for you?

If you’d like to learn more about time boundaries and the ways in which they can help you change patterns in your life and find time sign up for next week’s FREE teleclass (Wednesday, October 21 at 7PM ET). My friend and colleague Melissa McCreery will be interviewing me about this fascinating subject!

Please join us on the 21st – and, in the meantime, here’s to changing patterns and exploring new worlds with new eyes!

What if you could find another hour every day? You can! You are invited to sign up and download The New Finding Time 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 for Fully Transitioning Into Fall

Posted on October 7, 2009 by Paula, under Transitions and Time.

Finding time for moving from summer into fall means finding time for assimilating change, letting go, and moving with your transition into a new place. The other day I posted the following quotation on Twitter:

Everyone must take time to sit and watch the leaves turn.
Elizabeth Lawrence

To me, this statement isn’t only about stillness. It speaks to the ways in which stillness can be the base for (and a prelude to) movement.

As we find time to be still, we ground ourselves in the moment, in ourselves, and in our lives. Our feet touch the earth, and we have the traction to move.

It’s during times of transition that finding time for stillness can be especially important and sustaining. The turning leaves mark the transition of our seasons from summer to autumn. Everything around us is in a profound state of flux.

Being still and observing the flux in the world around us gives us the space to take in what is happening and then make a conscious choice to let go. We aren’t simply swept along – we are assenting to the transition that is happening in our world and flowing with it.

And that makes a whole world of difference!

Have you let go of summer? Are you consciously choosing to make the transition into fall? Please drop me a line – I’d love to hear your thoughts about this!

Let’s explore time together …

Finding Time to Transition Into Fall: Mind, Body and Spirit!

Posted on September 8, 2009 by Paula, under Transitions and Time.

Finding time to manage seasonal transitions is a task that is .. well … seasonal! I don’t know about you, but this weekend we had some chilly New Hampshire moments when my thoughts definitely turned to preparing for the transition into fall. It may be premature to actually begin the work of transitioning, but this is a fine time to start thinking about it!

Unlike sudden changes, transitions are planful processes. What this means, among other things, is that the power is in our hands to fashion our transitions in whatever manner we like. Transitions can offer wonderful opportunities to reflect on and let go of what is past and prepare for what lies ahead. Indeed, many of our holidays are founded in seasonal transitions, and the roots of many religious rituals can be traced to seasonal observances.

I like to approach my planned transitions on three levels. I think of them as corresponding to the mind, the body, and the spirit.

Mind: This is the engine of my transition planning. I pull out my templates from the previous year’s transition into fall, review the tasks involved, and set aside the time to attend to each. I keep track of what works and what doesn’t, and record this on my templates for the following year.

Body: These are the aspects of my transition that have to do with my practical, concrete, everyday life. I tend to tasks like putting away summer clothes (sorting and de-cluttering as I go). I pull out fall and winter clothes and put my gardens to bed for the winter, again, culling and organizing as I complete each task. I am preparing my physical world for the coming seasonal changes.

Spirit: These physical changes are accompanied by reflection, gratitude, anticipation, and letting go at each step of the process. I love the transitional tasks of looking back on what has been, and thinking about what is to come. Pausing to reflect while managing transitional times always deepens and enriches the experience – often in ways that you could never imagine or predict.

Are you starting to think about the transition into fall? Do you have templates from last year? How are you feeling about this change of season? Please drop me a line, I’d love to hear!

Let’s explore time together …

Finding Time When You’re Betwixt and Between

Posted on July 28, 2009 by Paula, under Transitions and Time.

Finding time and maintaining your energy and focus during times of change can be a challenge.

Here at Finding Time, LLC we had a major change over the last two weeks – a process you may have read about in some of our recent posts. While the most pressing work of change is now completed, we continue to be in a time of transition management. What does this time entail? What is its particular flavor and quality?

Times of transition are, pretty much by definition, unsettling. The older and more familiar ways are no longer accessible, for whatever reason. The new ways have not yet become familiar. Life feels different.

This unsettling quality can be very uncomfortable, especially if you fight it and/or feel victimized by it. As Ann Gottlier has said:

It’s so hard when I have to, and so easy when I want to.

That simple statement is so on the money! (If you follow me on Twitter, you may have noticed that it’s also one of my favorite quotations to tweet!) It succinctly expresses one of the most fundamental truths I know about time, energy, and transition management.

If we fight against our transitions, we will find them burdensome and constantly challenging. We will feel drained and discouraged. On the other hand, if we embrace the change and open ourselves to the opportunities that it presents, we will find each moment looking entirely different.

It’s not that each moment is concretely or objectively different – it’s that our eyes are seeing the possibilities rather than the losses. This is the fruit of choice. Sometimes, especially when change is pretty new, this is a choice that needs to be made repeatedly. (In addition to choice, it is also very important to work with your feelings of loss so that you can authentically let go of what was and embrace what is!).

What do you focus on when some facet of your life is in flux? Are you able to embrace change and see it as opportunity? What gets in the way of your doing that? Please drop me a line – I’d love to hear what you think!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Let Change Unfold

Posted on July 17, 2009 by Paula, under Transitions and Time.

Finding time to deal with sudden change is something that we’ve written about in the past on The Time Finder. Disruptions are never easy to cope with, be they small or large.

If you are someone who likes to be proactive and who does a lot of planning (as I do) the unexpected can be an especially challenging visitor! This is because, while any change can be disorienting, changes that arrive as surprises are doubly so. That has certainly been the case in our situation with the sudden disappearance of our web host and Finding Time website.

As I wrote yesterday, one of the key elements in dealing with disrupting change is to allow time to let your feelings emerge. Another important step is to assess the situation and do whatever needs to be done immediately to address emergent challenges and problems. In other words, do what you can to mitigate the damage and set the base for whatever the next step might be.

At times of sudden change, your perspective will be foreshortened significantly, especially at the outset. Your focus will shift from planning for the coming year to planning for the next moment. This is normal, and actually helps you to zero in on what is needed.

It is helpful to open yourself to the process of unfolding change. Don’t fight the narrowing of your focus. Let it be, and know that as time moves forward your vista will widen.

With each moment, the impact and ramifications of the change you are experiencing will be felt, like ripples on water.

With each moment you will have new challenges and opportunities to respond to.

And with each choice you make, you shape the next moment.

Sudden change can feel like it is a single event in time – but really, that event is just the start of a moment-by-moment unfolding that can take you in new directions that you might never have imagined. Remaining as open as you can to this process is a wonderful gift you can give yourself, as your changes unfold!

How do you feel about letting change unfold, step by step? Is it hard for you to stay with this process? Please drop me a line – I’d love to hear!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Be Agile and Embrace Daily Changes

Posted on June 9, 2009 by Paula, under Transitions and Time.

Finding time and knowing when to stick to priorities and when to hold them loosely, in the midst of daily flux can be a challenge.

Last night the clouds rolled in, here in New Hampshire. This morning the skies are gray and a light rain is falling intermittently. What a change from the brilliant sun, blue sky, and clear air that we had yesterday! As a gardener, I welcome this change — but if I were planning an end-of-the-year picnic for my sixth grade class, I wouldn’t be so happy.

Change is one of the few things that we can count on in life. And yet change, ironically, is something that we perpetually struggle to make our peace with. It represents a shift from whatever we had in mind, or whatever state we had become used to.

While planning is important if you want to use your time well and wisely, agility is also a key factor in finding time. Agility enables you to adapt your plans to the changing terrain. Indeed, beyond adapting, agility enables you to see the opportunities that come as the environment is altered or landscape shifts.

Change always comes bearing gifts. ~Price Pritchett

An agile mindset allows you to embrace the challenges that change can present. Like an athlete or a dancer, accessing your strength and creativity enables you to respond to change as something you welcome and work with – rather than as an alien, invasive force you must work against.

This strength-based and open-hearted approach to change, in turn, lets you see possibilities that you are blind to if you approach change from a victim stance.

Is change something that you let yourself embrace and move toward with agility and grace? How does this work for you? I’d love to hear!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time for Moving Through Change

Posted on April 16, 2009 by Paula, under Transitions and Time.

Finding time for blossoming (building on yesterday’s post) means finding time for moving through change. It’s helpful to see change, not as a single event in time, but as a series of insights, commitments, and events building one upon the other.

In her Life Attractions blog, Dr. Alice Vlietstra recently offered an excellent post about the stages of change titled, Change: It Doesn’t Happen All At Once, It Occurs in Stages. Building on Prochaska and Clemente’s Stages of Change Model, Dr. Vlietstra emphasizes how important it is to identify where one is, relative to these stages.

The 6 stages of change are as follows:

1. Precontemplation
2. Contemplation
3. Preparation
4. Action
5. Maintenance
6. Termination

As with our example of the daffodil yesterday, notice that the Action Stage does not appear on the list until #4! There is quite a bit of activity that takes place relative to change before any action happens. And, indeed, if someone tries to take action before he or she is actually at that stage, the effort is very unlikely to be successful.

Knowing that change is a process that can be broken down into steps helps address the illusion that it is purely a matter of willpower and action. Action and discipline are important, to be sure, but setting the stage for change, having the proper tools and supports in place, and fully buying in to the goal that you have set are all ingredients that contribute to successful change management.

As Dr. Vlietstra points out, “… sixty percent of all change may take place before any action occurs.” That is a remarkable statistic, and well worth pondering. It’s important to honor all of the stages of change, as we build toward our cherished goals!

Have you found time to notice the stages involved in changes that you are thinking about making? Is this a helpful way for you to approach change? We’d love to hear what you think!

What if you could find another hour every day? You can! For more Time Finding resources, you are invited to sign up and download The New Finding Time 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 …