My best business tool

Photo credit: Dave Goudreau via Unsplash

I must have spent £100s, possibly even £1000s over the years on productivity and business apps and software. Show me a course on productivity or a snazzy new app that promises to revolutionise my working day or streamline my content creation and I’m all over it.

Nothing sparkles with more promise than the ultimate hardcopy business planner complete with freshly sharpened pencils and a vat of coffee in my favourite coffee shop.

But lately I’ve come to realise that my best business tool, by a country mile is my beaten up pair of trainers. 

Recently I was stuck on something. Nothing as complex as algebra or bringing about world peace but it was something I’d been mulling over for days and I felt as though I couldn’t move on with my other work until I’d solved it. All day I’d sat at my desk, as well as in the aforementioned coffee shop but the words just wouldn’t come.

The odd idea swam into my head and then floated off before I could even try to journal on it. Put simply, I was stuck and frustrated.

Back at home and with dinner in the oven I shoved on my trainers and went for a walk with my husband. Walking in companionable silence, each mulling over our day the idea suddenly came to me.

It was a perfect, brilliant light bulb moment and suddenly I knew exactly what I needed to do, as though someone had laid out a yellow brick road right in front of me. I didn’t even need to stop and make a note on my phone for fear I would forget it. The idea was so clear and perfectly formed it was as though it already existed.

Thinking back, this is definitely part of a pattern and there’s definitely something that works for me in the simple repetitive soothing motion of walking. Something that calms my frazzled brain and helps me to make sense of the world around me. It’s no coincidence that during the Covid lockdowns our daily walks were the one thing that kept me functioning.

I can’t meditate to save my life. Just the thought of sitting still and deep breathing makes me want to twitch but simple, slow, mindful walking works for me every time. And I’m not alone. I found this wonderful article recently which sums it up far more eloquently than I could. It seems there is some solid science to explain the link between a good long walk and creative ideas.

I’m not ready to ditch the laptop and the coffee shop just yet, but I might just shove my trainers in the boot of the car for a pre-work walk around the block first.

It's OK not to share

It’s OK not to share: This seems like a bit of an odd subject for a social media post, but bear with me.

At the start of the year I set up a private Instagram account, just for me. The intention was to deliberately take a photo every day, to document what I’m calling a ‘tiny delight’ - nothing momentous, nothing earth shattering, it might just be a bowl of granola. But it’s a daily record of something I’ve done or seen that day, that made me happy and that I appreciated.

This was inspired, at least in part by the writings of two women:

Laura Pasha - author of Little Stories of Your Life - all about noticing the beauty in the mundane, everyday things.

Jo Dimmock - of @ochreandflax - and her gratitude and journaling practice.

So, if it’s private why am I telling you about it?

Ah - good question - I’m so pleased you asked.

It occurred to me while I was out walking this morning that, in an age where we are encouraged to share so much of ourselves and our thoughts online, that the deliberate choice to keep something back, to hold it just for ourselves is a really bold, assertive thing to do. It feels like a tiny act of rebellion in a world where oversharing is not just accepted but is actively encouraged. 

I wanted a place to share my ‘tiny delights’ in a way that was visual but that wasn’t just on my phone or in my journal. I wanted it to be somewhere separate from all of my other online activities but also somewhere just for me. A place where I can scroll through and see a permanent record of all of my daily ‘tiny delights’ that will hopefully help to perk me up, during those low moments which we all experience.

I’m keeping in mind the image of a determined toddler, with a very set expression on her face, arms crossed, saying calmly but fiercely “no, that’s mine”.

And I’m carrying that energy forwards into a few aspects of my online life this year, most notably with my Twitter usage. Twitter has been for the most part, my favourite online social media platform, the place where I am most free to be myself. Sadly though, for me at least, it’s become an increasingly noisy and hostile place where it’s all too easy to lose yourself amid the outpourings of so many other angry and frightened people.

As an empath, it’s something I have been increasingly aware of and the negative impact of Twitter on my mental health is no longer something that I can ignore.

This isn’t a grand ‘I’m leaving’ statement or anything like that. But simply a gradual realisation that I need to move towards something that serves me better - and 2hrs of daily twitter scrolling does not serve me well - at all.

Instead I’ve replaced the twitter app on my phone with the Kindle reader app (to supplement my Kindle and the physical books I have) and if I feel a scrolling urge I read a book instead.

I have set myself the target of reading 52 books this year (having read 25 in 2021) and I’ve surprised myself by reading 4 already. It turns out that 2hrs a day can really add up - who knew?

I’ll still be around on Twitter, and indeed I’ve curated a (private) list of knitty friends so that I don’t miss any updates, but I will be much more intentional about the debates and accounts I engage with. Reserving my energy and my attention for that which I can control, not that which I can’t.

I haven’t set any knitting-related goals this year - I’m not quite sure what that says about me - but there’s still time. For now I’m just happy that I have had a bit of a reset and I’m hoping that being more mindful in where I direct my energies will help me to be more present in other areas of my life - including my crafting.

How about you? Do you have any big (or small) goals this year?

If you’d like to find out what I’m reading I’ll be sharing this on my Instagram stories (and saved to my highlights) or I’ll be chatting about it in my bi-weekly newsletter too).

Weekends don't count

Much of this year seems to have disappeared into a haze of anxiety and stress, but something about the change in seasons and the change in routine, as kids head back to school has kick started my long-dormant creativity and got me thinking positive thoughts again.

I’m fully aware that this might be a temporary reprieve in the whole Covid situation and that things may well get worse before they get better, but at the minute I am carrying on as best I can fully masked up, limiting social interaction and trying to keep a ‘this too shall pass’ mindset first and foremost.

Spending a lot less time on social media has helped enormously, as has cutting the ties with Facebook for personal use and the toxic soup that is Facebook groups. Spending an intentional half an hour on the Mighty Networks group leaves me feeling recharged and energised and has proved to be the perfect way to both start and end my working day.

Another thing that has helped is getting back into writing again - always something that I love but that I seem to be only able to commit to patchily. I have dabbled with writing Morning Pages before - a three page ‘free writing’ session but have always struggled to stick to it, especially at weekends where my routine is wildly different to my working week and loss of momentum always seems to completely derail my fledgling habit.

This time though I was reminded of something that Sara Tasker taught when I did her 15 minute magic programme a while ago - basically that ‘Weekends Don’t Count’. Weekends are for many things but they are a chance to do things differently from the rest of the week. A chance to rest, regroup and allow your mind to mull over the challenges and happenings of the week. In short, they are a break to allow your creative, subconscious mind a bit of free rein.

So, with that in mind I went through and marked off all the weekend days on my 30 day habit tracker in advance. And oh, my goodness. The difference it made this weekend was incredible. Normally I would approach a weekend with a vague ‘oh, I must do my morning pages’ thought. I would prevaricate and procrastinate, feeling guilt that I hadn’t done it. Then by the time Monday morning rolled around I would have talked myself out of doing it altogether and chalked it up to just another example of how I can’t commit to anything.

This time though? Totally different mindset. Giving myself permission to take the weekend off - albeit from this small and totally self-imposed challenge was incredibly freeing.

And now I can’t wait to see what other areas of my business and creative life I can apply this to.

My Morning Pages habit tracker

Little by little

Blogging and writing is a tricky thing indeed. It’s very easy to get into a habit but conversely it’s very easy to get out of one too. A missed blog post one day, or not writing for a few days is such a simple thing but one that creeps up on you and before you know it you’ve missed a few weeks.

No one says anything - because of course everyone has busy lives - and to be fair they probably don’t even notice. But before you know it, it’s been weeks and you haven’t set (metaphorical) pen to paper.

Now, I love to write. In fact after knitting it’s my next best thing but recently I’ve got out of the habit. Putting your own work out there into the world, whether that be a knitting pattern or a piece of writing is not for the faint hearted or thin of skin. It’s easy to dwell on the negative voices, the voices that keep you small, the voices that tell you that you aren’t enough, that you aren't “good enough” or that you should somehow be better.

Gradually over time you start to listen to the voices and you don’t say anything at all. Keeping quiet is a good way to make sure you don’t invite any harsh words or criticism. But it’s also a good way to ensure that, in any debate, it’s those harsh voices that are heard loudest.

I’m a long -time follower of Jen Carrington and by a miraculous stroke of luck she has just started a 28 day free online course called “Write the Damn Thing”. It’s a course focused on overcoming your obstacles to writing - whatever they are - and just getting on with it. Jen has a wonderfully no nonsense approach and so I decided this was the perfect opportunity to get back into the writing habit. No excuses and no faffing.

My daily writings here for the next month will be just me, doing what I do normally. Knitting, writing and drinking coffee - cake may be involved.

I’ve no idea what I’ll write over the next month but I’m sure knitting will be involved.