Ashley Brown 0:00 [Intro]
W henever we set goals, we have the greatest intention to accomplish them. However, sometimes the curveballs of life can make it a bit harder to get there, we can become distracted or interruptions throw us off track. In this episode of the routine and things podcast, I'm sharing three important tips for staying on track with your plans, even when life shows up. Tune in to hear how to combat distractions and interruptions when trying to reach your goals.
Ashley Brown 0:43
Hey, girl, listen up. For the entire month of February, we are crowdfunding in order to create a planner for you. I am wanting to raise $25,000 Yes, you heard me right $25,000 In order to bring this planner to life, but I need your help. I would love if you would contribute to our crowdfunding campaign by giving what you have. By sharing with those you know, and by being a cheerleader for our campaign. I am so excited about this, and I hope that you will contribute. The great thing about the campaign is when you give to us, you receive something back, your contribution will go towards us creating a routine for a planner that puts your mind at ease and helps you manage what matters. I am so excited about this, I hope you are too. To contribute to the campaign, you can head to routine and things calm or click the link in the show notes.
Ashley Brown 1:51
Hey, hey, welcome back to the podcast. I'm Ashley, your hosts super excited that you are here with me today. So this episode is about how to combat distractions and interruptions when trying to reach your goals. We are still in the part of the year where our goals are a main focal point. And where we are trucking along towards those goals that we have. And so so I don't want for you to get to a certain space where you are moving outside of those goals. So I'm doing this episode today to really talk to you about how you actually can combat distractions and interruptions when you're trying to move towards your goals. I know for me, I love having goals a part of my life, especially when those goals are rooted in love and passion, and in joy, and ease rather than perfectionism of trying to have tight control over my life. Anytime I've had goals that are based in me trying to hold on to this perfectionism or had goals based upon me wanting to control every little fact of my life.
Ashley Brown 3:02
They honestly didn't work out. And so now, really, when I create goals, I want to think about goals in terms of are they coming through, or coming about based upon love and joy, and ease and passion, and just all of those beautiful vibes. And so I think goals are really great for us to have. When it comes to a goal that I have this year, I have a goal of raising $25,000 in my business routine and things. And this goal I'm trying to reach this month if you haven't heard about it. So I am crowdfunding for the business in order to create a planner and come out with a planner for you, which I'm super excited about it is an ambitious goal. And so not only today, am I sharing with you how to combat distractions or interruptions, I'm sipping my own tea today because I know this is a huge goal. And I really want to see it come to fruition so that I can help you I can serve you in a really beautiful way. And so that we actually are able to raise $25,000.
Ashley Brown 4:12
And I share that with you today because I not only share my tips and suggestions with you, I also you know take that in for myself every single time is super important for me to actually listen to what I'm saying. And not just sharing things with you but actually taking the information that I'm sharing as well. So let's get to it. What can help you combat distractions and interruptions when you're trying to reach your goals. The first thing is knowing what your typical distractions are and anticipating your interruptions. This can be really helpful so usually we know that things that distract us I know for me when it comes to reaching my goals what usually distracts me is having a lot on my plate, like at certain seasons When you just start to think about all the things you have to do that can sometimes distract me and pull me away from our goals.
Ashley Brown 5:07
Another thing is, TV usually would be the thing because I would just start to watch a show. And then I'm a binger. So like when I start watching a show, I want to watch the entire season because I usually watch Netflix or Hulu. And so with that, I just will binge the entire season in like three or four days, and that's a lot of time taken out that I could have been putting that time towards reaching my goal and resting. So that is a distraction for me as well. You want to really think about what are distractions for you the things that pull your attention away from your goals, right. And knowing those can help you to identify them, and then pull yourself back when you know that you're being distracted. Also, anticipating your interruptions is really helpful. Now, sometimes this isn't going to be able to happen, sometimes you're going to get interrupted and it's out of the blue. And you can't anticipate it.
Ashley Brown 6:10
But sometimes we can anticipate when we may get interrupted. So for example, if you are trying to move towards a goal, maybe like, you know that you are about to go downstairs and study. Because you have a goal of learning Spanish, this, I'm just making this up, you have a goal of learning Spanish, and you're going downstairs to like study, and you know that your family is in the house. Okay, that is when you can anticipate interruptions because unless you tell them I'm going down to study and even sometimes when you tell them, I'm going down to study, they may still interrupt you. But if you can catch it and be like I'm serious, like I'm going down to study, if we can get the kids something to eat or something put on the TV or some way to keep them busy while I am studying, that would be great.
Ashley Brown 7:13
Do not bother me for at least an hour unless it is an emergency, then that can help you to not get interrupted by your family. So if you can anticipate the interruptions you may have, that's really great for you to do even sometimes interruptions can be people coming over, like maybe you have an appointment and someone has to come over your house and you start working at the time not really thinking about oh, we do have like the maintenance man coming over here to fix the fridge, like maybe don't work at that time or work after they come in. So after they leave. So like just knowing that you can anticipate interruptions at times. And many times our biggest interruptions, although we love them, is our family. So they will interrupt us or our friends because maybe they're calling us or our moms and dads they are calling us. And we're like, I'm trying to reach this goal and I can't talk right now.
Ashley Brown 8:15
So at least I'm trying to move towards it. And so things like that, you know, thinking about how you can anticipate interruptions. But also knowing your distractions can be really crucial for you when it comes to continuing to move towards your goal.The second thing is having a plan. Okay, so you know, I'm huge on planning. That's why we have planning notepads in the shop at Routineandthings.com, you should go check them out. Because planning really is a way for you to stay rooted in the things that you want to accomplish. Your plan is a reference for you. You refer back to this when interruptions happen when you get distracted. So having a plan that can guide you towards your goals is really helpful so that you don't get so distracted and pull away that you forget what you were doing. You know, when you get interrupted, you can be like, where was I? Okay, what did I need to do today?
Ashley Brown 9:19
And the plan is there. So having a plan is really important. I stress this all the time. Because a plan can be helpful. Does that mean that plans sometimes fail or that we don't always stick to plan? Yeah, sometimes we don't always stick to planning and sometimes it's necessary for us not to stick to the plan, like to the tee. But sometimes we have to like kind of curve and do something else can come back to the plan but it just depends on what's going on. But when it comes to you reaching your goals, having a plan in place that says these are the things I'm doing in order to reach that goal or this is How often I'm doing a thing in order to reach that goal can be really helpful because you can refer back to it. So plan plan plan. Like I said, we have planners at routineandthings.com.
Ashley Brown 10:11
The last and final thing I want you to think about when it comes to combating your distractions and interruptions is setting boundaries with yourself and others around your time. Okay. And you see, I said, setting boundaries with yourself first, because I'm going to be perfectly honest with you and transparent, we usually cross our own boundaries before someone else does. Let me say that again, we usually cross our own boundaries before someone else does. So having boundaries with yourself and others around your time can be super helpful for you, not only having boundaries, but listen to this part, knowing the consequences when your boundaries are crossed, is not enough to set boundaries with yourself and others, if you don't know the consequence of when the boundary is crossed. Because knowing that consequence means you can be like, Okay, I set this boundary.
Ashley Brown 11:13
And I know, the consequence of me not focusing or not working for this hour is I'm going to be behind on my goal, or the consequence of me not working for this hour is I'm now not moving towards the dream I have for my life. So knowing the consequence is as important as setting the boundary if not more important, and you want to tell yourself what the consequence will be if you're setting the boundary with yourself, just like you want to tell your family or your friends or anyone else, what the consequence is if the boundary is crossed, right. I think that's, that's really, really important to do. I know when I'm working, especially when I'm working the business, and I have a certain timeframe that I need something to be done in. And what I'll do is say, Okay, I'm going to work on this tomorrow. And the consequence of me not doing it tomorrow, not completing this test tomorrow will be that I have, I can only complete the task probably three days later.
Ashley Brown 12:22
That's the consequence, that I'm not going to be able to work on this until three days later, which that already for me is like a no. Because what I don't want is something being in my brain, or just over my head for three freakin' days. So I will say, do what you have to do. Right? Don't cross that boundary, get it done, especially when I know I had time to get it done. Get it done. So that's kind of how I think about setting boundaries with myself, even when it comes to like I said, TV sometimes can be a distraction for me. I'm like, No, if you start watching TV, instead of actually writing in your journal, and meditating, you know what the consequence of that is going to be, you're going to feel like freakin crap, the next day, you're going to be annoyed, you're going to be frustrated, you're going to feel like crap. So I already know when I crossed that boundary, that's how I'm gonna feel. Because that's usually how I feel, if I don't journal and meditate at night is is just like, I feel like a piece of me is missing.
Ashley Brown 13:27
So it's really important that you set boundaries with yourself and I'd say set boundaries with yourself first in the set, set boundaries with others, so important for you to do so, so important. So think about the boundaries that you can set with yourself around your time, so that you can actually have time to put towards accomplishing your goals. So those are the three tips for you today, knowing what your typical distractions are and anticipating your interruptions, having a plan. So you can refer back to this plan when interruptions happen, or when you get distracted, and setting boundaries with yourself and others around your time. Plus, knowing the consequences when your boundaries are crossed. Okay, those are the three things I want you to think about. This year, I am rooting for you for you to meet any goal that you have any goal. I know when I've been speaking to people on Instagram because I love being in my DMs chatting with you all if you don't follow me on Instagram, please go follow today.
Ashley Brown 14:37
Reach out to me, I love chatting with you. But I've been reaching out to people asking them what their goals are. And people have said that they want to learn a new language or they want to read a certain amount of books, or they want to start a business and so is these really amazing and passionate goals that we all have and I'm rooting for you to reach your goals and I do not want for distractions and interruptions to pull you so far away from your goal. You know, like I said, life is going to happen. And when it does happen, know that you can always get back on track, I don't want for you to beat yourself up like, Oh, I've gotten so behind them our goal, you can still start back. Sometimes we're going to have seasons where we have to put our goals on pause. That's okay. That doesn't mean it has to be on pause forever, is just for right now. So good luck with moving towards your goals, wishing you all the best. And I want to ask that you help me reach my goal of raising $25,000 for routine and things, I would love your help.
Ashley Brown 15:44
You can check out the crowdfunding campaign for information on ways you can contribute, I would greatly appreciate it. And this is a rewards based campaign, which means when you give to us you receive something back. And so I'm so excited about this campaign. I can't wait to see that we reach it at the end of the month, and I'm so appreciative for anything that you can contribute. You can check out the crowdfunding campaign by going to routineandthings.com. Or you can also click the link in the show notes and the information is there as well. But thank you so much for listening to today's episode. I hope you found it extremely helpful. Let me know you can take a screenshot of the episode and tag me at routineandthings on Instagram. Let me know what you thought about today's episode. And I hope that you also subscribe to the podcast. Rate review, if you would be so kind and until next time, continue to enjoy wherever you are, whatever you're doing, Stay happy, and I'll talk to you later.
Ashley Brown 16:51 [Outro]
Thanks for listening. If you enjoy today's episode, take a screenshot and share it on social I would love to know you're listening and for tools to help you start maintain and enjoy your routines. Be sure to head to routineandthings.com. Here's to staying happy.