Hey yawl,
Ok so one thing and theme that is HUGE in my life is LEADERSHIP and as a Leader, time, people and energy management is SUPER IMPORTANT if not, you just find yourself majoring in the minors and letting distractions have a field day with your life.
Now I must define what I term distraction within the context of my life.
Distractions are not negative in themselves, they are just not the focus in this particular season of my life, so if I give my strengths to them, they become distractions, a weight, an anchor and they keep me from moving forward speedily.
let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us…Heb12:1
So, as I share, don’t even think these are bad. Nah, most aren’t. They are not just the focus…
With that explained, here’s is how I am keeping my distraction levels low so that I can keep my productivity levels high.
So, let’s start with TIME management within the context of mentoring and discipleship.
This year, the number of things that put pressure on my time has increased exponentially while the hours have stayed the same. Two of the most amazing outflows of my life are my discipleship and mentoring streams and much as I love them, I soon realised that I would DROWN if I didn’t structure them.
First, I kept the numbers low.
With discipleship, I planned for 12 (Hey Jesus haha) but I selected only 10. Now, we have just 8 left and then my sessions with them are Monday, Wednesday and Fridays and I even have times when on those days, I say that I cannot turn up. On days when we are not in session, I ask that they keep things on a REAL SILENT level on all our platforms. I have to control the ways things come at me and if I do not do that, then the rush and information continually distracts me and reduce my productivity levels.
On mentoring, I asked for just 5 ladies. I was laughing recently when I read an old blog where I said I wanted to mentor 20 and indeed we had that in the Academy at the time. Now, ko le work. Just 5 ladies work. That way I can be more effective especially with time management as the more you lead, the more questions you have to answer and direction/counsel you have to give. Also Mentoring runs Tuesdays and Thursdays and for 4weeks.
Discipleship is for a year
In the past, I ran these gigs daily and I would just be so SWAMPED. Now, I can truly manage my time and productivity. Also, weekends, I don’t have any scheduled commitment with both but if I like, I can freestyle.
So, the wisdom here is there may be some outflow relationships in your life you need to schedule. Without boundaries especially around your time, it would amaze you how quickly the good stuff soon becomes a HUGE distraction. Some meetings should NOT be daily. Schedule it.
Now on to events, programs and more.
Yawl KNOW I love gaining knowledge and building strength and capacity but mehn, I have learned to REALLY stream line the events I attend.
Fam.
For January to March, I knew it was more of an outflow season for me than it would be an inflow, as I had learned so much in 2018 and a good way to make sure that you are practicing and living what you learned would be to TEACH it. Gosh I have POURED into a world of people this year. I sense that the second quarter would be for an infilling and I already know an event I am attending sometime next week as we nicely enter quarter two.
There have been amazing events that have held in Q1 that I just KNEW were not for me so I had to be wise enough to pass it over. One of the mistakes we make is not knowing that not every event is for you. It may be good and godly, but is it for you?
If you attend an event not for you, you have just increased your distraction level and reduced your productivity and I am talking beyond the hours that the event held. If you don’t get this now, you will get it later.
Next on technology and social media.
First, you must know that I run a social media powered company (mostly but 100% Holy Ghost haha).
What this means is that if I am not BRUTAL about managing the information that comes to and at me, both from my clients and my team, I will be super distracted and unproductive. So, with CoachE’Squad, we have coaching hours and my work phone is 85% separate from my personal phone. I say 85 cos my team are also on my personal phone but my clients are not. I also do more chats than calls (cue 2D and 3D convos).
I also tell my team who handles social media to stick to certain hours… nothing earlier or later. Even responding to enquiries are time based. I don’t fear that you will go to another person. That’s fine really. God powers my business. Now something else I do is I turn notifications off… IG, TWITTER, FACEBOOK lol all off. I have to enter the App to see it so no pressure.
Recently, I went even a step further and turned off ALL notifications on my personal phone. I should turn SOME back this week but for 2 or 3 weeks they have been off. So, my drop-down menu on my phone is ALWAYS empty. Kai, if you know how that helped me ehn. For me to even see a credit alert, I have to enter my messaging app. Missed call? I must go to call logs. WhatsApp messages? I must open the app. I only left WordPress on, one time I needed to see upload progress. It was strange but freeing.
With no red light or white light buzzing on my phone, I drastically reduced distractions
I missed a few Apps tho. Like my Bible App notifications, SMS esp alerts lol, My FitBit notifications too so it meant I was wearing a dead tracker and didn’t know a lot of the time. Of course, I sorely missed my emails so I was constantly entering the app to check but still, the benefit outweighed the inconvenience
On YouTube and sermons.
Ah, this one was huge. At the end of the year., the Lord told me to listen more to a few preachers one of which was Pastor Sam, my Pastor.
To accommodate these new ones, I had to cut down on a few of my oldies and besties…
Lisa Bevere, Steven Furtick, Sarah Jakes Roberts, Heather Lindsey, I had to really cut back on them
Not that they are bad ooo, at all, but for my new season, God highlighted the main teachers.
DDK, Pastor Sam Adeyemi, Chris Caine, Joyce Meyer and Craig Groeschel.
If I was still struggling to fit in the rest to these new ones, I would have been so distracted and then my productivity which has peaked in recent times as a result of my new in-season teachers, would have sharply declined
Every once in a while, I hook up with SF and see what my sister girls Heather and SJR are up to but they don’t get the same level of attention Pastor Sam gets in this season.
For some of us, the reason we are not that productive is cos we have too many GOOD OPTIONS but I challenge you today to take all those options to God and ask him to highlight the ones that you NEED in this season. Then zoom in on them. Your hours are limited and so is your emotional and mental energy. If you let distractions in, productivity and fruit will decline
Be wise.
From time to time I would be happy to share leadership principles I am applying which are working for me like todays own. I would be as practical as possible so we know how best to apply too. Any questions, let me know
Ok let me run along…
Also, please help me spread word about my Stay at home mom WORSHIP and WARSHIP powwow happening in about a week. Satan is throwing down but he is under my feet. On his matter, it is already finished.
Also pray along with me as God leads you. Your girl needs all the prayers for strength she can get.
Kisses
Eziaha.
