Transcript
Christie Flora: I'm Christie Flora, a time management coach who believes our relationship with time is really a relationship with life. And it'd all be much easier if life would just stick to the plan.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I'm Mia Northrop. a researcher and writer, who finally realized time isn't something we have or don't have, it's something we make choices about. moment by moment, day by day.
Christie Flora: Today, we're asking if you constantly feel like you don't have enough time. Do you actually need more time or a different relationship with it?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Hello and welcome to Life Admin Life Hacks. If you've been with us before you'll notice some changes this season. We've taken a break. And when I say a break. We've had a hiatus for over a year and now we're back with a slightly different format.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And when I say we, I mean me and my new co -host and longtime collaborator. Time management coach, Christie Flora. So a warm welcome to Christie. I'm super excited about this new chapter together.
Christie Flora: Thank you so much for having me. It's been a delight to be asked to collaborate with you and over the years we've done quite a lot together so this next chapter is going to be very exciting.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So my previous co -host Dinah and I are still great friends and we catch up regularly, but she's stepping back from the podcast to focus on other projects. So for those of you who are returning listeners, thank you. Your support over the years has... meant the world and thrilled that you're coming on the ride for this next era and if you're new to the show welcome
LifeAdminLifeHacks: There's a whole archive of episodes waiting for you on topics like decluttering and meal planning and password management and so much more. So have a browse and find what speaks to you.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: This year we're actually building towards something new. One reason for the hiatus is that I wrote a new book. called Everyday Ease, 365 nudges towards an organized home life. And that's launching in early 2027.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So in the podcast, we're going to explore key ideas from the book spanning both admin and housework. two sides of that domestic coin and it'll be full of practical and actionable nudges that help you manage your time and your money and your systems and yourself when it comes to home life.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: because we're all looking for more calm and more clarity. So I'm really thankful to be able to bring Christie's expertise into the discussion and also show... the different perspectives from, you know, someone who's a millennial and child -free and a small business owner in contrast to me as a Gen X with my two teenagers.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: and a dog who's probably going to wander into frame any second now. cause like Christy, you know, when we talk about life admin and Housework, what we hear so much is where do you find the time? And we often say, well, actually think about the last time someone asked, how have you been? What do people normally say?
Christie Flora: The B word. Busy.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. Busy. they say i'm crazy busy i'm flat out where does the time go And we often talk about time like it's happening to us, like we're victims of it. We talk about time slipping away, time flying, time running out.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah, most of us are time poor. time starved. And it's interesting because the language we use around time really shapes how we experience it.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And when we're constantly telling ourselves and everyone around us that we don't have enough time, we really create this sense of scarcity. And. I think people are legitimately time poor during certain seasons of life. If you've got like a busy work period or you've just had a baby or you're juggling kids and paid work and parents.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: It's probably hard to find gaps in the day where you feel like you've got you know it feels spacious and Now we have this 24 -7 news cycle. We have infinity pools of information and TV and social and music. So it feels like we're always doing something or we're always consuming something.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I hear over the years is people Most commonly talking about life admin and housework is I don't know when in the week there's time to attempt it. or it's just taking up too much time and they're trying to squeeze it in.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So And obviously we don't want to be telling people that you have all the time in the world because that would be rubbish. We all have 24 hours, but for a lot of us. Those hours are spoken for. We've got work. We've got caring responsibilities. We need sleep. We've got to move.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: But we can challenge that idea that... Time is something that just happens to us. and that you're just reacting. and we can start instead making intentional choices about it.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: and stop letting other people's agencies dictate our days.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: as a time management coach. Can you talk us through what is a scarcity mindset versus an abundance mindset when it comes to time?
Christie Flora: So a scarcity mindset is... that just as that language that you mentioned before of i don't have any time it's disappearing so quickly I can't get to the things that I...
Christie Flora: want to get to. Time is happening to us. rather than an abundance mindset is really... We are time. I get to decide what I spend my time on and it's about choices and that it's an expansion feeling. uh rather than a contraction feeling which is that scarcity mindset Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. And so... I know some people distinguish between time management. versus attention management and energy management. Talk us through what those those three differences are.
Christie Flora: Yeah, well when I started in my work Well, I was a house organiser first and then I moved into time. management coaching.
Christie Flora: uh but then looking at it more of uh as a from a holistic point of view i liked saying I'm a time energy attention trainer because those three things really have to work together to to make the most of of how we approach each day so time is that 24 hours a day that we all have.
Christie Flora: that. that's how we as humans measure time is that construct that we've put around it And then energy management is that. ability of Am I able to do this right now? Have I had a good sleep? Have I had food?
Christie Flora: Like am I able? to approach this hour. fully and i'll get a little bit more into that but attention is are we able to focus on what we're doing so rather than being feeling fragmented or scattered are we able to single focus on that.
Christie Flora: task in front of us. and task. it could even be a good thing spending time with someone or whatnot. but are we are we able to focus and so those three things really come into play so you might wake up in the morning and have Had a bad sleep.
Christie Flora: and the six hours ahead of you. Look. really hard. But if you had... a really good slate. those six hours look like oh gosh like i'm just bouncing through it i'm going to get so much done and your attention is a lot more focused on what you need to do rather than yeah missing things or making mistakes or you know and this can happen too when people Wait, what?
Christie Flora: with the news or whatnot or we've got something in our personal life that's distracting us it fragments our attention too.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: So those three things really have to come in. come to play to make the most of our about hour that that construct of an hour that we've done
Christie Flora: that we're working with.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And so is the idea then to focus on energy management first? Is that where people should start thinking about, all right, When am I going to have more energy in the week or when am I going to have more energy in the day to tackle? Whatever life admin and housework is on my plate.
Christie Flora: Yeah, because this comes into the topic of our... episode of relationship with time because everyone's energy is going to be different than that. changes the relationship of time so are you a morning person are you an evening person when do you best do your creative stuff when do you best do your socializing uh when when works for you and so
Christie Flora: It is a little bit more of a, it's a different angle to time management to come at it from your energy. uh you know how you're feeling and especially for women and those who bleed.
Christie Flora: Energy. will change throughout the month and so it's something to keep in mind that maybe something is really easy this week But next week, we're going...
Christie Flora: Why was this so easy last week that this week is really hard? And that's energy management because those...
Christie Flora: 24 hours can't change.
Christie Flora: So a recent example from my life was that I was going to apply for a credit card and it was 4pm on a Saturday and I had... scheduled it in for then. uh did i have the mental energy for it the concentration was i able to actually make a good decision uh looking at the information available so That was something that I was like, I don't think even though I've scheduled it in I had the time
Christie Flora: but it wasn't right to my energy or my attention so i had to rethink about when do I need to do that so that's checking in with those three levels scheduling it in a place to do it.
Christie Flora: is good because without a time. Nothing gets done. But... having that wiggle room of like say with my credit card example It's just me, so my deadline is...
Christie Flora: A month? Two months? you know it's okay so i've got that wiggle room to actually move it around the the flip side is that when you have a deadline that you actually have to use some other tactics to to zero in on your energy and attention to make sure that you get it done on then but having that wiggle room so that you can move it around that you Do it at a time that best suits you.
Christie Flora: uh is part of that checking in on your energy and attention making sure you're doing it at the right time because
Christie Flora: When I ended up doing it the better time for me It was over in like 45 minutes. So if you push at the wrong time...
Christie Flora: You always don't know.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And that's what we hear so much from people. They're trying to do life admin at like nine o 'clock at night. It's like, oh my gosh. depending on what it is. it's likely that you're going to be tired and depleted and it is the last thing you're going to have energy for and it's going to take you twice as long. If you did that thing fresh in the morning when you're alert. You'll probably knock it over in 20 minutes.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So how do you identify when you naturally have more energy for these kinds of tasks?
Christie Flora: This is where observing yourself comes into play. tracking so having a using your calendar and just observing When am I feeling good? When works? if you can track Good.
Christie Flora: similar tasks. So... I'm doing this thing and that was kind of like this other thing. and Yeah, that time of day suits me best for that. observing that observing when you feel good doing a task. And also observing when you keep moving things around. So I have several clients who they're like, oh, that's been on the list for ages.
Christie Flora: and it's like well like my credit card you've got that in the afternoon so let's flip that to the morning And then the next week they're like, oh, I actually started it.
Christie Flora: i got into it it's okay so now we know morning is best for that sort of activity so
Christie Flora: kindness in your experimenting and your observing is that first spot. and then writing it down making some notes because we're not going to remember unfortunately
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And have you ever done one of those chronotype quizzes to find out if you're like a morning person or an evening person? Often some of the quizzes like you're a bear, you're a dolphin or, you know, you're an owl or whatever.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Have you done one of them where it sort of tells you? When in the day you're most alert and the best working hours?
Christie Flora: Yes, I have done a couple of them. When you said dolphin, I was like, oh, that's ringing a bell. I think I got something like that. Yeah, that early bird versus the night owl. There's a...
Christie Flora: it was something I'd read and it was like a lot of people a lot of people are larks I think that was the terminology like I was like that speaks to me because I've never really
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
Christie Flora: Felt like an early bird nor a night owl but just that middle middle range Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: that middle Yeah, we'll put a link in the description because there are some quizzes out there.
Christie Flora: How about you?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: to give you a guide of how best to use your time if you skew towards morningness or eveningness because it is a thing and it does change over your life as well so you might have been someone who in your 20s and 30s was not a morning person and you did actually function really well at night and that can change as you get older and vice versa.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: It's worth doing to see when you have energy.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Those days are over.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Those days are over.
Christie Flora: observe yourself daily observe yourself weekly but also look at yourself annually like so i In winter, the moment it goes dark, my brain shuts down.
Christie Flora: So over the last few years, I have really respected that. And now like presentations or running classes. If it's after 6 p .m., I'm like, sorry, I'll come back to you in late spring because.
Christie Flora: I just I'm not going to be able to.
Christie Flora: that comes back to like our humanness. relationship with time.
Christie Flora: because at the end of the day we're animals right like we keep
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: acting like we're different, but... We're meant to hibernate. So lean into that.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And the other thing about attention management that comes to me is around Managing distractions. So often we might set aside a task. time in the day to do a task, but there's so much going on around us in the household that it's actually hard to just lock in and do the thing. Or we've got our phone. wonderful phones pinging and dinging and distracting us from concentrating and moving through the task faster.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And distractions can be other people. It can be just worries and thoughts that would ideally dump into a list so you can. concentrate on whatever you're doing.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: But that ability to just focus on whatever. the task is at hand and remove those distractions i think that's a big thing that plays into it you're having a space in your house where you can sit down and do your credit card application without someone wandering in and asking you questions or having digital devices or televisions or whatever pinging and dinging
Christie Flora: Yeah. A really nice distinction that I like. is distractions are what we do to ourselves whereas interruptions are from other people. and animals.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: so So it's really... it's interesting to to observe again Am I doing this to myself or is this an external?
Christie Flora: problem so distractions it's like when you're reading something and The word budget pops up and you're like, oh, I should check my budget. And then you find yourself in your budget and you're like.
Christie Flora: How am I here? How have I distracted my... like I was doing something else. But as you say, making note. of okay check budget after i finish this thing And then, if someone does walk in.
Christie Flora: then that interruption of Do I need to deal with this right now? Are they bleeding?
Christie Flora: Whatever's happening, like...
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Is something on fire?
Christie Flora: is something on fire or can i
Christie Flora: Give me two minutes. I'm just going to finish this thought, going to finish this thing.
Christie Flora: and i'll get back to you so yeah observing that as well so in your environment
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I love that distinction. between that you've said between distractions and interruptions and you being okay someone wanders up just go I'm just going to finish this just give me 15 minutes and I'll be with you but I just need to get this done perfectly reasonable.
Christie Flora: Doesn't
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Something else that I think has really affected my relationship with time. And which I got from that. wonderful book which i have here One of Laura Vanderkam's books, Tranquility by Tuesday.
Christie Flora: Love that book.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: She talks about shifting from thinking about time in a 24 -hour span. to thinking about... your whole week. 168 hours so we often think okay 24 hours either that is sleeping then i ate it was working. I've got these tiny little bits of time on the beginnings or the ends of day to squeeze things in, which was really restrictive. And she suggests.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: open up that time horizon you've actually got think about a week you've got 168 hours in a week
LifeAdminLifeHacks: That starts to feel luxurious and generous. and you start to think okay surely we're not got 168 hours to play with I can find... an hour for grocery shopping or I can find 30 minutes to clean something or declutter or whatever it has to be I love that idea of just shifting the time horizon and it and it kind of it shows you how arbitrary our relationship with time is when you just sort of zoom out a bit and you're like
LifeAdminLifeHacks: In terms of how your mind works and just thinks about that better and how your whole nervous system can just... take a breath and relax because you think oh this feels suddenly spacious and abundant.
Christie Flora: Yeah, so true. something i really loved from that book was the thought of like three times a week as a habit. because we often think i have to do this every day or i'm a bad person or i failed or whatever.
Christie Flora: insert belief here is but if you do it three times a week that's a habit too so it yeah that it's expansive to think I've got the whole week Two. feel like I have.
Christie Flora: achieve something or that I am this person who
Christie Flora: X, Y, or Z, you know?
Christie Flora: Yeah. And it's something I. talk to people a lot about. Is the maths adding up? because yeah you've got 168 hours But you've got 300 hours worth of things to do.
Christie Flora: So that's not happening this week.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep, yep.
Christie Flora: It just doesn't add up. A lot of people need that. that data right in front of their eyes like oh yeah that doesn't add up
Christie Flora: So I need to be kind.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. So when you...
Christie Flora: So.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. And so when you have clients where you're suggesting. I think you should time track and do an audit of where your time is actually going. How do they approach it? And what kind of clarity do they get?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Afterwards.
Christie Flora: So some people not into it at all. others
Christie Flora: can combine it with calendaring because if you're already using a calendar to to track commitments and all it's not that much of a stretch to add that to your calendaring but for those who
Christie Flora: are really interested in doing it and want a deep dive on it an excel spreadsheet a notepad something simple like maybe a notes app on your phone uh so we don't want to over complicate it but we just want a snapshot of like
Christie Flora: What did you do the last half hour, the last hour? that gives us an idea of where are those 168 hours going. end.
Christie Flora: where are the where can we retrieve some time back so that you're not feeling Blah. Like I've got no time and I'm not getting to anything that's important to me. Well, let's have a look.
Christie Flora: Well, we've got two hours going to scrolling on Instagram. Let's take that back.
Christie Flora: Let's put it towards something that you really... want to do so yeah it's it's a Very valuable exercise. and the data you can't lie with the data so that's why it's so incredibly important because
Christie Flora: I'm so elusive.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: i think Well, that's it.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And we do have a link in the description to a time audit spreadsheet that you can use in either Google Sheets or Excel. And it's a template for one week with little drop downs for the common activities.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So you can select your activities and then it automatically summarizes and gives you a little pie chart of where you spent your time. So if you want to lock in and do that. you can find the link in the description But I think, as you said, it does two things. It shows you where those gaps are of things that you're like, okay, well, you spend a lot of time doing this. Maybe you can make different choices. But it also validates your experience if you are actually maxed out.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Because then you can go, okay. my week is nuts and that means okay I need to ask for help or I need to lower my standards or I need to outsource, delegate, let some activities go.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: and you can make different kinds of choices in that direction.
Christie Flora: definitely definitely and it is it is all about choices really at the end of the
Christie Flora: the day.
Christie Flora: Because...
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I...
Christie Flora: You have to.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I think the other thing that... I've time tracked once and it was enough. And I read about this, the planning fallacy.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: This condition that we as humans have where we're quite terrible at estimating how long things will take and how we spend our time. And our brains tend to lie to us sometimes. They underestimate time spent on things we feel we shouldn't be doing and they can overestimate time spent on things we...
LifeAdminLifeHacks: think we should be doing and then as you said you see the data doesn't lie It helps you get around that sort of blind spot that you might have about. where you thought your time was going.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: It gets objective.
Christie Flora: Yeah. Yeah, and the time fallacy, like we... The things we don't like, the things we find boring, we often think that they take hours.
Christie Flora: in reality they don't so yeah it's very your time estimating skills error. a good place to start. Just make notes. of how long do you think this will take and then how long did it actually take and start rewiring and do something.
Christie Flora: like an average of three times and then oh do it three times then you'll end up getting your average of this time takes me about this long and so then the next time your brain's like i don't want to do that thing because it takes so long then you're like hang on
Christie Flora: I know they're my average. is 20 minutes it's 45 minutes for that it's an hour and a half and then that data really helps you to get it done the next time.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah, I feel like this is a conversation I'm having with my kids all the time when I suggest they do anything and they're like, oh! time it's gonna take so long and I'm like honey it's gonna take you 10 minutes we're gonna set a timer and we'll set the timer and do the thing and usually we're done before the timer and I'm like okay can we remember this can we remember that this takes literally seven minutes and that it's not a big deal
LifeAdminLifeHacks: It takes a while. It takes a bit of repetition, but yeah, that's the kind of tuning in that you have to notice so that you...
Christie Flora: See you.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: i guess raise lower the obstacles especially if you procrastinate about things it's good to have that clarity so you can lower the obstacle of thinking how long this is going to take me and feel overwhelmed about even starting.
Christie Flora: and you mentioned seven minutes there which reminded me of something i'd read about teaching time to to younger kids is this will be a bluey episode like seven minutes this is a bluey episode so they have they have a reference point or, you know, if your kids are in sport.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. Yep.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: to be like. This is how this is we're going to do this up to half time or... I'm not big on sport, but like, yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. Yeah, or I say two songs. This is like one song, two songs.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Have a shower.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Get in the shower. Two songs.
Christie Flora: Yeah, true song.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Please get out. So how has your own relationship with time changed over the years? What have you really noticed that you understand differently now and do differently now?
Christie Flora: Yeah. Gosh, as a. As an early 20 -year -old, I definitely had time anxiety and I think probably time anxiety in recovery now.
Christie Flora: I was very anxious about... getting everything done and making sure I was making the most of every moment.
Christie Flora: And now, actually, In my early 20s, I had read this book, The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks, and it opened my mind up to Einstein time versus...
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Hmm.
Christie Flora: Newton time, so Isaac Newton. Alvin and I.
Christie Flora: time. And time anxiety was very much this. linking back to that language that we were talking about. the time is outside of ourselves and that I was racing after it. I was trying to catch it. I was behind. It was happening to me. Whereas Einstein time, it's that relativity of if I'm with a loved one hours fly by but if I had
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: put my hand on a hot stove like i'm like 30 seconds is gonna feel like three hours like or even longer So that relativity of time to...
Christie Flora: Trust that and kind of go with the flow a bit more. I think that's how my relationship with time
Christie Flora: switched.
Christie Flora: over the years.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I do. And I do rely on that.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I do sort of rely on... Feeling like. Or just trusting that time does expand for things that you enjoy. And even if sometimes it's like...
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I'll think I'm going to catch up with someone and I've only got this much time to do it is it even worth it but then you go and catch up and it might be only 30 minutes but because it was so enjoyable it felt like you saw them for two hours and it's bizarre it's a bizarre trick of physics that that's that experience of time just feels so different based on what you're doing.
Christie Flora: Yes. Yes.
Christie Flora: Even time over our lifetime changes because of how many memories we are taking in and how much our brain helps us to...
Christie Flora: Flick away. The... the average the the the things we've already experienced and how that compresses time i just i find that extremely interesting as well so that's why when when we're a kid.
Christie Flora: Christmas feels so far away whereas as an adult We're like... Oh gosh, we're already three months away from Christmas. because we have had 41 years of christmas whereas they've had seven, eight, nine, you know, so.
Christie Flora: It's just fascinating. that.
Christie Flora: how that changes over our lifetime. Hmm.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So Chrissy, what questions should you ask yourself to work out if you have a scarcity or an abundance mindset? when it comes to time.
Christie Flora: it's not so much a question but uh linking back to the observation of of How often do you say, oh, I'm so busy? How often are you using the B word? how often are you saying i don't have time or i'd love to but i can't get to it or i'm negative kind of language around time rather than The choice of where your time is going so that can be a real
Christie Flora: a real swap so yes asking yourself
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Mm -hmm
Christie Flora: and observing what is my actual language with time what's my what's my relationship with time? What am I saying out loud that is actually flowing?
Christie Flora: what I feel about it.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And... And then, so what is that? So you've done that and you might think, all right, I'm constantly telling myself, oh, I've wasted the day. I'm behind. I'll have to catch up tomorrow. What is the first step then to feeling more in control of your personal time or the time you have at home to do stuff?
Christie Flora: I... I definitely think the calendar is underutilized. support system. It helps you look at your capacity and to ground yourself in
Christie Flora: in that. know 24 hours that 168 hours that we've been talking about and to actually
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: put. items to the times even if that's just a block of like cleaning or life admin or you know just so that it has a home so that you're like
Christie Flora: I've got a space for that rather than it just not being anchored throughout. the week so
Christie Flora: leaning on your calendar. seeing it as an absolute support tool. and
Christie Flora: attaching times to the things that you need to get done. And that includes the fun stuff as well.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. And we've got an episode coming up about your ideal week where you go through that exercise of kind of templating out your week and finding homes for the stuff that has to happen.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: To my... the house runs smoothly. Your household runs smoothly and it's stuff that you might do and other people might do. But everyone's aware in the calendar of when's grocery shopping happening?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: When does laundry happen?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: When does, you know, batch cooking happen? Just so everyone's on the same page about. Where? and they have the confidence that, yeah, we can fit all the things we need to do into our week and this is who's doing what. Yeah, that's... That's essential.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And so where does prioritization come into all of this?
Christie Flora: We don't have.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Because Also, We have all these things to do. They're not all worth doing. So... How do you start prioritizing?
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: When? Or if at all. you do life admin and housework.
Christie Flora: Yeah. I really like that. Do we do the housework? Do we have to do the live admin? That's an interesting angle.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: In terms of frequency.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Some of it is like. Do we have to do it as often as we do? Everyone's got different standards. Everyone's I've, I've, I've recently started following Loui Burke on Instagram. Who's this. he's like, he talks about
LifeAdminLifeHacks: what does he put together life and and how you run your home and he's got this whole thing about making your bed and posts around you haven't made your bed for ages get up now go and change your sheets go and change your sheets and it prompted this discussion in my family about how often is everybody changing your sheets because there's wisdom out there that says you should change them every week because they start to get gross and a lot of people are like yeah that's not happening That's not happening at my house.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So when I say. Do you have to do the thing? Everyone's got different standards around the frequency. Versus doing it at all.
Christie Flora: Yes, yes.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So yeah, prioritization.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: How do you... How do you help people? How do people prioritize what needs to happen any given day, any given week?
Christie Flora: Yes. So. I find the... the tool the time management matrix tool really useful as a visual for how to So looking at...
Christie Flora: the urgency of something and the importance or the impact of something and that helps people
Christie Flora: Even people who feel very overwhelmed quickly can point out This needs to happen this week. That can wait. And then even if they have an arm's length of urgent things.
Christie Flora: There's always a few things in there that are more urgent.
Christie Flora: They stand out. So... So running yourself through that. that idea of Yeah, what's urgent here?
Christie Flora: Like, even with the bed sheets, like... Okay, it's been a year. Maybe it's urgent now.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah, it's cardboard.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: They've become sentient. I, you know, I'm sure there's lots of parents out there with teenagers and children and well, everybody who like. no people who just never change their sheets in it It does get skanky after a while.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: But then I feel like there's seasonal aspects to that, like summer versus winter.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
Christie Flora: Yes.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Are you sharing your bed with another person?
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Are there pets on the bed or not? I feel like that's more dimensions than just...
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: A week has gone by.
Christie Flora: That's right.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Change the sheets.
Christie Flora: And that's where I like the, so yeah, like.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Sorry Loui.
Christie Flora: We can apply the urgency to... house management and house care to what's our minimum standard of care like okay the moment i start getting a whiff off my sheets it's time to wash but until the whiff starts we're good
LifeAdminLifeHacks: there's people out there who are just like thoroughly grossed out now but you we all have to do ourselves you do you this is the whole point
LifeAdminLifeHacks: if we're talking about priorities and what your day and week looks like what do you have time and headspace for where are your standards at
Christie Flora: Bye, Clay.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: What's important?
Christie Flora: Yeah. yeah so your minimum standard and then having a look at what else is on your plate. Like, does it fit?
Christie Flora: like is it really is the world really going to end if you go another week
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: without them happening. Yeah. i was going to tell the story about the
Christie Flora: some pushback I'd had around making choices around prioritizing so there's
Christie Flora: there's a well -known story The big rock story about a glass jar filled with rocks.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yep.
Christie Flora: and Yeah, is this full or is this not? And some pushback.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Okay. Can you describe that for people who haven't heard that analogy before?
Christie Flora: Oh, sure. Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Can you talk through it?
Christie Flora: Yeah. So it's over 30 years old. So it first came... was published in Stephen Covey's book. First things first. The story goes that this lecturer is in front of the class with a glass jar pours in big rocks and ask the class, is this full?
Christie Flora: Some are like, yeah, that looks cool. Others are... like no that's that's not full The lecturer paws in pebbles, shakes it all around, asks again, is this full? They're like, oh, no, no, this space, this space.
Christie Flora: The lecturer pours in sand, shakes that all around and then asks the class again. and then they say that that jar is now definitely full and one of the students asks So is the point. of the story of the of that demonstration that you can always fit more in.
Christie Flora: The lecturer says no. The point of the story is that if we hadn't started with the big rocks first... we wouldn't have got them in afterwards. So it is about choices. You can't do everything.
Christie Flora: So we need to make sure that the important things get a look in first in our front and center.
Christie Flora: Otherwise... The things that don't matter will just suck up your time.
Christie Flora: And so some pushback I had on that was around that. you should be able to fit it all in and it's about doing it all. but it's not the whole point of that is like if Eve?
Christie Flora: yeah more is not better if the stuff doesn't matter so
Christie Flora: you might be running around.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah, it's about effectiveness. Not just...
Christie Flora: Yeah Hmm.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: quantity.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
Christie Flora: So you might be running yourself ragged going... Every week I need to change all the beds in the house. Why? Bye. spread that out and then Bye.
Christie Flora: in the context of your life, maybe changing the beds every week is a bit of sand. so I can wait.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah, that's right.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. So it's worth that exercise of stepping back and going, okay, what are the big rocks?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: What are the things that I do want to take most of my time and attention? What are the pebbles? And then what is the sand that just fits around everything else that literally you squeeze in around everything else?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Because yeah, it can happen, but it's not the focus of my time.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: The other book I love that touches on those kinds of things is this one, Essentialism by Greg McKeown, when he talks about the disciplined pursuit of less.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
Christie Flora: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And it's this whole idea of just. focusing on fewer things and doing them well rather than trying to spread yourself thin across a whole bunch of things and doing none of them.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Great. So it's a lesson there. constantly have to remind myself it's like all right I'm feeling overwhelmed or nothing's really getting done what are the key things that I need to do today or this week or that other people in the household need to do today or this week so we can feel like we're you know cruising that life is feeling smooth and we're not feeling like we're you know ricocheting off the walls in chaos
Christie Flora: Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah and it's good to have that conversation. with everyone involved. Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Alright.
Christie Flora: Excellent.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So... Our top three nudges for this session. What should people be focusing on as they're walking away from this today?
Christie Flora: so notice your time language so catch yourself saying busy i don't have time i'm behind Looking at your week, so... Maybe you have a calendar that needs some attention. Maybe you want to give the Excel spreadsheet a try. Maybe you want to see the link that we're going to give in this.
Christie Flora: episode have a look at your week really really track it so track before you fix so have a look at where is your time actually going and do that kindly so without judgment you just want to be really kind and just be interested where is my time going
Christie Flora: Anything from you? What do you think?
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I'm just thinking about what I'm going to take into the next week. Thinking about my time. I'm going to... Just think about some new placeholders for where some of my...
LifeAdminLifeHacks: weekly activities have to happen. So for me, I know there's like I used to do grocery shopping on Thursday nights. That's just not. that's the last thing I want to be doing on Thursday nights now.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: And I actually notice half the time I go to the store and it's run out of half the things I want.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: So I need to find a new time. in the week to do that. In terms of my overall relationship with time, I feel like it's actually at a healthy place now and there are kindnesses that I give to myself knowing when I have energy to do things and when I can know.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: I should step away because I can't do this now, but I know that I'll i'll be happy to do it first thing in the morning. So there's some nights after dinner where I cannot be bothered to clean up the kitchen and it's a pigsty and I just can't face it. And i know I know myself well enough to know that when I get up in the morning.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Even though 99 % of the time I do clean it and my future self always thanks me. Sometimes like I'm like, I can't do it. But I know my morning self, it'll knock it over in two minutes and it won't be a big deal. So that's some of that. wiggle room that I like to play with now.
Christie Flora: Yeah, beautiful, beautiful. And that's a... Good segue into what we'll be talking about next episode.
Christie Flora: I'd like to recommend my free holistic organizing life audit resource, otherwise known as HOLA. So it's a tool that helps you step back, look at your life as a whole and think about whether the way you're spending your time and energy actually reflects what matters to you. Because as we've been talking about today, our relationship with time is really our relationship with life.
Christie Flora: So that might be a good exercise for you too.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: Yeah. All right. So if you do that audit or if you end up getting the time tracking spreadsheet, if you're brave enough to do either of those things, please let us know. We want to hear how it went and what you learned. But otherwise, thanks for being with us today. And a big shout out to all our followers who've nudged us to ask when we were coming back.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: We're back baby.
Christie Flora: And next episode, we're getting into the kitchen as command center and how a few simple systems can make one of the busiest spaces in your home work a whole lot better.
LifeAdminLifeHacks: yeah and if today's got you thinking we've also got previous episodes on finding more time in your day so that'll pair nicely with this one we'll put a link in the episode description
Christie Flora: And if you've got 30 seconds, please subscribe and share this episode with a pal and a rating or review wherever you're listening or watching. genuinely helps more people find their way to the show and we really appreciate it.
