After weeks of thought, and a few rough drafts, I am putting the finishing touches to my 2023 Business Plan. I used to focus strictly on business tasks, prioritizing and focusing on those. In the past two years, I have started looking at this as my Life Plan, and including life goals.
"The key i snot to prioritize what is on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities"-Stephen Covey.
In business, it is recommended that you only have between 3 and 7 Big Rocks, to avoid negative consequences. In personal life, your family, exercise, recreation, giving to others may all be big rocks that also need to be placed into the jar.
My plan took longer than usual because I intentionally made certain that my "Big Rocks" both personally and professionally went into the jar first.
"If the big rocks don't go in first, they aren't going to fit in later"-Stephen Covey.
Planning the "big rocks" for me can be as simple as writing 5:15 workouts into my planner, scheduling a set evening every week to call one of my kids, making sure I can be finished working in time for "steak night". All of these are activities that I can weave in with professional responsibilities, helping to create a balance. Thankfully, those who are involved in my personal "big rocks" are very understanding when taking care of a customer is priority and our phone date, or catch up chat gets moved up or down a few hours or even into the next week.
As the year winds down, and it seems that there is a never-ending list of "must do's", and "want to's" on the calendar, in your text messages, and in the endless lists that are written on the backs of envelopes. Remember to always make sure you are tending to your Professional "big rocks" and not neglecting your personal ones either.