How to Supercharge Your Day as a Mom

Hey, my name is Teresa Hildebrand and this is Organized Chaos. We take a deep dive into living with intentionality, focusing on what's important in our lives so we can truly feel our best. It may feel chaotic at times, but with a little organization, the right mindset and a ton of self-love, we can still thrive. Join me as we talk to other busy moms and experts who will share tips and strategies to help you reach your goals. Hope you enjoy this episode of Organized Chaos. Now on to the show. Hey friends, welcome to this episode of Organized Chaos. I'm so glad you're here. Today we're going to be talking about how to supercharge your day as a mom. So, because you're a mom, you have probably felt a lack of energy. You have so many things going on. You feel mentally and physically exhausted. So I want to give you some practical tips on how you can actually energize and supercharge your day so that you can boost your productivity and maintain some sense of order. So I'm just going to jump right into it and I'm going to talk about the morning ritual, and this is kind of like the morning ritual for success. I've shared my morning routine and this is different for everybody, so I'm not going to say this is the end, all be all. I'm not going to say you have to wake up at 5am. I'm not going to say any of that. But I do want to give you some of the things that I do that actually create this successful morning routine and how it helps me have so much mental clarity and physical energy so that I can take on the day. So really it is important to start your day off right, and it doesn't matter what time it is, but the actions that you take in your morning routine are super important because it sets the tone for the entire day. So my particular personal morning routine starts off like this I wake up super early, but what I do is I focus on my mindset first, so I jot down my goals, I plan out my day, I write what I'm thankful for, and that kind of puts me in a sense of like gratitude for what I have and the things that I'm working on. And I plan out my day because I need to know, like, what's coming up right so that I can prepare. And although I've already created kind of like a weekly plan, doing this on the day of and time blocking it, which is what I personally use, it just helps me know, like, what's coming next, and it's not just like this, you know, throw spaghetti on the wall to see what sticks. So that gives me more of a sense of control and order and, although it doesn't always pan out to what I expect it to be, it still gives me a sense of you know, control, that I know kind of what the plan is going to be and I can make pivots along the way. But I'm really thinking about being prepared, being intentional, and that really motivates me to start the day off. Now. My morning ritual also contains physical movement, so I got to move my body and normally when everybody's still asleep, that's the best I could do it because I don't have interruptions. So I get my body moving and it's anywhere between 30 and 45 minutes. So the good thing is that I have actually a gym per se in our garage so I can go downstairs and do that and, like I said, it doesn't matter what it is, it just gets my blood flowing, it gets my heart pumping and that actually creates more energy for me. Okay, and I also prioritize right, I prioritize and I manage my time because I can't possibly do it all. So when I am thinking this way and when I think, well, I got to do it all and it's got to be done by me, then that clouds my mind, that doesn't create any clarity, that creates overwhelm. So I have to make sure that I understand that I can't physically do everything and I can't, I don't have the mental capacity to take on all of these responsibilities. So I have to prioritize, because it's a lot to juggle family and work and other responsibilities right. So I have to make sure that I focus on the most important things and I decide what that is and then, once I prioritize, then I fit it into my schedule. That's why I time block, because that creates more intentionality for me and I'm able to manage my time more efficiently. So the next thing I do is I organize my day. So the first thing that I talked about in my morning routine was part of it was planning out my day. So I'm able to do this so that I feel like I'll be more effective. And I really kind of have a two-parter for this, because I will schedule my time and create events and meetings, and all of that I'll put it in a digital calendar. I use Google Calendar, but I also have my physical planner where I jot down like what I'm going to be doing for the day, and that kind of helps me a little bit. First off because I can actually share it with anyone else in my family and we're all we can all be on the same page. So it helps me to kind of see it digitally. But then when I actually write it down, it solidifies it and it's like ingrained in my mind that this is what the plan is. Now, one of the things that I question I get a lot is how do you balance work in your family? And there's a lot of different ways that I explain this and a lot of different things that I do in order to accomplish that. But the key thing here is that I don't balance, I harmonize. So I know that there are certain things that are going to be more important or they're going to need more of my attention at certain periods of time or at certain seasons of my life. So I have to get out of my brain that I have to balance it all, because if I try to balance everything, that means everything is important, and when everything is important, I just don't have the physical capacity to do that or even the mental capacity to do that. So I'm really hindering my progress and hindering my energy, like lowering my energy when I'm thinking that I have to balance it all. So the first thing is to think about okay, going back to prioritization what is more important, what requires more of my focus, and then I put my energy and effort into that and then it could change depending on month it is, what week it is, whatever, right, you always think about this in the sense of where you are in your life and what season that you're in, and then you can decide what requires more of your attention. But when I do think about balance, I think about, like you know, tipping too far right too far into a specific area of your life. So if I find that I'm putting in way too many hours or way too much focus and effort in, let's say, my business and I'm not spending enough time with my kids, then I have to pivot right. I have to become aware of that and then start to recognize that I'm doing this so that I can make certain changes and the prioritization comes in. You know, delegating and outsourcing comes in, because I will find myself doing this from time to time. But it's not about beating myself up. It's not about, you know, feeling shame or guilt that I'm doing it. I just recognize that I'm doing it and then I can make some changes. So the next thing is tools and resources that I use to help me super charge my day. So I mentioned before that I use my calendar, a digital calendar, but I also have my specific daily plan that I have in a physical planner. But another thing that really helps me is because sometimes we get really deep into work or deep into another specific task. I make sure that I time myself. So the timer on my phone has actually become a tool for me, and this is similar to, like the Pomodoro technique, where you do 25 minutes to focus work and then you take a break, and then you do that depending on how long you're going to be working on a specific task. So that has been really helpful because we can get really deep into work, right. So having kind of like a timer or something to remind you that, hey, it's time to get up, it's time to go and do something else, take a break, right, because sometimes we can just like go on and then we have problems with her bag, especially if you're sitting down in front of a desk, in front of a computer, then you can start to feel it physically. So this is a really good reminder for me and it's a tool that I can just set and that'll be my thing, you know. Another thing that I'm working on is actually ignoring when the timer goes off, because you, like, you, just want to finish the task, but I feel like it's super important sometimes, especially, I think there's some science behind the 25 minute mark, because there's only so much you can do and there's only so much brain power you can exert until you start actually not doing your best work. And another thing is resources. There's so many communities out there that you can relate to. There may be moms, mom entrepreneurs, you know, ambitious women, whatever that may be, that you can tap into, where you can get other ideas, or that you can get support, and I have found this to be really, really beneficial because I don't feel like I'm doing this alone. There are other moms out there, other business owners that are, that maybe struggled with certain things and they overcame them. There might be some things that they do now because they learned from their past mistakes. There's so much valuable insights that you can get from joining these groups or seeking some type of support. Okay, so, just to recap, I gave you a few ideas of how you can supercharge your day. One of the most important ones is how you actually start off your day. So a morning ritual routine is really important. Then you prioritize and manage your time, then you start to organize your day and you figure out ways on how you can create some type of harmony between work and home life. So the one thing I'll leave with you today is the first thing that I talked about, and it was the morning routine. Now, this will take some time if you don't really have one, but I can't stress enough how important that is. And remember, it doesn't have to be super early in the morning. It's just a set of actions that you take in the morning that will set you up and set the tone for the rest of the day. So work on that and see what works best for you. So, before I end this episode, I do want to remind you that you're doing amazing. Don't beat yourself up if you're tired all the time and you feel like a failure every day and you feel like you're defeated. Take it one step at a time. You are doing amazing. All right, that's all I have for you today. I hope you have an amazing rest of your day and I will see you next week.