Welcome to the real mom's playbook where balanced becomes a lifestyle brought to you by our premier sponsor The Breakfast Club Coffee Co. In season three, we are building good foundations with your Monday morning wake up. So fill your cup grab a notebook and let's get going Welcome to episode 7 of the real mom's playbook.

I'm your host Lisa Autry.

Today, I'll share with you three perspective shifts you can make with your time so that you can maximize the hours you have without stress. So grab your notebook and let's get ready to dive in.

First, let's give a huge thanks to our premier sponsor, The Breakfast Club Coffee Co. I'm all about supporting businesses with beautiful missions and amazing products.

The Breakfast Club Coffee Co. is a Christian mama owned business by Ashleigh and Stacey who personally pray over every order. Small batch roast means high quality and maximized freshness that is insanely delicious. Finally, us moms have a coffee community that supports our cravings and aligns with our values, something here at the Daughter Diaries we take very seriously. Today in my cup is my absolute favorite, the Highlander Grog. It's my favorite cozy cup of coffee with hints of creamy caramel and buttery rum and vanilla. Mia made mine with honey and sweet cream today and used the frother. It is perfect.

Head on over to the show notes to grab your foundations flight and Highlander Grog today.

So today we're going to get real with our routines and explore how three mindset shifts can help you get more fluid with your time, set the right expectations and make the most of your days. If you're like many moms that I work with, you fall into one of two camps. Number one, you either set the bar extremely high, planning your life down to the minutes, keep your routine for a few days before burning out because it's really hard and it's just not sustainable.

Or number two, you're allergic to routines and the very thought of planning your day feels too rigid and too constraining. You might find yourself drifting through your days, reacting to whatever comes your way instead of intentionally guiding your time and energy.

Either way, whatever camp you're in, it can leave you feeling overwhelmed, unproductive, and constantly on the brink of chaos. But what if I told you there's a better way, a middle ground where you can embrace flexibility while still having a good sense of structure. Today, I'm going to share some mindset shifts that can transform how you view and manage your time, helping you create a rhythm that works for you and your family.

Let's kick off today's discussion by getting down to the basics and defining what a routine is. A routine is simply a set of actions or tasks you perform at specific times each day. Instantly, this raises red flags for most of us moms because our days hardly ever look exactly the same.

So we create a routine that can feel unattainable and unrealistic, especially if you fall into camp number two that I mentioned before, you know, highly allergic to routines.

Today, I'll share three key shifts that you can implement right away. These shifts will help you see your time in a new light, plan your time strategically, and approach your daily routines with renewed energy.

So shift number one, how you view your time. We all have the same 1440 minutes in a day. And as moms, we feel that the majority of those minutes are like a marathon. So how do we change this mentality? Look at time as finite. Ask yourself how you choose to spend your time. Time is a limited resource, once it's spent, you can't get it back.

So instead of letting your days just happen to you, take control by consciously deciding how you want to use each and every single moment. Ask yourself, are you spending your time on things that matter to you, or are you just reacting to whatever comes up?

Shifting your mindset from, I have to, to I choose to, can also empower you to prioritize what truly matters to you. Make your power of six list of objectives and ask yourself if it's fulfilling to you or draining you. More often than not, we pack our day, give ourselves no room to breathe, and survive through it over caffeinated and stressed.

During your power down hour the night before, make your power of six list and ask yourself, is this how I choose to spend my 1, 440 minutes tomorrow? If the answer is no, then what changes do you need to make? What commitments do you need to adjust? And what action steps do you need to take? My challenge to you is to get off the hamster wheel of chaos and change the pace.

Build in buffer room around activities and boundaries for yourself and your life. This will help you to not only be more present, but to see your time as valuable versus expendable. Another thing I want to say on that is If you know what your value system is, so go back to the first couple of episodes of this season, figure out your value system, that's going to help you determine how you want to lead with your time.

We get each and every single day once, how are you choosing to live it going forward?

Shift number two, how you plan your time. Instead of planning your life to the minutes, which is a failing system, plan your time in chunks that give you breath and buffer room. This is where that power of six comes in again with the three large objectives and three small objectives.

Within the objective, assign the tasks that need to be completed based on the amount of time you have devoted.

It helps you build proficiency by batching your time based on similar tasks, as well as mark off several tasks per objective, which makes it a momentum builder for you. So for example, I want to give you guys an example.

Say there's a bunch of family appointments you have to make, but haven't gotten to. Within one of your power of six objectives for the day, you'll list out the calls you need to make. What I like to call. Life administrative tasks. So that would be the objective for the day. One of your power of six life administrative tasks.

You may be making five different calls, which would be the tasks within your power of six objective for the day. So you plan your power of six and blocks of time by saying from 12 to two, which would give you buffer space for those interruptions versus saying, I'll do X task from 12 to 1225.

So timing to the minute doesn't really give you the fluidity or flow in case of interruptions and derails your plans pretty quickly. When we go by minute to minute, one shift creates chaos. So we want to make sure we build in a bucket of time and a buffer room for interruptions. And just even, you know, if you're making five calls in a two hour period, making a call, taking some notes, take a break, make another call.

And that's going to help create more fluidity and flow in your day.

And then shift three, how you act through your time, what are you noticing about yourself as you go through your day in the evening, do a reflection to see what went right, what went wrong and how you felt throughout your day. Do you ever have those evenings where it felt like everything just went really well and right during the day?

Reflecting back upon the day can help you determine patterns of success you've created for yourself. Is it the power of six that's helping you build momentum? Or maybe you gave yourself ample time throughout the day and didn't feel rushed. Whatever that feeling of success means to you, we want to make note of it so we can duplicate it over and over.

This is the importance of reflection.

Are we shooting for perfection every single day with all our objectives crossed off? No, we are seeking a lifestyle where we feel more on top of our game than not. So about 85 percent success, 15 percent chaos management and survival.

So let's review. How you view your days is important. How you plan for the coming day is important. How you act through and reflect upon your day is important. These three shifts are a game changer when it comes to us moms feeling like we are fluid and accomplishing a lot.

It's not about a perfect daily routine, but rather keeping a fluid rhythm with your day, knowing what's coming for the next day and being prepared is going to keep you on top of your game.

Here's a great question. Do you get hit with something and get derailed?

I want you to ask yourself the next time this happens, what can I remove from my schedule today to best survive? And where can I place it in the coming days? This is a necessary pivot in order for you to feel in control when life gets out of control And as moms, this happens a good 15 percent of the time.

It's Time to implement these three shifts so you can feel more in control of your days, staying focused on what matters most, and finally creating rhythms that work with your busy life, not against it.

And if you're wanting more help with how to structure your time, make sure you grab Flow, my audio training and workbook that helps you break down some of these concepts even further, so you can create freedom and start seeing more success in your days. I've left the link in the show notes for you, so you can go ahead and grab it and dive on in.

That's it for today. Next episode is all about becoming a money magnet, even when things get tough. So stay tuned. That's it for today. Thank you for joining me for the Real Moms Playbook. I'm Lisa Autry. Thank you for joining me for the Real Moms Playbook, which has been made possible by our amazing sponsor, The Breakfast Club Coffee Co.

Make sure you check the show notes for links and access to the resources from today's episode. If you love this podcast, make sure you subscribe, rate, and share. See you next time. I'm Lisa Autry.