Ep. 104 – Vacay Mindset

Jeff: Hello, everybody out there. It’s Jeff and Doreen. Today we’re gonna be talking about the vacation mindset, how to stay on vacation all the time. So if you’re ready, let’s get started.

Doreen: Are you ready to create a life that’s better than ever before? We are Doreen Yaffa and Jeff Wilson, and we are here to give you the strategies you need to create the life after divorce that you deserve and desire. As partners both in marriage and coaching, we use our expertise as well as our own personal experiences to help you make the next chapter of your life the best chapter.

Jeff: Hello, Doreen. How are you today?

Doreen: I’m good. How are you?

Jeff: I’m doing great. You know here we are in Marathon, Florida, in the Florida Keys and we’re coming to the end of our vacation.

Doreen: Yes. I know that triggered your episode, for our episode for today.

Jeff: Yes. Yeah.

Doreen: About the vacation mindset.

Jeff: I don’t want the vacation mindset to end, so I was thinking, how can we make that happen?

Doreen: Right. Especially after divorce, I think that people really need a break. But it’s a mentality that you can have all the time is what you’re saying.

Jeff: That’s what I’m hoping and that’s what I’m saying. And so how do we do that? How do we have that vacation mindset where you’re chilled, you’re relaxed, you’re enjoying your time off, you’re not stressing over work when you’re not at work.

Doreen: I think that a lot of it has to do with something that I talked about previously. Do you recall which episode.

Jeff: Yes. It was your Amazing Divorce episode number 57.

Doreen: 57. About time management.

Jeff: Time management.

Doreen: I think that if you, you know, many people have a mentality that they can just go through their to-do list. There’s so much going on after divorce, you know, you’re busy, you’re trying to restructure everything, and let me just get through my to-do list. But truly, it’s a lot simpler than that because the thing that we do and why we’re here on vacation is because we have put that in our calendar.

Jeff: Correct.

Doreen: Right. So even today, like I had meetings scheduled this morning. We’re doing our podcast episode now, and then we will go out, in spite of it being almost 110 degrees with the heat index, we’ll go out on the boat and we’ll have the rest of the day to be in that vacation mindset. So we have the time scheduled this morning, and now we will go and do what we need to do. So what we’re suggesting is what.

Jeff: Well, everything has to be on a schedule and you have to manage your time better. And when you manage your time, you’re allowed to escape, or if you want to use that word, escape from your work and your other things that you have on your mind when you’re normally on vacation.

Doreen: Well, I think what it has to do, yes, and I think what it has to do with is that when you, we do what we call a Sunday download, right? So we, on Sundays, take out a fresh piece of paper and put down everything that I have to do, but that includes also personal things. So working out, going to the grocery store, you know, then you have all your work related things.

You just put it like, list everything down. And then when you think you’re done, you do it, you add to it, and then what you do is you take it and you put it on your calendar. So everything that’s on your to-do list goes on your calendar time, date specific, right? So that includes vacation time, that includes workout time, that includes reading time, that includes just hanging out time. If that’s what you’re into. Those things are just as important as your basic to-do list items, right? So you wanna put those things on your calendar.

Jeff: Yeah, that’s why before I do the calendaring, I like to do a little prioritization as well. An A list, B list, and a C list. And that helps me to prioritize with my calendar as well.

Doreen: What does that mean?

Jeff: Well, if there’s something on my A list, it goes on the calendar, on the schedule first.

Doreen: Oh, right, right.

Jeff: And then, the B list, if I can fit the bees in there, and the C’s might be just reading a new magazine.

Doreen: And I think it’s important though, that you don’t have to cram everything into a week. Like we, I do this on Sunday and I don’t just put all of it into my calendar for the week. Right. I put it in for three weeks out.

Jeff: Yeah. If you remember, when I was new at this, I would cram everything in Monday and then try to fit everything in on Tuesday.

Doreen: Can’t do it.

Jeff: And then came Thursday. I had nothing left to do.

Doreen: Well, there’s always left to do

Jeff: And then well it then you said, well, what about next week? Yeah, I guess I could do that next week. And then I started to spreading it out a little bit more and it was more of a realistic doable schedule.

Doreen: Well, I think it’s human nature to think that things that have to get done, need to get done now, and that the reality is that’s just your brain playing tricks on you. Right? You can schedule the things that you have to do. Let’s say you’re starting a new business, right? Okay. And so you would brainstorm all the things you have to do to get that business going, right? Whatever that looks like. And then you would probably even break it down more, figure out how much time is involved in each of those items, each of those things, each of those tasks, and then put them on your calendar if you do that, as opposed to just winging it.

Waking up in the morning and just saying, Hey, I’m just gonna get through this. You will be so much more successful, detailed, dedicated, and you will get there sooner than later. And you put the things that matter to you also in your free time on there. And it’s amazing how much you can get done.

Jeff: Yeah. You know why we don’t do this?

Doreen: Why don’t we do this?

Jeff: Do scheduling and calendaring?

Doreen: Well, we do this.

Jeff: Well, not you and I.  I meant as a people, as a race, as humans.

Doreen: What do you mean a race?

Jeff: As human beings.

Doreen: Yes. Why do we not do this?

Jeff: Because if we do not calendar them our primitive brain is not set up for failure.

Doreen: So what do you mean?

Jeff: So if something is on a calendar and it’s scheduled to do something, there’s a chance that you might not do it, and you’re setting yourself up for failure in your primitive brain,

Doreen: Right. Cause you don’t want to.

Jeff: Exactly.

Doreen: When the time comes at two o’clock today, when you’re supposed to write copy for your new website, let’s say that’s an item and you put two hours down, your brain is going to tell you all the reasons why you should not do that.

And they’re gonna sound really good. You’re hungry, you haven’t had lunch yet. The phone is ringing. You have to answer emails. Your child has been asking for you. Like, there will be so many things that will come into your life at that particular time. When two o’clock comes, that will tell you, no, I don’t need to do this today.

Jeff: Exactly.

Doreen: So the goal is that you ignore that. Your human brain, if you wanna say your prefrontal cortex, which is your thinking brain, knows better, knows that you put this time there to do this task. Because to do this task means you’re going to now be that much closer to your goal of, in this case, opening a new business.

Right? So you’re writing the copy for the website at two o’clock today, period. Nothing should come in the way of that. I always say it’s like you have a date with the most important person in your life, so think about somebody you totally admire, admire. If you had a plan to have lunch with this person, okay, who would you pick?

Jeff: Well, I know I’ve heard of this sample and I know it was lunch with Oprah.

Doreen: I understand, but who would you like to?

Jeff: Who would I like to, I would say, well he’s passed now, but I would love to have dinner with, Jacques Csau back when I was a kid.

Doreen: Okay. Well, let’s assume for a moment that he’s still with us. Right?

Jeff: Okay.

Doreen: And I know you’re into diving and underwater and all this.

Jeff: Sure.

Doreen: And you had the opportunity to have lunch with him. You would be there, right?

Jeff: Oh, I absolutely, I would be able to sleep the night before.

Doreen: You would show up.

Jeff: Sure.

Doreen: And you would show up early and you would show up ready to go, and you would show up in your best, you know, your best attire, your best personality, your best person and you would be there. And that’s how we have to treat ourselves with the same respect that we would have for somebody that we totally admire, that we have a plan with.

Jeff: Absolutely.

Doreen: Because if you do that, then you can truly accomplish a lot.

Jeff: And here’s the thing also, if you think about it, you said, we may put off something at two o’clock because you want to go, you know, something else is on your mind, but that something else should also be scheduled so it wouldn’t be a deterrent for getting it done.

Doreen: Yeah, I think that’s really important. Like in my personal business. What I do is like, we have email time. I have email time, which means that I look at my emails in the morning, I look at my emails in the evening or towards the later part of the day, and those are blocks for those things because if not, and you’re just sitting there randomly going through your texts and your emails and you’ll never, first of all, you’re never gonna get finished.

You know, I think I get 500 emails a day, right? So you’re never gonna be finished, and you’re never going to accomplish something more in your life because you’re constantly, you know, really trying to multitask, which doesn’t work. People think that multitasking is a thing. But it’s truly not a thing.

Do we do it from time to time? Yes. Do we have to do it from time to time? Maybe. But the bottom line is if you dedicate specifically in your day what you’re doing, at what time? And not try to multitask, you will get a lot more accomplished.

Jeff: You know, I do struggle with this because when you were talk, especially when you’re talking about time for emails or time for social media and time for that. I find myself getting distracted a lot.

And when I realized that it’s not on my schedule, not on my calendar, I can redirect myself and it keeps me on task a little better.

Doreen: Yeah. Cause I think that’s the thing. It’s not just understanding this, doing your, what we call thought download on everything that you have to do, right. You have to do want to do, and then putting it actually on a calendar, figuring out every task, everything you have to do, how much time it’s gonna take, and then putting it down, right.

And including, like we said, your personal things like working out or whatever it is that you want to do. But how do you, when you’re, when that time comes now on your calendar, how do you control your brain?

Jeff: Well, I think you’ve made a commitment to the calendar just as much as you made a commitment to yourself and you just do it.

Doreen: Right. But what happens? Like, I’m just wanted to know from you when two o’clock says that you’re gonna do whatever, and now that two o’clock has come and you find yourself doing something else, how do you bring yourself back?

Jeff: Ah, that’s a good question. I mean, you just have to refocus your brain and say, this is something I’ve committed to, and you put whatever you’re doing down and you may have to reschedule it on your calendar  to finish what you’re want to do.

Doreen: That’s what I was gonna suggest as well, because this is, it takes time to learn how to do this. It doesn’t come easily. You have to work at this. This time management putting things on your calendar, you really have to work at it. So what will happen is the day will go by, something else will happen. You won’t get to everything and don’t punish yourself. You know, don’t be hard on yourself.

Jeff: It’s very normal.

Doreen: It’s very normal. It’s very normal for things that you have committed yourself to do, you don’t do. Okay? So what happens? First of all, don’t beat yourself up. Second thing is now just put it for the next day whenever you have time and recommit to it. Eventually you will become a person who’s super like flowy with this.

Jeff: Yeah. More efficient.

Doreen: More efficient with this, for sure. Right?

Jeff: Yeah.

Doreen: But why is this important for people after divorce?

Jeff: Well, I think that maybe there’s a little, I don’t want use the word disheveled going on. But maybe, there may have their mind going in many different directions.

Doreen: True.

Jeff: And refocusing your mind and your priorities, super organization, super prioritization. Is gonna be key. And again, just like you said earlier, it’s maybe simple but it’s definitely not easy.

Doreen: No, it’s not. And when, and I think you’re right, I think that after divorce there’s a lot of, you know, your thoughts, your commitments, your needs. There’s a lot going on, right? You’re probably moving into a new home. You might be starting a new career. You’re dealing with schedules with children, new two households, you know, trying to figure out all of the nuances of the divorce itself, right? There’s a lot going on, so this time management is extremely important

Jeff: Yeah. If you think about it, there’s a lot going on. All the time, no matter where you are in life. And after divorce it’s a lot busier. So that makes it even more important to prioritize and write things down on a calendar and schedule things.

Doreen: And give yourself a break in between. Like, I like to put, you know, an hour break in between things and sometimes in between what I’m doing. So that way, put your lunch in. Maybe you just wanna take a walk for 15 minutes, you know, clear your brain, put it on your calendar.

Jeff: It’s funny that you say that because I was guilty of that as well as I would schedule something at 10:15 to 10:30, 10:30 to 10, you know, 10:45..

That’s right. I didn’t even schedule lunch. I didn’t even schedule a break or anything. And it’s like, so I wasn’t really, true to my, my what was going on in my life. I was just trying to throw everything on the schedule. So it’s very, very important to look at your day, very realistically when you’re sit, when you’re calendaring things.

Doreen: Right. And be realistic with the time that you need to devote to each of the things that you need to do. I think that’s where I’ve had some challenges is I think I can do something, let’s say in an hour, ends up taking an hour and a half. And for me, I’m pretty proficient. Like I can get through things like, you know, pretty fast, but I was underestimating the amount of time I needed.

Jeff: And then also, and I’m gonna use this you as an example, allowing other people to throw off your schedule.

Doreen: Oh, right. Explain.

Jeff: I’ll let you take that. I’ll let you explain that one, because, you know, you may say, this is gonna take me an hour, but it may take you an hour without phone calls or without distractions, or without emergencies and, you know, putting out fires. So there’s things that come up when you’re a business owner.

Doreen: Yes, there are, but you know what? You can put in your calendar, an hour block dealing with certain things that you did not expect to happen that day. There’s no problem with doing that, right?

Like for example, I have a block of time on the calendar to return phone calls. People will call in and they want a phone call back. So my assistant knows that’s where that goes, you know, in this one block of time.

Jeff: So it’s good to know and let our listeners know that you do not have to answer the telephone.

Doreen: No. Well, that’s your brain saying answer it. Right? I mean, there truly are very few emergencies in life when you think about it.

Jeff: Exactly.

Doreen: You know, obviously if someone is hurt, you know, something happened with your child, somebody, you know.

Jeff: Yeah. You know, so the phone rings like four times the same phone number. You know, there’s something going on. You may take a, uh, a little time to answer the phone. However, I think if you have, let’s say 45 minutes’ worth of work and you put it down for an hour, I think that could, you know, tie in that can help out.

Doreen: What do you mean?

Jeff: Well, if you say, I need an hour to do this, so you put down an hour and 15 minutes just to give you some extra time for things.

Doreen: Sure. Nothing wrong with that.

Jeff: Nothing wrong with that.

Doreen: You just wanna be realistic. Alright, so time management after divorce. Super important to getting your life back where it needs to be to creating the best chapter, the next best chapter of your life. Remember, we do this with our clients. You know, we help them to first uncover their thoughts, figure out where they are emotionally after divorce.

There’s various stages of divorce, we talked about that. Where are you? And then we like to set goals with them because goals really as humans is what keeps you excited in life, right? When you have something to achieve. And so we get them to really dig deep on what that is for them. Where do they find their passion point? Why is this important? Because the next step is how do we get there?

Jeff: Exactly

Doreen: And you write down all the things that you have to do to get there, which is really pretty easy to understand. And if you have to do research on whatever your goal is, how to get there, and then you put it on your calendar

Jeff: And speaking of calendars, guess what time it is.

Doreen: Time to say goodbye.

Jeff: Time to go on the boat.

Doreen: Okay.

Jeff: Let’s go.

Doreen: All right, my listeners, everybody have an amazing week. Think about the things that are important to you. Do your download on all the things you have to do. Get it on your calendar. And live true to your calendar and to yourself.

Jeff: And stay on vacation.

Doreen: Well put vacation in there as well, right?

Jeff: I mean in your mindset.

Doreen: Absolutely.

Jeff: Bye-bye. Have a great day.

Doreen: Have a great day, everybody. Bye.

Jeff: You have the vision of what you want your life to look like after divorce, but maybe you just don’t know how to get there. So if you’re ready to take control of your life and want to find out more about our coaching, visit us at lad-coaching.com. That’s L A D as in life after divorce dash coaching.com.

Doreen: Until next time, have an amazing rest of your day. And remember, yes, you can have an amazing life after divorce.