The Definitive Guide To Reducing Anxiety, Overwhelm and Busy-ness

This week it’s all about calming down an out of control productivity system.    Links: Email Me | Twitter | Facebook | Website The FREE Beginners Guide To Building Your Own COD System Carl Pullein Learning Centre Productivity Masterclass | Create Your Own Custom Workflow Carl’s YouTube Channel Carl Pullein Coaching Programmes The Working With… Podcast Previous episodes page   Script Episode 129 Hello and welcome to episode 129 of the Working With Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein and I am your host for this show. I do hope you are all doing well and staying safe. It is in times of difficulty when the best of us comes out. Now is the time to stand up and be a leader and set an example for everyone around us.  Now this week, I’ve received a few emails and I’ve had a number of people ask this question on this subject—or a similar question— and that is one where the productivity system itself has become overwhelming and is now the problem and not the work being thrown at us.  Now, before I do go into this week’s question, I should point out that if you also find your productivity system has become bloated and overwhelming now would be a very good time to take or retake, my FREE COD productivity course. COD (Collect, Organise and Do) was created with simplicity at its heart. It was born out of my own experiences creating a monster of a productivity system that In itself became the problem that demanded more and more of my time every day.  The COD course will take you through the basic set up of a simple system, explain what you need (and by omission what you do not need) and show you, in outline, how to manage your work so you spend more time doing and less time organising and processing.  So if you haven’t done so already, get yourself signed up. It’s completely free and don’t worry, it is not a sales pitch designed to get you to sign up for ever more expensive courses. It is a course designed to help, not sell. And most important of all, it will show you the essential components of building a productivity system that works for you. Okay, it’s now time for me to hand you over to the Mystery Podcast voice for this week’s question.  This week’s question comes from Helen, Helen asks: Hi Carl, I’ve been following your work for some time and wonder if you can help sort out the mess I am in. I am using Evernote and Notion for my notes, I also have to use Microsoft OneNote for my work and I also use Todoist for my personal tasks and Microsoft’s new To-do for my work tasks. It all just feels so overwhelming. Is there anything I can do that will help me to feel more in control?  Firstly, thank you, Helen, for sending in this question.  Now, where do we start? The best place to start is recognising there is a problem and in this case Helen, you have done that. You have recognised you have a problem.  A good place to start is to calculate how much time you are spending organising and processing each day. Under normal circumstances, you really should only be spending twenty to thirty minutes, maximum, processing and organising your work. The rest of the time you should be doing the work.  A lot of overwhelm is self-inflicted. We spend more time adding than taking away. What we should be doing is looking at subtracting instead of adding.  Asking questions such as ‘do I really need this app?’ And ‘Is this adding to or reducing the amount of work I do each day?’ Are helpful in determining whether or not your system is the cause of the problem.  Also, look at the tasks themselves—do those tasks really need doing or can you combine them with other tasks—picking up your prescription at the same time as doing your weekly shopping. Replying to your actionable email while waiting to pick up your kids from school, for example. Problems are also caused by us wanting to see a lot more than we need to see. And there is a difference be