I Hate to Break It to You — But Crazy Busy is Just Crazy

At the end of the work day, have you ever asked a friend or significant other “How their day was?” and they replied with “It was CRAZY busy — but a good kind of busy.” Worse yet — have you ever said that?

Well, I hate to break it to you but being CRAZY busy is not good — it’s just crazy. I mean think about it — just the word “crazy” brings up emotions and thoughts of stress, overwhelm and complete disorganization. Is that how you want your day to be? And do you really believe that is good OR do you just not know how else to describe the maniacal attempt to get stuff done while still feeling like you accomplished nothing?

Maybe I’m the crazy one but that is the last way I want to feel at the end of the day.

As a kid, I used to play “office” with my little sister. I was always the President of the company and my sister was the Secretary — there are perks to being the older sibling, after all. She didn’t seem to mind anyway — or maybe she just didn’t know any better. But as part of our “play” I would dictate memos for her to type and then go to “lunch” while leaving her behind to get all the work done. I would then come back after a leisurely lunch play time and my sister was still slaving away at our old typewriter. Now, before you think I am mean — just remember, that is what we thought work was all about. The person at the high end of the totem pole gets to bark directions and have fun while the others just carry out the bosses wishes. I guess you could have called her “Crazy Busy” but she looked more miserable than anything else and for some reason didn’t want to “play office” the next day.

So here’s the lesson — There is no need to be “crazy busy” if you know how to structure your day. The problem is most people (like my 8 year old sister) were never taught how. Think about it — no one teaches time prioritization skills in school and by the time you get a job, everyone thinks you should already know what to do. It’s ludicrous, really.

There are a lot of time saving secrets that would cut down immensely on the stress, overwork and the 80% job dissatisfaction rate if only they were taught to business professionals. So, the choice is up to you — continue to do the same thing and expect a different result — yes, that is the actual definition of craziness OR learn the right way to do it.

Ask yourself these questions to see if you need help in this area:

• How do you determine the priority of your task list? When it’s due or by “similar” tasks?
• How often do you time block your day and what are your 5 consistent blocks each week?
• How have you automated your email so you don’t spend hours getting sucked into the vortex?
• How often do you allow distractions from other people and/or technology?
• Do you schedule regular “jam” sessions?

Those are the 5 areas to focus on initially to get your time under control. As they say — either you have your own plan or you will be part of someone else’s. Being part of someone else’s generally means they leave the office to have fun and you are still “grinding” it out being “ crazy busy”. Stop buying into that stupid myth and learn the time secrets of the uber productive because they are having “crazy fun!”

Take your first step toward sanity and get a FREE Time Savers Toolkit here.