Have you ever heard “planned neglect” anywhere else but Organize 365? Probably not because it’s a term I coined to describe what I do to more effectively manage my responsibilities and time. One can’t do everything so you must determine what is the highest value you provide to your work, community, or family and implement planned neglect for a certain amount of time to manage it all.
I Must Have Mentioned “Planned Neglect” Before
I was fairly shocked when I asked AI to give me some feedback based on a few episodes I shared. It explained the “framework” I have put in place. Ha! Much to my surprise because I hadn’t realized I offered a framework. I must have talked about it a few times on the podcast. But it wasn’t wrong. You need to identify the timeline when you will be using this planned neglect. Then you should tell your family so they know what’s happening when you start to cut corners to free up time for you to better utilize your highest value in this phase of life. Then you need to extend a lot of grace to yourself. It’s ok that you have lowered your standards. It doesn’t have to be forever just while something else needs more of you. Then you need to implement these temporary habits. And understand that this particular shortcut you have used in the past may not help you the same as it has in the past. You may need to figure out a different way to make life easier for a certain amount of time.
So back in the day when the dinosaurs were still roaming around, I identified planned neglect. I needed a little more time to work on my direct sales business. I thought about what could I neglect to give my attention to focus on my business? So I started with a nanny for 10 hours one day a week. Once my business grew even more I hired an assistant to help just 5 hours a week. Then there was the time I realized I was driving 25 hours a week. It was time to outsource laundry. It was beautiful for a while when I would drop off my laundry and pick it up folded and hung. And I have shared a few phases of life when paper plates became the china of choice in the Woodruff household.
Coming Out of “Planned Neglect”
Now that the PhD is coming to an end I have really wrestled with what I want to do with that time. I acknowledge that I will go back to cleaning my house and maintaining my own window boxes. I have really been thinking about the planned neglect I have practiced and it’s time to reverse some of those habits. It dawned on me that while I am back to using real plates for lunch and dinner, I will continue to use paper plates and bowls of different sizes for breakfast. Also, I hadn’t realized pursuing the PhD meant my health and body would suffer. I hadn’t put any thought into my nutrition and I certainly wasn’t moving as much as a person should. So now that I am coming out of planned neglect I have started to use some of that time to go to the gym. And I have decided I no longer want to spend that money on the Tovala meals. It was worth the money when I didn’t have time to grocery shop or meal prep. But now, I have time to focus on my nutrition so I am not ordering Tovala meals. Who knows, I may utilize them again in a season I need to.
As I come out of planned neglect I am going to take back my body and health. I will also be giving time back to working on Organize 365®. You have already seen a little bit of this as I have eliminated the work products. I am launching my new book “Escaping Quicksand” and will likely write more books. And I am getting ready to focus on The Productive Home CEO and new terminology to go with it being the Household CEO. I also want to explore how to use this new authority in academia to benefit household managers and their systems.
And at home I will be filling in all the blanks in my information management binders from The Paper Solution® and taking one day a month to focus on my CEO position in the Woodruff house. Planned neglect is simply looking at your tasks, deciding how you can lower your standards of that task and then implementing a new habit for a certain amount of time. Mine was the PhD recently, what is yours?
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