3500: How to Prioritize What Truly Matters by Molly Fletcher on How to Stay Focused

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_00] Überlass deine gesunde Ernährung und die Gains nicht nur deinem Bauchgefühl. Denn bei der Ernährung gaukelt uns unser innerer Schweinehund manchmal ganz schön was vor. Sag stattdessen Hallo zu deinem neuen Coach, Yasio. Yasio ist die meistgenutzte Ernährungs-App Europas, made in Germany. Egal ob Massephase oder ein bisschen Abnehmen, tracke Kalorien, Proteine, Carbs, Fette, Bewegung und Intervallfasten. Und mit den Tasty-Rezepten bist du ready für deine Ziele. Let's go! Lade die Yasio-App jetzt herunter.

[00:00:30] [SPEAKER_01] This is Optimal Living Daily, How to Prioritize What Truly Matters by Molly Fletcher of mollyfletcher.com. And I'm Justin Malik, your personal narrator, reading to you every single day of the year with permission from the authors. Kind of like an audiobook, but kind of not. It's a lot shorter than an audiobook. And I bring you one article every day of the year. So with that, let's get right to it as we optimize your life.

[00:00:57] [SPEAKER_01] How to Prioritize What Truly Matters by Molly Fletcher of mollyfletcher.com. Right now we are experiencing a major shift in ways of working and in the importance of work-life balance. With a great resignation, we've seen lots of conversation around employees and leaders reassessing their priorities and reevaluating where they spend their time and energy. It's so important for leaders to help their teams identify what truly matters

[00:01:25] [SPEAKER_01] so leaders and businesses know how to help support their teams. My Moment of Realization Once during my mid to late 20s, my parents flew in from Michigan to visit. I lived in Atlanta and I was so excited to see them because my parents and I are really close. We actually still talk every day. I picked them up from the airport and took them to this great restaurant where we could sit outside, look out over the city, and enjoy the beautiful weather together.

[00:01:52] [SPEAKER_01] I'd really been looking forward to spending time with them and was so excited for time together. All of a sudden, my phone started ringing constantly, one athlete or coach after another. I jumped up from the table, walked over under this old tree that was right there, and took every single call. After the fourth call, my mom asked me what they wanted, and it was like I turned the fire hose on her. I told her, That was a golf firm and his clubs didn't arrive. He's freaking out.

[00:02:22] [SPEAKER_01] I have to go to the manufacturer to build some stuff for him for this week. And, That was one of my coaches. He thinks the job's going to open up. He's interested in it. And then the phone rang again. Mom, this is one of my baseball players. He thinks he's getting traded. My mom looked at me completely unimpressed and annoyed that I was taking every call when they just landed and had come down to see me. I'd been so excited to spend time with my parents, and yet, I was totally unfocused.

[00:02:51] [SPEAKER_01] I wasn't present at all for them. Something that I was so excited about previously quickly found itself lower on my priority list. I was more worried about my athletes and coaches at that moment. A five-minute exercise to find what matters. When I work with leaders and teams, there's a simple exercise I like to utilize to help them identify what truly matters. I'd like to walk you through it in five simple steps.

[00:03:19] [SPEAKER_01] Step one, take a moment and identify the five most important things in your life. Maybe it's faith. Maybe it's your family or your career. Take five separate little sheets of paper and write one thing on each sheet. Step two, now you have the five most important things in your life on five separate sheets of paper. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to pick up the least most important of those five and crumple it up.

[00:03:47] [SPEAKER_01] I want you to just set it in front of you. Step three, you're down to four sheets. Those are the four most important things in your life. Now, pick another one. Again, I want you to crumple it up and put it in front of you. Step four, you are left with three. Look at those three and pick the least most important of those and crumple it up. And step five, you have two sheets left and you know where we're going. Pick the least important and crumple it up.

[00:04:16] [SPEAKER_01] Now you're looking at the most important thing in your life. I need you to ask yourself if you're giving that one thing enough of your time and energy. Is that one thing know that it matters to you? Is that one thing in your calendar every day? Is it something that you're intentional about ensuring you live throughout your days and weeks? Be intentional and disciplined to protect what matters. We live in a world where we can have more than one thing that we focus on.

[00:04:45] [SPEAKER_01] You can uncrumple the other four sheets. But I have a challenge for you. Make sure you are intentional and disciplined about ensuring that the one thing or the five things are living inside of your days. Be intentional. Be disciplined. It's up to you to prioritize where you put your energy or the world will decide for you. That was a mistake that I made that moment when my parents came to visit. They are the top one, two, or three things in my life. But I wasn't behaving like that.

[00:05:15] [SPEAKER_01] If we're going to live those one, two, or three things that matter the most to us, it requires discipline and it requires intentionality. You just listened to the post titled, How to Prioritize What Truly Matters by Molly Fletcher of mollyfletcher.com. And I'll be right back with my commentary. As a small business owner, you never clock out and neither does LinkedIn Jobs. While you're running your business,

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[00:07:42] [SPEAKER_01] Visit wonderfulpistachios.com to learn more. Thank you to Molly. That exercise she mentioned about writing down five important things and crumpling up four of them. That's actually pretty intense when I think about it. Even just imagining having to crumple up things like health or purpose, friends or family. It sounds pretty uncomfortable, right? But I think that's exactly the point. It's supposed to feel uncomfortable

[00:08:09] [SPEAKER_01] because it makes us really think about what matters most. This reminds me of something my business partner and I talk about pretty frequently, how easy it is to get caught up in the day-to-day tasks and forget about our bigger priorities. Like with this podcast, sometimes I can get so focused on the technical aspects, like editing and the sound quality, that I might forget the main purpose, trying to bring a little bit of positivity and helpful content to you each day. But I think what's important here isn't about being perfect,

[00:08:38] [SPEAKER_01] it's about awareness. Just noticing when we're putting our energy into things that maybe aren't at the top of our priority list and then making small adjustments. Maybe putting the phone away during family dinner or blocking out specific time for what matters most. So maybe today we can think about our own top priorities and be honest with ourselves about whether our actions match up with what we say is most important. I know I'll be doing the same. And with that, have a great rest of your day

[00:09:08] [SPEAKER_01] and I'll be back tomorrow where your optimal life awaits.