Conquering the Creative Work-Life Balance: Goal Setting with The Project Planner

Oh boy, do I have a treat for you today. We’re going to get after it with our “simplifying things” process for creative work-life balance. Actually, we’ve already been getting after it with our creative work-life balance discussions for the past few weeks now. But, I’m talking about putting what we’re blogging about and reading about to practical application.

Noticeable progress is all about applying what you learn. So, this very sentiment is what I’m referring to when I say that we’re going to “get after it” in this blog post.

Are you with me? Or, ARE YOU WITH ME?!

So, let’s just go back to a previous blog post of mine, entitled Conquering the Creative Work-Life Balance: Simplifying Things, for just a minute. In that blog post, I stated that the first step of the Creative Work-Life Balance Process is to . . .

. . . go to my tried-and-true process of list-making to write down those areas of life I need to focus on. They are broad categories. And for you, that might look like: physical health, mental health, and spiritual health. Or, the categories could take on the form of health and wellness, spirituality, family/social life, career life. Or they could simply be personal life and professional life. Or, they can consist of any other major categories that make up your life components and what you intend to work on in 2022.

And then, what I want us to do is to take the step (above) and add a goal-setting hack to assist us with our balance challenge. We can find that hack in step one of the Goal-Setting Process that I’ve outlined — also from a previous blog post. You can check that out below:

Goal-Setting Process for Writing & More – Step 1: Brainstorming

Ah-ha! So, that’s the hack. Brainstorming it is. Stick with me here, okay?

Here’s what we’re going to do with our goals: we’re going to let ‘er rip when it comes to free-flow goal-mindedness. Let it out. Let it ALL out. Stimulate your mind into “brain dump” mode with your list of this year’s dreamy (and even undesirable) activities, tasks, and goal achievements you’re currently working toward, you haven’t started yet but must do, you’d like to do if you were in a perfect world, etc. I want you to think of all the things.

That means the personal as well as the professional to-dos, which is why I use the term “work-life” in this process we’re embarking upon. And no, I’m not contradicting myself here. I’ve mentioned previously that for the sake of the discussions in these blog posts, I’ll tend to focus the content on the professional side of things. (Reason being: I don’t want to wear your patience too thin with the length of my blog posts.) But for the sake of YOU and YOUR life goals, I want you to focus, again, on ALL THE THINGS – personal and professional when engaging in our steps throughout this process.

And guess what you’re going to do with all of that stuff just waiting to ooze right on out? Well, you’re going to capture it onto something that looks similar to (or EXACTLY like) this “Notes” page in the 2-page document combo (below).

Now, I know it doesn’t necessarily look that fancy and all, but it’s practical, people. I’m going for the ease-of-use route. What can I say? I’m all about the simplification of processes these days. And maybe you’re thinking, “I don’t need this. I can just jot down what I need to on a piece of notebook paper.” And you’d be correct. You could do that; but you have to admit that this document is kind of cute, isn’t it? Plus, there’s a goodie attached to The Project Planner pages. Just . . . keep . . . . reading.

The “Notes” page is simply what it’s designed to be – a notes-taking page. And that’s exactly what I want you to use it for. All that brain dump stuff you’re going to do is going to be captured on this “Notes” page. (The title page of the document will come into play later on in the process.)

“But wait a minute, Jana,” you might be saying. “I have waaaayyyyyy too much stuff for this one 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper.” And here’s what I’d say to that . . . “print off as many pages as you need in order to get the job done.”

IT’S A FREEBIE! But listen. You can only get access to this document by clicking on The Project Planner image below.

Once you click on the image, you’ll not only have access to The Project Planner pages, but you’ll also become a part of my email-subscribing family. By joining the family, you’ll get some bi-monthly goodies in the form of the DOMinators News newsletter (distributed every 2nd and 4th Sundays) where we’re focusing on personal and professional development through simplification and goal-setting. This year is looking to be a fun ride. I feel it in my bones.

I’m talking about BONUS stuff, freebies, motivational content, and the like. Now, you have to admit that free stuff can be pretty valuable every once in awhile. And I’m going to work hard to make sure the newsletter is worth your time. As a matter of fact, one of the goals I listed out during my own brain dumping session was to make sure the Degrees of Maternity newsletter is just that — a valuable resource to YOU.

Anyway, I hope you’ll take me up on my offer, so you can get that extra work-life balance, simplifying things, and goal-setting gold you’ll only be able to get as an email subscriber.

But not to worry. Let’s just say that you’re not interested in the whole email/newsletter-and-other freebies route. Well, that’s just fine and dandy, too. I’m here for you no matter what. This blog is dedicated to providing helpful, encouraging, and motivational content 24/7. I’ll have some good stuff for you here as well.

On that note, I’ll leave you with your brain dump/brainstorming session(s) to work on. Then, we’ll plan on meeting back next week to work on some more of the creative work-life balance process, unless something else comes up to change my plan. (I have to put that little caveat in there, because you just never know.)

Until next time . . .