I had a stressful day on Monday.
Why? Well, it was my fault. Whilst I was busy working on the ‘big picture’ stuff in the development of new clients and workshops, having meetings and getting new commissions – with some AMAZING business clients, schools and Universities, but I haven’t been looking ahead in detail and planning on the day to day needs of the workshops and planning that needed to be done for the teams in the next couple of weeks.
And the VAT submission.
And the car service.
And the new broadband installation.
And the doctors.
And preparing the Soapbox factories.
And sending out the Soapbox orders.
And chasing payments
And sorting printing.
And booking hotels…
You get the picture now don’t you? I took my eye off the balls without putting other team members’ eyes on them so although no balls were dropped they were pretty close to being a major health and safety issue for everyone nearby!
At first I blamed myself – after all I did take time out for myself on Sunday and went for a two-hour bike ride in the Dales – and saw it as a terrible waste of time.
Then I felt sorry for myself ‘no one is helping me, life is so hard, boo hoo…’
Finally I gave myself a metaphorical slap round the face (and a biscuit) and decided that the reason I was stressed, pressed for time and running to keep still was my recent ‘go go go’ lifestyle, always on the move and not planning what was next or delegating and sharing work and responsibility properly.
Now Patrick is on stream in Winchester and covering the South and South East for us, new staff are being trained – like Rad and Natalie as well as regulars like Millie and Jess in the North we are developing a real team and instead of taking the lead I’ve been doing things I CAN do but SHOULDN’T be doing.
So what?
I tell you what, it made me think ‘I can control this and I don’t want another day like Monday.’ (Obviously I hope there will be other Mondays, just not like that one).
Every day you wake up with the chance to make your day as good as it can be and, although there are pressures and stresses that aren’t always yours, you can plan ahead and work together with your colleagues, friends, team and clients and make days more like you’d like them to be.
Hardly a revelation, just a reminder that sometimes the simplest actions can make the biggest differences to you.
So Plan, Think and be Merry (or Merrier at least!).
Bernie.