Planning My Creative Tasks Using my Productivity Planner
Getting back into a productive rhythm after burnout.
Do you struggle to be productive with your creative or writing projects?
In terms of creative projects, I was highly productive last year, or at least for the first seven months of last year. This was from a system I’d perfected for myself using what I call my ‘productivity planner’.
It’s simply a hardback notebook, A5, with either gridded or dotted pages. I credited this planner, alongside my writing notebook, with the dare I say dramatic changes in my creative life. They helped me go from a hobbyist flailing from one project to the next and never finishing anything to a writer with a writing and mentoring business. And a number of completed projects.
Yes, I went from someone who would reach the end of each day, feeling wretched and wondering what on earth I’d done with the hours I had, to feeling pretty smug about what I’d ticked off my list. Having spent so long (years in fact) messing about and not getting any closer to the goals I had yet to admit to myself, I was now writing and completing a workbook, I was creating masterclasses and I built a membership club. Then I created this Substack. So, they also basically encouraged me to become more creatively confident.
Throughout burnout, however, I didn’t pick up my productivity planner. I completely ignored it. But I knew that this notebook held the answers to me getting properly back into the routine and rhythm of writing and mentoring again.
During May I peeled the cellophane on a brand new notebook, I still had pages left in my old one but I needed the incentive of a brand new one (if you know, you know!) But I haven’t created a productivity plan for the month, week and day ahead like I used to until today.
And guess what - it felt good.
In the video below (it’s for paid subscribers) I share how I’ve got myself organised for the rest of the month of June, how I’ve worked out what I hope to achieve this week and what I’d like to have completed by the end of today.
I say in the video that I like to break my tasks down into small tasks (and this is small for me, if you were to do this type of planning you have to work out what is comfortable for you). As many small tasks as possible because I get a buzz from ticking them off the list. I’m a big believer that breaking them down, and ticking them off builds momentum and this momentum builds confidence.
So instead of writing ‘edit non-fiction book proposal’ for example, I’d write down each bit I wanted to edit. ‘Edit non-fiction book proposal’ became the smaller tasks of ‘edit chapter one’, ‘edit chapter two’, ‘edit chapter three’ and ‘edit chapter four’. Instead of having one big and almost overwhelming task that would feel like such a huge and neverending mountain to climb, I had four smaller ones that seemed more within reach.
That’s how I grew my confidence before and this is how I intend to rebuild it after burning out.
[I realised during the making of this video that I’d missed creating little films. So maybe I’ll create more behind-the-scenes videos, particularly for paid subscribers in the coming weeks and months.]