Something I am working on consciously at the moment is to stay aware of boxes as they sneak up on me.
If you have read Brilliance Unboxed (published this March with the glorious UNBOUND press, and available on Amazon or Barnes and Noble online), you may be familiar with the idea of staying conscious to the boxes you are in, and creating a practice around noticing when you felt unboxed.
As things have started to get back to *some* level of normality at this tail end of lockdown, I have noticed some boxes starting appear again.
My daughters are back at school in their bubble, so a late start to school and earlier pick up means days are topped and tailed again by a certain amount of routine.
I often find myself needing to be at my computer, for calls and project work, and it’s easy to suddenly reach the end of a school day and realise I haven’t moved from the house
I know that walking, being in nature and changing my environment are what I need to thrive. To stay creative, inspired, energised, and able to work in a way that has impact, and that feels FUN, flexible, and fluid.
Coffee shops and co-working spaces haven’t been available for obvious reasons- but it’s easy to get stuck into lockdown fatigue and complacency around how my day works.
As an introverted creative dudette, I *need* acres of white space to function at my best (believe me, #toomanyhumans and no space = grumpy Jo).
So I am making sure that as I plan ahead in my bullet journal ? for the next day, that I ask myself the questions:
✅ How did I feel unboxed today?
✅Where did I feel boxed in today, and why?
✅ How can I unbox tomorrow more?
Looking ahead at tomorrow, I could see a lot of projects that, at first glance, look like they need me to be working on my Mac
But with a closer look, I realised I can make some swaps.
The two articles and summit presentations I need to write can be planned in my notebook as I sit by the river.
I can go for a bike ride to town, have a coffee ☕️ by the water, plan out what I need, and voice memo the content.
By the time I cycle back, it can all be back from transcription, and ready to roll.
Exercise, fresh air AND efficient working.
Awesome ?.
The calls I have can be taken from anywhere, which frees me to walk and talk if I need to (something I love to do to get my steps up and also get a change of scene).
The planning I need to do to roadmap out a project I can do in my notebook before transferring it to Asana and getting nerdy and granular.
Now, if the weather is rainy and cloudy tomorrow and it’s not possible to get out and about easily, I will need to get more creative, or whack on my wellies and raincoat, plan to enjoy to outdoors, and find some trees to hide under.
So, over to you:
– How have you felt unboxed today?
– How can you feel more unboxed tomorrow? Or next week?