Now, when I talk about running your life like a project, what I’m really talking about is a conversation I had with a friend of mine. Now, he’s a business owner, and he manages several projects on the given day. He’s really efficient at it, but when it comes to his life when he leaves work, his life seems to fall apart. He looked at me and said, “Doug, what do I do? Like, you know, I go home, my relationships are in shambles. I can’t seem to get fit, my health, my energy is just down. I just can’t manage all of this.” And as soon as he said, “I can’t manage all of this,” a light bulb picked off in my head. He’s a project manager, so why isn’t he managing his life like another project?
So here’s a tip that I learned a long time ago, that I picked up. So I manage multiple projects across multiple companies, and the way I do this is by using project management software. So about three or four years ago I started using the same exact software to manage my life. Now, it sounds like it puts a lot of restriction, but in this organization and management, there actually is freedom, and that’s what I found. It really took me a long time to get around that. I had my own perception of what freedom should look like, what I found out was, when I organized things in the project management software, it allowed to me knock off those tasks quickly and efficiently.
So, what did I do? I went over and I used a software program called Teamwork PM, and I’ll put something down in the notes so you can check it out too. And I actually manage all of our company’s projects, both internally and for our marketing agency, in particular, all of our clients. So I’m managing hundreds of projects in a given week. One of those projects and the one that’s most important is my personal project. Now, why do I say it’s the most important? Well, if I can’t take care of myself, I can’t take care of my family. If I can’t take care of myself and my family, I can’t take care of my clients and customers. If I can’t take care of them, I can’t also take care of my employees. If I can’t take care of them, I can’t take care of you, and I can’t deliver these Daily Growth Hacks to you.
So what I’ve done is, I went over to Teamwork PM and I signed up for an account, and I set it up. And for right now I have, one of my projects is Doug Holt 2017. Now, it’s not a catchy name, I recommend you come up with a better one, but that’s what I have right now, it was quick and dirty. But what I did is, I broke it down into my Five to Thrive, and the reason we came up with this Five to Thrive was, over decades of me taking personal development and business development, I recognized that there were five things that came into a holistic package; your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business.
And if you don’t have a business, remember, if you haven’t heard previous shows, your business can be a goal. If you’re in school, that’s your business. If you’re retired, maybe it’s philanthropy. But either way, these five things make up a holistic package, or a wheel of life so to speak. Now, what I’ve done is, I’ve broken my project management into five major categories, into my Five to Thrive. And inside of that, I’ve come up with two items, keystone habits so to speak, two items that, if I do on a regular basis, will get me to my goal, make me be a better man, make me be the man of my dreams.
Now, I’m already there to some degree, and I’m not comparing myself forward, but in comparing myself backward I can look at my accomplishments by looking at the tasks and milestones I’ve hit. So I’ve set my 90-day game. If you’re not familiar with the 90-day game, go over to AuthorOfYourOwnStory.com, you can find out more information there. But I’ve set my 90-day game as milestones. So every 30 days I have to hit a certain milestone, just like I would manage my business. I have to hit daily task; they’ll tell me, “Hey, your task is late.”
So one of my tasks, for example, is to speak Spanish. Or one of my goals, I should say. So every day I spend 45 minutes going through a Spanish audio and doing exercises. One of my other tasks is to work out. It’s as easy as checking off that list. Another task of mine is to reach out to a particular friend, to make sure that they’re doing alright. Now, maybe some people think, “Hey, look, you’re reaching out to friends, you shouldn’t have this on a task list. It’s your friend, it’s a heart thing.” Well, it reminds me. It reminds me to put myself back in my center, and it works for me.
And for business, I have goals for my businesses. What items should I do? In fact, for my business, one of my goals is to check the project management software, ’cause then I can manage all of these projects and make sure nothing’s slipping through the cracks, and do what I do best in my companies, which is the high-level strategy. And that’s where I excel, and that’s where I can add the most benefit to my staff. So I’ve chosen to do this and then talking to my friend, who is a project manager, I said to him, “Hey, what if you managed your life like it was a project?” He paused for a second, and then all of a sudden you could see the lightbulb go off in his head, and he just got super creative and fired up. And he went right to work. And I’m proud to say that since I talked to him, he’s actually successfully been managing his life, his relationships, his mind and his body. He’s been going to the gym, he’s getting his workouts in. Because you can look at it.
Now, there are sometimes you may not get things done on your project management, or in your software, your task, or whatever it may be, and that’s okay. You can set up simply and easily, and remember, it’s a game. This is life, it’s supposed to be fun, you’re here to enjoy it, please. So don’t take yourself, or the project management, or your task, or your to-do’s, or even you 90-day game, too seriously. It’s not worth it. But what it does give you is actionable items that you can knock off every day, and I encourage you to do these first thing in the day.
I try to set these off in the morning, so before I do anything else I have my PM for my life ticked off. Once that’s done, myself, my heart, my body, my cup so to speak, is full. And I can allow everything else extra that’s inside of me to pour over into others, and it allows me to give back exponentially. And my ultimate goal, as I’ve talked about before, is to touch the lives of over one million people in a positive way, so I can make the world a better place, and that’s what I’m trying to do today.
So, that’s my hack for you today, I hope it’s helpful for you. If you have any questions, go to the AuthorOfYourOwnStory.com community, I’m happy to answer any of those questions, and exactly how I use the PM, and help you set up your own, or what other questions you might have.
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