Episode 539: Do Your Homework

Today, we discuss getting ahead of the urgent by doing your homework, as well as communicating when schedules slip.

• Live with The Humble Mechanic and John Willis, Tuesday at 12:30 CT
• Microclimates Webinar with Kerry Brown, Sunday, March 13 at 3pm Central
• SelfRelianceFestival.com

Tales from the Prepper Pantry

• Road food fail
• STILL SEEKING to reorganize the freezers
• Reconfiguring the above chest freezer storage this coming weekend
• Lots of green beans to eat - not sad about this
• Scored a beautiful Bok Choy from the Stoltzfuss farm at Rogue - so nice to have something fresh to cook

Forage this Week - not much has changed

• Watercress (but flooding)
• Dead nettle
• Chickweed
• Dandelion greens

Operation Independence

• Post Rogue Assessment - lost money - next steps (Profit was -$455)

Main topic of the Show: Do your Homework

We haven’t had a hard conversation in a long time. You know the one I mean - the one I mean. The one where we are honest with ourselves.

Just got back from Rogue - got me to thinking about doing my homework (explain the coffee situation there and what we did)

Then starting thinking about SRF 1 and 2 and ways we could have better equipped sponsors, vendors and attendees with information in advance of the festival and realized we had more homework to do as well as a 9 hour drive.

I am very good at handling changing demands of an event with grace, but if I do my homework, there are fewer of these issues.

What do I mean by doing your homework?

• Post meeting follow ups the same day
• Preparing a thank you note in advance of an event where one will be needed gets that small but important task done
• Thinking through big projects and identifying production needs, then doing them BEFORE deadline
• Looking into the background of people and things that you must know about to be successful (SRF Speakers)
• Establishing project goals and planning how to achieve them
• Setting up systems so that post event items get cleaned and stowed efficiently

The list is endless. And therein lies the rub. The key to finding success and easing your life by doing your homework is knowing which homework you truly must do.

If you don;t change your hvac filters, you end up with a huge mess.

Likewise, if you do not thank your sponsors or other supporters, you damage the relationship.  And usually these kinds of problems stem from not doing your homework in advance.

Usually these things keep us from doing our homework:

• Fear of failure
• Overcommittment or overwhelmedness
• Disorganization
• Distraction
• Depression

All are excuses when you embrace who is in control of your life and schedule.

So how then, do we hold ourselves accountable while maintaining that all important health-relationship-work-fun balance?

• Separate the important form the busywork (Example - coaching call transcript vs coaching call summary. Speaker confirmation and communication vs internet sleuthing for more on the speaker)
• Establish your baseline: what must always be done (Example - coaching call must always have a post call write up the same day)
• Set up the system that empowers the homework: (Example - schedule coaching calls with an additional hour or two for the post call write up)
• Make the promise to yourself (I WILL do or die this thing)
• The hard step: follow through. 
• Communicate better - underpromise and overdeliver rather than over promise and underdeliver. Eg - someone wants something now

From planning events, to executing things well on your homestead, to interacting with people better - homework is something that is easy to put off. Part of this is because we are expected to do things that are busy work - like filing our tax reports. And because things like taxes come with a heavy consequence if you do not do the busywork, we have become trained to not separate the true homework that is important from the busywork that it is easy to assign ourselves because we feel good when we do it. You know - that endorphin rush you get when you click things off your list? 

But imagine what it is like when you DO set yourself up for doing your homework? Think of how SRF check in will be when we have everyone with parking passes in advance. When vendor spaces are on a map and assigned?

Or think of how easy it is to add people to your table when you have a plan for dinner and a deep pantry?

Or how about when you have a template email ready to go to confirm things?

All of these sorts of structures happen when you do your homework.

But you have to do it or it will never get done.

Membership Plug

MeWe reminder

Make it a great week!

Song:

GUYS! Don’t forget about the cookbook, Cook With What You Have by Nicole Sauce and Mama Sauce. 

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• The Booze Whisperer
• The Tactical Redneck
• Chef Brett
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Resources

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