106. [BONUS] How I'm prioritising my intentions

Surprise!! I have a bonus episode for you!

I received a comment on an instagram post asking me how I was going to prioritise such a big list of intentions for the year (listen to the last episode and all will become clear). 

What a great question. But the more I thought about it, and the more I tried to write a response, the bigger an essay it became. So here I am, recording a bonus episode for you. 

I’m talking about how I’m going to tackle that (what I now realise is a) very large list of intentions for the year. Want to know what my system is? You’ll have to listen and find out.

Transcript

 A quick heads up before you start reading..... My transcriptions are automatically generated. I do not type them manually. For this reason there may be errors, incorrect words, bad spelling, bad grammar, and other things that just seem a little 'off'. You'll still be able to understand what is being said though, so please just ignore that and enjoy the episode.

Welcome to the intuitive eating and body positivity podcast. I'm Terri and I'll be talking about all things intuitive eating, body positivity and health at every size and shaking off weight stigma, diet culture and food rules so that we can all have a better relationship with food and our bodies.

Good morning. I say good morning because it is morning here. It's very, very first thing in the morning. I got sent a question on Instagram about the last podcast episode. So the last one I did, I was talking to you about my intentions for 2024. And there was a massive list of intentions. I didn't realise that when I was recording it, but rightly so, somebody said that there was quite a lot on my list and how the hell was I ever going to prioritize that?

I hadn't even thought about that. I hadn't thought about it. And actually that's not how it was phrased. Let me tell you how the question was phrased. It says, 

Really appreciated listening to this podcast and the word intentional really resonated with me. Yay, I'm so pleased. One thing I noticed is that you talk about being intentional in many different parts of your life and I wondered how you are prioritizing those so it doesn't become overwhelming.

For example, are you picking one small thing per life area that I will prioritize or are you perhaps picking one or two life areas that you will prioritize being intentional in? Great food for thought though, thanks. I hadn't even thought about it. But now that this question has come about, thanks Em by the way, I really appreciate that.

Thank you. I love it when people comment and post and ask questions and things. I love expanding on the stuff that I talk about. So. Feel free, do that and I will happily answer things. Can't promise there'll be a podcast episode every time, but I will definitely answer your questions. So then I sat and thought about this and I was going to write the answer on Instagram in response to that comment.

And the more I thought about it and the more I tried to write a response, the bigger the thing became and the bigger the essay got that I was writing. And I thought Instagram is not a place for a massive. Essay of a response, is it? There is not the place for the 18 pages front and back. Mm hmm. You with me?

If you know, you know. Um, so here are my thoughts. I thought I'd just put them in a podcast episode instead. Here are my thoughts. And this is the thoughts about my intentions. So I went back to my list and I had a look and yeah, there's an awful lot on there. I hadn't realised. Because for me, some of it just kind of flows into one another.

A lot of it kind of goes hand in hand for me, but you're right, as a list, that is actually quite big. So then I thought, do you know what? I'm actually going to try and prioritize this list because It's all very well having these intentions for the year, and it's all very well having these plans to make these changes.

But yeah, actually, what if I can't put them into place because there's so much there? So I thought, you know, I'm gonna actually do that work. I'm gonna do that exercise and I am going to put the prioritizing into place and see what comes out of it. And I find that actually the things on my list are a mix of different, um, requirements, shall we say.

I'm not going to repeat the list here. If you want to go back and listen to the last episode, you'll know what the list of things are. So I'm not going to recap all that here, but there are big things on my list that take a lot of energy and focus. And there are smaller things that just need kind of noticing in the moment.

There are things on the list that are really important to me, and there's things that I just like to do. And my list is so big because I sat and brainstormed, I sat and had a little journaling session and I kind of put this list together of what I wanted my year to look like. So this list was born out of a journaling session.

It doesn't mean that I have to do it all at once. It doesn't mean that I have to do it all, ever, if I choose not to. It's not set in stone. But at the moment I do want to do it all. So then thinking about the prioritizing and I was thinking, actively prioritizing this feels very structured to me. And this year I want, I want to be intentional.

That's my word for the year, but I also want flow. And I know I said as part of my intentions, I wanted to work with my energy. I wanted to work with the universe. I want to go with the flow this year. And that's not in a really overly laid back manner. I don't mean, I'm just going to sit here and see what happens, man.

You know, that kind of thing, but I do want to go with the flow. I don't want to force anything. And for me, actively prioritizing and structuring how I'm going to tackle it all goes against that grain a little bit. It doesn't allow me to go with the flow. So then I questioned, right, well, if I don't want to actively structure this, and I don't want to make a list, essentially, of how I'm going to prioritise this, and the order I'm going to tackle it in, how am I going to do this?

How am I going to prioritise it and not have this structure? This is really bizarre for me. I really like structure. I love lists. I love ticking things off. But this year feels different, and This year, we're going with the flow, and it's really strange, it's really odd for me, sitting here thinking, No, I don't want a list, I don't want priorities.

It's just not me. Anyway, then I thought, I'm going to do this slightly differently, I'm going to put lists in place. I'm going to write some lists. And I'm going to start with the importance of them. So I tried to rank them in importance order. No, that didn't work. They're all important to me. They're all really important to me.

Everything on the list is important to me. So that was not the way forward. So then I thought, right, I'll write some lists and I'll categorize them into active effort rating. That's what I called it when I wrote it down. Active effort rating. Um, and I put them into groups of high, medium, and low. So on my high list were things like food.

This is going to take a lot of effort for me because. Right now, I don't enjoy food preparation. I don't enjoy cooking. I don't enjoy focusing on food. That's where I am right now. This happens. Even as an intuitive eating coach, I can still get in these funks around food and things. Um, somebody on Facebook, I think it was, commented that and said it was really nice, actually, to hear that, that, that these things still happen to me as a coach.

And yeah, of course they do. Because I'm a human being and actually through me experiencing these things I can work through it. I can then pass that information on to you. So anyway, back to my lists. Things like food, I'm not enjoying food preparation at the moment, which means that I'm not enjoying eating my food very much because what I'm eating is stuff that I've thrown together with the very least of effort.

So for me to Change my eating for me to have more focus around food. It's going to be a big effort. It's going to be an effort to do something that I'm not particularly enjoying at the moment and find a way to enjoy it again. Movement much the same because of my health issues that I've had these last couple of years, I've not enjoyed moving.

It's become quite difficult and it's a far cry from what I used to be. So, as I said, last episode, I used to train a lot. A lot, a lot. I used to be really physically fit and strong and I'm none of those things right now. So for me to get that movement back in my life is going to be, it's not going to be physically difficult because I can start small, but the motivation here is difficult because I am very much in the headspace of, well, I used to be this, I used to do that.

And right now just to go out for a walk feels like effort. So movement and getting that in my life, as much as I know that it's going to be so good when I get back into the swing of it, the initial effort of doing it is going to be difficult. I know that. And then also on the high list was money because that takes active focus.

That means I have to sit down. It means I have to do a piece of work around. Where my spending is, where I want my spending to be, what spending I maybe don't need in my budget anymore. Um, maybe it's sourcing new suppliers, that sort of thing. So it's a very big piece of work to rehash how I spend my money and where I allocate it.

You know, um, where I prioritize my spending. Uh, for some people that will look like budgeting because It's difficult to pay the bills and put food on the table and that sort of thing. For me, it's more, I want to maximize what I do with my money. I want to put it in better places. I want to really look at where I'm giving my money to and see if that is still serving me.

So whatever aspect you're looking at money wise, it's still a piece of work to do, right? And the same with my business offers. I want to streamline. I want to improve my services. And that's going to be a big piece of work because I need to know what my business is going to look like, what I want in my business, what I enjoy doing, what I enjoy doing with you, what I think you will benefit from the most, that sort of thing.

Big pieces of work for all of those areas of my life. Then there was mid range effort, mid range active effort rating. And that was things like my sleep, getting a better sleep pattern. Not that difficult, because this means doing things like putting my phone down earlier in the evening, getting into bed earlier in the evening, getting up at a reasonable time in the morning, that sort of thing.

Not difficult, but hard habits to break, yeah? And that's why they're on my mid list, because they're not difficult, but they will involve me being active in what I do. The same with clutter, the same with clearing out the things that don't serve me anymore, the same with improving my environment. That's not difficult.

It just takes a bit of focus and a bit of time maybe. And the same with people. I don't see that as a big effort. I don't see improving my relationships with people and building relationships with people as a big effort. Uh, as difficult. But it will involve me being present. It will involve me being intentional about it.

Um, so that too goes on the mid list. And then there was low stuff, the low active effort rating. Do you think this will catch on? That low rating goes to things like working with the universe, because for me, I love it. It's easy. I want to do it. Um, give where I give my time, where I give my energy. That's easy for me because I know what sucks my energy.

I know what sucks my time and I just need to actually just. Just do it and make some changes and start saying no to things and saying yes to other things, you know? So that's a low input on my part. And then, then I was looking at the other things on my list that I hadn't yet categorized and I thought, actually, there's things here that I just don't want to do.

I just don't want to do them or they're hard. And by hard, I mean difficult for me to want to do or to get into or to tackle. Whether that's physically or mentally or whatever. Um, top of that list, I put sorting out my dental treatment. I have horrible time with the dentist. I have started the ball rolling on that, but that I still can't easily prioritize because I just don't want to do it as much as I know that my life will be way easier for having it sorted.

I just don't want to tackle it. You know, big mental block around that. Uh, things like relaxing in the evenings and not working and doing the same at weekends, that sort of thing. It's really difficult for me to do that. It doesn't involve a lot of effort. It involves very little effort, but for me to do it, it's going to be tough because I want to work.

I do want to work. I really enjoy working in the evening and I enjoy working at the weekend and I need to not though. I need to not do it. So that's difficult for me to tackle. Um, and my social media use. It's not, it's not something that involves a lot of active effort, but it is going to involve me being really intentional about it, putting my phone down or, you know, just removing myself from groups and things that I'm in.

And there's a part of me that doesn't want to do that. I've looked at a couple of groups this last couple of days, and I've thought. I don't want to leave them because I don't want to offend the person who runs the group. How blooming crazy is that? It doesn't serve me. I'm not getting much from it. I'm not really using the group.

Just the odd comment here or there. Doesn't serve me. I'm not serving the person running the group. But I feel like they might be offended if I leave. They probably wouldn't even notice, would they? I'm giving myself a little mini coaching session here, aren't I? So that's definitely on my list of things that are going to be difficult for me to do.

Things I really just don't want to do, but I have to do because I've got to put myself first. This is the whole point of these lists, isn't it? It's the whole point is that I'm improving things for myself. Uh, being in groups like that, not serving me, not saving my life, not saving anybody. So I need to do it, but it doesn't mean I want to do it.

So, then I looked at my rating system and I thought this doesn't prioritize things well either because there's things in the high effort stuff that I want to do. There's stuff in the low effort section that I want to do equally as much as the others. And when I looked at it all, I'm like, this is, this is just still a load of stuff that I really want to do all of.

Except the stuff that I put in the don't want to category and even the stuff in the don't want to category. Still really needs doing. So maybe I start with some of the stuff I enjoy and some of the stuff I need to do. So in the enjoy section would be things like working with the universe and, uh, the personal development stuff maybe.

Maybe that's stuff that I want to focus on and I enjoy focusing on and that would be good. And then maybe I mix in some of the other stuff that I need to do, such as Improve my sleep, my food, my movement, my business offers, that sort of thing. Maybe I have to have a mix of those things. But also, as I was thinking about all of this, I realised that some of it affects others anyway.

So if I improve my food, I'm going to improve, um, my energy levels. And that means that the ability to move more is increased because I have more energy to do it. If I sleep better Then I'm in a better mood in the day. My focus is better. Then maybe I've got the focus to do the money work and figure out the business offers.

If I've got say, better

focus on my energy and where I give it, then maybe that allows me extra energy to put into the relationships that I want to work on. See, it all kind of blends, even the stuff that I don't want to do. If I fix my dental habits. Not habits, my dental difficulties, then some of my dental work can be done and that means I can choose different foods.

And then maybe focusing on the food gets easier. It's, it's all going to blend in together, isn't it? So yeah, maybe I can't prioritize it. Maybe I just can't. There is no easy solution to this. There's no obvious way to tackle everything on my list. I am just going to start, just going to start and reflect over time.

I'm going to look at it every couple of months maybe and see how things are shaping up. I'm just going to make small changes, not a massive overall, overall? Overhaul. Because that's the other thing, isn't it? We go organs blazing at this stuff and then burnout. So it would actually serve me no good at all to have this whole list and go right, I need to change this and this and this and this immediately, please, because I am just going to be overwhelmed.

I am going to burn out. I am not going to enjoy the changes. That's what I'm like. I know I will do that. So I need to be really careful about just making these changes as I go along. So. Maybe one morning, when I'm putting my makeup on, if I've got a bit of extra time, I'll chuck some of the old bits of makeup in the bin.

That sort of thing. Maybe as I'm getting dressed in the mornings, I'll have a box. I'll have a box. And if I put something on that doesn't fill me with joy, and that I know is not going to fill me with joy another day, I'll put it in the box and that can go to charity one day, you know? There are little ways to make these changes that will have a big impact over time.

So if you're thinking about doing this, if you're thinking about making some changes, make sure they're manageable. Make sure they are small. Don't go massive overhaul with it. This is why diets don't work. This is why new year diets do not last for people. This is why January you're like, go, go, go, do it, do it, do it.

Awesome. And then in February, the energy starts to wane and come March or April. You may have fallen off the wagon and that is because you cannot make sustainable, massive changes and expect them to last. You just can't. They don't. You have to work with what you're used to. You have to work with what your brain is used to.

You have to work with what your body is used to and it has to work for you and your life. You know, that's the other thing. We quite often make all these massive changes and it doesn't work for you and your lifestyle. You know, if I was going to throw out all my clothes today, that's not good because I don't have spare clothes.

And I don't have the money to go shopping. And if I did go shopping today and just buy a whole new wardrobe, maybe tomorrow I wouldn't like them. So maybe it's better to introduce new pieces of clothing over time. Because that way I know I'm building a collection of clothes that suit me every day. With my different moods and my different body feels, you know?

So. Start small. This is what we're going to do. This is what we're going to do. I'm involving you in this now. I'm just gonna start. We're gonna reflect over time, make some small changes and drip feed it in. I have no one answer for you, but I hope that helped and yeah, hope you enjoyed a little bonus episode.

Normal service will resume next week. Thank you. Goodbye.



​