Do you often reach the end of your day and feel like, regardless of how busy you’ve been, you still don’t feel productive?

It’s all too easy to begin our day in our emails and allow all the interruptions of ‘urgent messages’ to run our entire day. These digital distractions can seriously affect our productivity. The constant notifications and easy access to social media and other websites can lead to procrastination, reduced focus, and decreased efficiency. It’s important to set boundaries and limit distractions in order to be more productive.

Asana, the project management tool, often talks about productivity on their website and in one article they share how digital distractions can be the arch-nemesis of deep work (focussed, uninterrupted work). 

According to them, distraction—especially of the digital variety—is more common than ever in today’s fast-paced work environment. At a time when 80% of knowledge workers report working with their inbox open and nearly three in four employees feel pressure to multitask every day, avoiding digital distractions can seem nearly impossible. 

However, minimising distractions is still doable with a few simple strategies: 

Turn off notifications.

Sounds, banners, and notifications flashing across your screen have a negative impact on focus and can quickly jolt you out of deep work. When you’re trying to focus, use Do Not Disturb mode or snooze notifications for your phone and any communication apps you use. Or to really disconnect, close your email and messaging apps completely. Remember that you can always check notifications during your next focus break.

Make depth your default.

Instead of living in a distracted state and wrangling your brain into focus mode to complete tasks, schedule focus breaks—times when you allow yourself to take a break and give in completely to distractions. You can use this strategy during your workday or in your personal life. For example, you could schedule a focus break after work when you’re allowed to browse the internet and scroll through social media—then turn your undivided attention to cooking dinner, watching a movie, or talking with loved ones.  

Choose your tools wisely.

According to Asana’s research, the average knowledge worker switches between 10 apps 25 times per day to do their work—and employees who switch between apps are also more likely to struggle with effectively prioritising their work. But just because a tool exists doesn’t mean you have to use it.

Lighten your tech stack as much as possible!

And, let’s not forget that one of the reasons all these interruptions exist is because of FOMO. We need to decide if we will let the fear of missing out run our day and leach our productivity, or if we will be ready to reduce digital distractions.

Digital distractions drain our creativity, our energy and our focus and the key to being more productive lies in managing them more wisely.

Our minds are extraordinary. The human brain has evolved to solve complex problems and successfully manage unexpected situations, and yet, coping is less about what is happening in the world and more about how our senses decipher the situation.

Perception is everything; this is why coping mechanisms focus on managing, reframing, or avoiding how we perceive triggers and stressors. Suppose our inability to cope is hindering us from enjoying a full life, achieving our goals, or causing hurt to others. In that case, we must adopt and adapt the best tools to overcome and reduce anxiety.

Depression and anxiety often co-occur, and many individuals with depression also experience symptoms of anxiety. In some cases, anxiety can lead to depression, and in others, depression can lead to increased anxiety levels. The exact relationship between depression and anxiety is complex and may be influenced by various factors, including genetics, life experiences, and brain chemistry.

For severe cases, you need to talk to someone and see a professional who can help. If you are feeling helpless, it will seem impossible to regain control of your mental health.

South Africa has one of the lowest mental health scores in the world. A 2022 Wits University study showed that 25.7% of South Africans are probably depressed, with more than a quarter of respondents reporting moderate to severe symptoms of depression.

Approximately 9.5% of American adults, ages 18 and over, will suffer from a depressive illness each year and more than 31% experience an anxiety disorder at some point in their lifetimes. In the UK, the figures are around 8% for depression, and about 1 in 20 suffer from anxiety disorders.

A sudden onset of mild anxiety can be triggered by many things—from a significant event, like a death in the family, to everyday stressors, such as work or budget worries—but sometimes it can be caused by seemingly nothing at all—or even issues we are not consciously aware of.

Psychological research has proven the importance of relaxation as an effective technique for managing anxiety, recognising that we can influence our minds by taking control of our bodies (Strycharczyk & Clough, 2015). Here are two ideas if we are looking for an immediate interruption to a pattern of anxiety or even an unexpected onset.

1. Controlled distraction

Like self-talk, controlled distraction reduces anxiety by redirecting attention away from a negative situation. When a quick fix is required, take your mind off your anxiety by focusing on something that doesn’t cause stress. For example, before giving a presentation or having a difficult conversation, count lights or ceiling tiles, listen to music, or imagine being at a happy event.

2. The Mitchell Relaxation Method

According to positivepsychology.com, this technique involves flexing and relaxing specific muscles to increase awareness of body position, breathing, muscles, joints and where we might be holding tension. As we focus on this, we’re able to intentionally release somatic tension and increase our mindfulness, which helps reduce anxiety.

​​If we can see stress not as something to be shied away from but as an opportunity to embrace, we can live a more complete, authentic life. After all, although evolution has shaped our minds and bodies, we are free to choose how we react and behave. Overcoming challenges, pitfalls, and failures in life are just as crucial as celebrating the wins and enjoying happy outcomes. Stress can be a valuable force for growth.

It’s easy to feel like our lives are just a series of obligations – choices and decisions made because we have to, not necessarily because we want to. From paying bills and working 9-5 to attending continuous professional development seminars, family events and keeping up with the Joneses. When we view life through the lens of obligatory choices, we can feel frustrated, stuck and hopeless.

On his blog in 2019, Seth Godin wrote: “If it’s an obligation, then you don’t have a choice. Pretending you do is simply a way to create frustration. Free yourself to simply do what you have to do. On the other hand, if you do have a choice (and you probably do) then it doesn’t make sense to treat it as an obligation. Own the choice.”

He’s not actually talking about obligations and choices here; he’s talking about mindset. Whilst acknowledging that some things are as they are and we can’t change them, Godin reminds us that we can choose how we think and feel about our actions. Rather than blaming others, owning our choices empowers us to make different choices.

When we own the choice, we can change the choice. Then, it’s not because we have to, but because we want to.

But – we need to understand what’s happening when we make a choice. With every choice, there is a trade-off (or multiple trade-offs).

Saying yes to something generally means that we’re saying no to something else. When we accept the loss inherent in the choice, we can move forward with peace and clarity.  When we choose something, it is so easy to only think about what we get from that choice. However, by choosing something, we are actually letting go of something else.

Our lives, ultimately, are not merely down to chance but choice. We don’t have to stay stuck in a job we don’t want, or a relationship that’s unhealthy for us. We can change the situation by either changing how we think about it – or trading it for something entirely different. From debt to a dead-end job, from unhealthy eating to sedentary lifestyles, we can change because we want to, not because we have to. 

When we know what’s in the trade-off, it’s so much easier to find the motivation to become unstuck.

There are moments in life when we slow down and reflect on where we’ve been, where we are – and where we’re headed. Sometimes this is at the start of a new year, or perhaps it’s at a significant milestone in life when we feel like we’ve crested a hill and can take a rest and enjoy the view.

At this point, as we identify things we’d like to change and things we’d like to amplify in our lives, we set intentions and goals and share our dreams. When it comes to financial planning, it’s vital that we set our intentions with integrity and authentic values, not superficiality and disconnected values.

There’s a quote by Kevin Heath that goes like this: “In the end, kids won’t remember that fancy toy or game you bought them; they will remember the time you spent with them.”

As you read this and reflect on your own childhood, and perhaps your parenthood, it’s easier to remember the moments – not the monetary value – that defined us and motivate our choices today.

Yes, we can remember times of financial hardship or prosperity, and we can often remember big-ticket purchases, but it’s not always about the money spent, but what the money meant. This topic keeps coming up in our reformed thinking around financial planning: it’s not about how much money we have but how much we can achieve with our money. The two are linked, for sure, but where we place our focus will determine where we find our value.

When money is tight, it’s an opportunity for us to draw together and find creative ways to achieve our goals and dreams with the resources we have. And, when money is plenty, we have an equally challenging responsibility to invest or spend it wisely in ways that will have lasting value.

Ultimately, it’s about deeper relationships, not deeper pockets. As Charles Dickens wrote in his Christmas Carol, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour. Wherever you are in your planning and reflection, may you be encouraged to focus on what you can achieve rather than what you can earn.

With a positive approach, physical and mental stress can both be helpful in moving from a fixed to a growth mindset. Research has found that people who adopt the mindset that “stress is enhancing” experience more exceptional performance and fewer negative health symptoms (Crum & Crum, 2018).

It’s easy to try and avoid stress entirely, especially since we operate in overdrive way too often. Instead of finding the balance, we swing from each end of the spectrum to try and find better ways to cope. This affects our mental, physical and financial health as we find ourselves making decisions that have tradeoffs that sometimes sit in our blindspots.

We see this in our personal choices, but also in the way we interact with others. We might overspend in order to make a partner or child happy, or we might underspend in order to keep ourselves feeling like we’re minimising the impact on our finances. We might avoid certain conversations, or spend an unhealthy amount of time on one activity in order to avoid others.

In their research with athletes and Navy SEALS, Crum and Crum developed a three-step approach to harnessing the positive aspects of stress while reducing negative health impacts.

Step one – “See your stress”

Don’t attempt to ignore stress. Label it. Seeing it as something positive, rather than to be avoided, can change our physical, cognitive, and behavioural response to it.

Say to yourself: “I am stressed because I haven’t discussed our monthly budget with my partner.”

Step two – “Own it”

When you are at risk of being overwhelmed by stress, own it. Say to yourself: “I need to make time to have this conversation and stop avoiding it.”

Step three – “Use it”

Your body and mind have evolved to respond to stress; use that energy, alertness, and heightened concentration to boost your mind. Be open to the opportunity. Use the stress to energise and motivate yourself to have that conversation you’ve been avoiding.

Reframing stress to something positive can enable you to overcome existing and future obstacles.

Another psychiatrist, Professor Steve Peters, specialises in the human mind. His bestseller, The Chimp Paradox, explains the inner workings of the brain using what he describes as the “Chimp Model.” It consists of three elements: the human, the chimp, and the computer, and can help us understand why we behave in certain ways when under stress.

According to Peters, the human element uses a logical and rational approach to solving problems. The chimp element describes the fast-reacting, instinctual parts of the brain. It solves problems emotionally and often reacts impulsively, frequently causing us problems. The final element, the computer, stores previous experiences and uses this information to advise the human and the chimp. It represents your memory and a set of learned, automatic responses.

Ultimately, dealing with stress is a key skill to living a life that we’ve planned and designed. Without coping mechanisms and language to label, own and use our stress, and understand our motivations, we will frequently find ourselves stuck in situations that we could very likely avoid.

When life gets full and busy, it’s hard to remember why we do what we do, and it’s easy to become unhealthily disconnected from who and what we value. As Dr Susan David often says, finding your “why” can be as simple as reconnecting with your values and reframing your everyday activities in relation to those values.

This is not so easy when we’re under pressure to perform and meet the expectations that have been placed on us. But, if we’re cognisant of it, we can learn to be more intentional about seeking out our values, even when feeling the squeeze. This is how we can find and remain connected to our purpose and meaning in life.

As Dr David puts it – perhaps you’re dreading a particular meeting with a client with whom you just don’t see eye to eye. But when you remind yourself of the values you want to bring to work—such as clear communication and collaboration—you begin to evaluate this tricky relationship through a lens of possibility instead of struggle.

It’s not always as tepid as this, sometimes it’s red-hot volatility or significant change that we need to confront in order to find our peace. Engaging with our deeper values may call upon deeper disruption – like leaving a dead-end relationship or choosing to move to a different country. 

The challenging reality is that if we don’t, at some point, try to engage deeply with our motivational values, no amount of money, status, property or relationships will give us the value that we’re desperately seeking. So, whatever it means to you, find it.

Dr David says that walking our why is a surefire way to cut through life’s messy and confusing meanderings to connect with who we really are. We cannot find our meaning at the end of an investment strategy or career path. All of those have little meaning, and equate to ‘just stuff’, if we don’t know who we intrinsically are at heart. 

It is helpful to think about choices not as better or worse but as equal and different and to remember that values are related to quality over quantity. Consumerism puts blinkers on us and keeps us constantly ‘busy’ – so practice social snacking and find opportunities to enhance relationships when life gets busy. For example, prioritise phone calls and coffee dates!

Show up to yourself with courage, curiosity, and self-compassion. This is where we begin to experience authentic, deep, long-lasting value, which we can then lean on to guide our choices.

Did you know that listening to classical music has been proven to lower blood pressure, make us more emotionally available, help us sleep better and relieve anxiety? Ironically, our emotions around money can achieve the exact opposite!

Firstly, if money brings up a lot of emotions for you, you’re not alone. Financial expert Ramit Sethi (on a blog for The Harvard Business Review) reminds his readers that our relationship with money is just as personal and valuable as any other relationship. 

It’s okay to feel emotional about money. We should take our emotions seriously, but we should not always take them literally. This is because our emotions tell OUR truth, not THE truth. As a relational species, we hold many truths. So, one truth does not necessarily tell the whole truth.

In a recent Instagram post, therapist Jake Ernst talks about how we need to use our emotions to help us understand our values, fears, needs, and wants. We need to let these emotions play out whilst being aware that whilst we may be getting an accurate read on a situation as it applies to us, it may be an inaccurate read on how others perceive the same situation.

The triggered emotions may be a valid response, but that doesn’t mean they’re an effective way of dealing with our anxiety, frustration or anger. Ultimately, it’s helpful to remember that our emotions will always hold a paradox. To help us manage these paradoxes, we can educate ourselves about money and open up conversations that allow us to be vulnerable with people we trust. Often, the fear of money comes from a lack of knowledge or awareness about it, or from feeling unsafe and judged.

When we’re able to manage our emotional responses to money, we can choose to become inspired by money. This is a positive attitude, and it’s something we can proactively choose; emotions are not something we can choose, but we can choose our attitude. Instead of focusing on what we don’t have, we can think about what money can buy or help us achieve. Don’t just focus on the materialistic aspects but also the experiences money affords.

And, if you find yourself in an emotional spiral, try to interrupt that by speaking to someone you trust, doing something you love or simply listening to some classical music. It works!

If you’re not familiar, the Enneagram is a personality typing tool that focuses on why we do what we do. It is a model of nine interconnected personality types – from the Ancient Greek word “ennea” for nine. A quick Google search will tell you what you need to know and guide you to free tests if you’d like to dig a little deeper.

Over the last few decades, the Enneagram has grown in popularity, proving helpful in conversations of meaning, value and understanding our core motivations. It enables us to spot patterns in our behaviours that speak to our intrinsic fears, triggers and unbridled inspiration. From how we spend money to how we react to the neighbour’s dog barking all night – the Enneagram can open our eyes to habits that keep us in a place where we feel stuck, frustrated and unhappy.

Money is a common blockage for many of us. Whether it’s a debt trap into which we keep falling, or an inability to enjoy our hard-earned moola, when we can see how our motivations influence our money habits, we can decide if and how we might change our situation.

Here are some money management tips from the Real Simple blog – let’s jump straight in! (Link at the end)

Type One: The Reformer 

Let go of judgement around your spending, as this only leads to harsher self-criticism. Check in with your values around what you want, assess how much it will cost, and set a little money aside each paycheck. 

Type Two: The Helper 

Ask yourself: Do you need this right now? Are you saying yes to spending on something to please others? This will allow you to save for what you truly love—even if it’s in baby steps.

Type Three: The Achiever

When you feel compelled to spend, check in with your true intentions. Is it to impress others? Is it to keep up with a trend? The clearer you are on your priorities, the more you’ll be able to invest in things that speak to your innermost happiness.

Type Four: The Individualist

You may not want to hear the B-word, but budgeting is your best friend when managing your money. Grab a pretty notebook and some coloured pens, and plan how much you’ll spend and save. Why? It will help you prioritise the bigger things that fill you with joy and purpose.

Type Five: The Investigator

Recognise how money can provide that sense of freedom and autonomy you desire. Create a “treat yourself fund” in your monthly budget that allows you to spend on experiences you love, whether it is a book you want or a friend you want to spoil. You may be surprised how much this opens up in you.

Type Six: The Loyalist

Take the time to understand your finances, from investing to budgeting and everything in between. Not only do you love learning new things, but this will help you feel more prepared to make those more significant decisions instead of letting fear drive your actions.

Type Seven: The Enthusiast

The trap of the Seven is “shiny object syndrome” and wanting new things to feel satisfied. Before handing over your credit card, reflect on your long-term goals vs instant gratification. Is spending money right now filling a void you’re not tending to? When you realise you have enough and are enough, you will find satisfaction that money can’t buy (and save more along the way).

Type Eight: The Challenger

Notice where you are spending money as a way to feel in control. Do you need to buy things in bulk every month? Do you buy products you don’t end up using? When you feel the impulse to spend, consider how your future self will feel. It may be a wiser decision to invest your money to build wealth over time.

Type Nine: The Peacemaker

Create a vision board for your finances. Not only does this get you to take action, but it’ll help you get clear on your priorities and build a structure. Get crafty by cutting out images and words that speak to your goals, and make sure everything is measurable so you can track your progress.

If reading through this has helped uncover some blindspots, or sparked some more questions on how you feel, think and behave with your money, please feel free to reach out for a chat.

We permanently activate our fight-flight-freeze-appease response when constantly performing at our peak. This acute stress response activates our sympathetic nervous system and keeps us unhealthy or from experiencing deeper joy and fulfilment in life.

Blogs and TED talks abound on how we’re living in an age where our stress level is way above a healthy normal, and we need to find ways to reduce our stress to enjoy more of life.

Stress can be relieved in so many ways – from meditation, making better choices, and learning to say no and establishing boundaries – but one way is to learn how to control the controllable and let go of the things we can’t control.

For athletes, they say that we can’t control the rain, road surface, wind, or competitors, but we can control our attitude, effort, focus, fitness and preparation. In psychology, they speak about realising that we can’t control other people’s behaviours and emotions, only our own. When it comes to financial planning, we say that we can’t control the markets, only our investing behaviour.

As we’ve often said before, not all stress is bad. A research paper by Crum & Crum (2018) noted that people who adopt the mindset that “stress is enhancing” experience more exceptional performance and fewer negative health symptoms.

If viewed positively, stress is essential to moving from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset. Having worked with athletes and Navy SEALS, Crum and Crum propose a three-step approach to harnessing the positive aspects of stress while minimising any negative health impacts.

Step one – “See your stress”

Don’t attempt to ignore stress. Label it. Seeing it as something positive rather than to be avoided can change our physical, cognitive, and behavioural response to it.

See it, and label it: “I am stressed because I haven’t completed the report yet.”

Step two – “Own it”

When you are at risk of being overwhelmed by stress, own it.

Own it: “I recently got the promotion I wanted; this is part of my new role.”

Step three – “Use it”

Your body and mind have evolved to respond to stress; use that energy, alertness, and heightened concentration to boost your mind.

Use it: Be open to the opportunity. Use the stress to energise and motivate yourself.

Once we separate stressful factors into those we can control and those that we can’t, we can begin to healthily see it, own it and use it!

Despite our best-laid plans and most honourable intentions, conversations about money can go south quickly!

There’s never going to be a perfect time to talk about money dreads or financial dreams, but preparing our partner or family for the chat, and finding a space where we won’t be interrupted is always helpful. It’s also helpful to think about what you want to say, but you can never know exactly how others will feel about it.

In a recent blog from moneyhelper.org.uk, they offered several insightful ideas to help us talk to people we love when we disagree about money.

Here are some of them…

If they disagree with the situation as you see it…

Ask what their reasons are and listen with an open mind. If you feel they have a point, say so. If you disagree with them, suggest how you can move forward.

If they blame you…

Listen with an open mind, and figure out what’s making it frustrating without getting defensive and blaming them back. Are their comments justifiable? If so, how will you address these comments? Are their remarks simply shifting blame? If so, ask them what they feel you can both do to resolve the problems.

If they are impatient or attempt to change the topic…

Explain the aim of the conversation and let them know their choices. Listen to what they’re saying to address later. Express your understanding that it’s a difficult conversation while highlighting that it will be easier to have it now rather than later.

If they all talk a little too much…

Make sure you leave plenty of time for the chat, yet keep them on the topic by referring to what they’ve said and asking relevant questions. 

These are only a handful of possible responses; if you can think of others, write them down and challenge yourself to keep an open mind. Often, we only respond negatively when allowing our emotions to drive us. The sooner we can identify and acknowledge those emotions, we can allow them space and then move forward with rational intention.

Also – if the conversation is completely derailed, don’t give up hope. Try again and keep the channels of communication open.