{"id":2692,"date":"2019-08-02T03:00:08","date_gmt":"2019-08-02T08:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/?p=2692"},"modified":"2019-08-01T20:59:57","modified_gmt":"2019-08-02T01:59:57","slug":"add-margin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/add-margin\/","title":{"rendered":"Four Ways to Add Margin to Your Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

How Can We Add Margin to Our Busy Lives?<\/span><\/h2>\n

Producing For Others – Part 6<\/span><\/h3>\n

How can we add margin to our lives while improving and developing?<\/span><\/p>\n

I like talking about margin.\u00a0 It\u2019s not a common word. The common term, which is more prevalent, is stressed or busy.\u00a0 Ask someone how they\u2019re doing their response is…I\u2019m so busy. That\u2019s a life that lacks margin.\u00a0 Can you believe there was a day where my life (my activities & responsibilities) were out of control, my control?\u00a0 Well, I didn\u2019t like that at all so Pamela and I decided to change that. We decided to concentrate on this focus statement all year (in 2012): “Create Margin in All We Do.\u201d\u00a0 Lacking margin brings stress, and restlessness. It brings chaos and disorder. It leaves you chasing and running behind people, activities, and responsibilities. In the workplace they call this a \u201creactive\u201d approach to getting things done; you wait until you see the fire before taking action.\u00a0 If being reactive is the opposite of having margin, that means the solution to the margin problem begins with being proactive. Let\u2019s discuss what it means a little further.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"The Thought or Concept:
\n<\/span>What does it mean to have margin?<\/b><\/p>\n

I learned more about the margin concept from two people: <\/span>Craig Groeschel<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Michael Hyatt<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0 Craig taught me this, “<\/span>Better is one handful [with peace and] tranquility than two handfuls with toiling and chasing after the wind.<\/span><\/a><\/em>”\u00a0 When you have both hands full there is no room to use either hand for anything else.\u00a0 Even if you try you end up dropping something. That\u2019s living without margin.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Michael taught me how to live intentionally.\u00a0 People who have zero margin in life are those who are not intentional about what they are doing with their life.\u00a0 They\u2019re not intentional about planning or managing their time which produces <\/span>margin<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

“Margin is not something that just happens. You have to fight for it.” – Michael Hyatt<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Lacking margin means you lack a plan or clear objectives to accomplish anything.\u00a0 You \u201cfly by the seat of your pants.\u201d So how can we add margin to our busy lives?<\/span><\/p>\n

The Practice:
\n<\/span>How does one add margin?<\/b><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Decide that this is a problem for you.<\/b>
    \n<\/b>Decide that your hands are too full, your plate is too small.\u00a0 Until you think this is a problem for you, you\u2019ll never adjust your behavior.\u00a0 I’ve heard that “<\/span>    life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.<\/span><\/a>”\u00a0 Most people are victims of being overwhelmed and they believe it\u2019s nothing they can do about it.\u00a0 You must leave that type thinking and gain a victor’s thinking in which you believe you don\u2019t have to continue to live life like this.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  2. Live by <\/b>a calendar<\/b><\/a>.
    \n<\/b>You must learn how a calendar works and why calendars exist.\u00a0 You don\u2019t have an endless amount of time. Your days aren\u2019t 25 hours long.\u00a0 Living by a calendar puts things in a proper place. It says these are my priorities for the day, week, month, and year. Without it, you\u2019ll forget or attempt to do more than you have time to do.<\/li>\n
  3. Build your own <\/b>digital toolkit<\/b><\/a>.
    \n<\/b>To have margin will require getting some help.\u00a0 You\u2019ll need some tools and must rely on those tools.\u00a0 You can\u2019t continue to do things the same way you\u2019ve always done them.\u00a0 You’ll need to use apps that can make your life more efficient and easier.\u00a0 You will need to learn how to use productivity apps just like a pilot navigates with his instruments.\u00a0 For example, it\u2019s like my \u201c    Mint<\/a>\u201d app.
    \nI once did all my financial accounting using a spreadsheet that took me about an hour or more each week to update.\u00a0 Today using     Mint<\/a>, this process is almost automated.\u00a0 Talk about a time saver (4 hours a month, 48 hours a year) and a margin gainer.<\/li>\n
  4. Evaluate your <\/b>processes<\/b><\/a> regularly.
    \n<\/b>You must evaluate what you\u2019re doing to improve the process regularly.\u00a0 It’s never finished. I used to perform all my website updates myself, now I have a team for that.\u00a0 Why? I was no longer effective or efficient. I fell behind and worked a lot more than I should have on the wrong things.\u00a0 I wasted a lot of time, time I could have been spending doing the things only I can do. Evaluating lets you shift your efforts from what you\u2019re not good at, to what you are.\u00a0 You should try it.
    \nDon\u2019t be afraid to admit that a process is no longer working or can be improved.\u00a0 This is called growth and growth yields margin.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    We\u2019ve just discussed four ways you can add margin into your life.\u00a0 Take one and start today.<\/span><\/p>\n

    Today is Friday!
    \n<\/span>You know what you have to lose by starting the process of adding margin to your life today?\u00a0 Stress and feeling overwhelmed. You get to lose the busyness that life tries to pile up. By gaining margin which requires a plan, you get to live the life you dream.<\/span><\/p>\n

    Until next week, remember to create margin in the only life you have, which is…your business.<\/span><\/p>\n

    The Family Plan Binder<\/a>\"\"<\/a> is available now!

    <\/p>\nOur team has worked very hard putting it together. We designed it to help you and your family move the needle forward in making your life your business. \nFind out more about the Family plan here.<\/a><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    In this web-post, we share four ways you can turn stress and the feeling of being overwhelmed into margin. You know what margin is? Having room to move and adjust without any negative impacts to whatever else is going on in your life. Could you use some of that? Check out “Four Ways to Add Margin to Your Life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[173,25],"tags":[157,239],"class_list":{"0":"post-2692","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-producing-for-others","8":"category-production-and-development","9":"tag-calendar","10":"tag-productivity","11":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/20190802-TIF-Blog-Four-Ways-to-Add-Margin-to-Your-Life.png?fit=760%2C360&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4jb7V-Hq","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2692"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2692\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2701,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2692\/revisions\/2701"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerryaclark.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}