"Don't Bite Off More Than You Can Chew!"

Remember when you were a kid and your mom used to say this?  Usually it was after you had taken way too big of a bite of some fabulous food and now you were choking.

Now that I'm older this term has a different meaning for me.  It means something different than actually taking a big bite of chocolate cake and gagging it down.  It means taking on more work than I have time to accomplish in a day, week, or even in my lifetime.  It means I've taken on so much that my family and clients are all suffering because of it.

I've spent this week focused on getting my lists back in order and making sure I have everything written down, with the intention of putting it all on a calendar and making a real plan for the next three months.  It has been a hard and time consuming task, however very necessary.  I'm glad I did it.

Once I filled out over 5 pages notes with my thoughts as they came to me, I broke everything out into categories, then broke them all out into headings, then made the sub-lists and finally I put them in the order in which they needed to be completed.  Then I just sat there staring at the page and just about had an anxiety attack!


If you read my last post and saw how long my short list was you may not be shocked to know that the actual real list with everything on it is ridiculously long.  I determined if I worked on the list only, not including doing anything with my family, for 3 straight months, 10 hours a day, 7 days a week, I would never finish everything on the list.  And while I was working on the list things would be adding on almost as fast as I finished them.  This is not the life I wanted when I decided to become a virtual assistant and work for myself.  The list would be much shorter if I just went back and got a regular job.

I haven't been able to sleep all night and I realize that I have definitely taken on WAY more than I can chew and am in fact burning my candle at both ends and all over the middle.

This is another saying that we have all heard.  The difference with this saying is that it is probably a little more accurate and real for me.  I'm feeling the fire baby!  I've got to slow down, regroup, make some changes, and shorten these lists or I'm going to burn out completely.

So, as of today I've already taken a few things off my list and I have every intention of taking a bunch more off before the day is over!  It's time to make a real plan.  One that can be accomplished.   A plan that will make it so my clients are getting the quality of service I expect from myself, and they should expect from me.  A plan that will make it so my family doesn't wonder, "What happened to mom? "  "What is that pile of ashes in her chair?"