Is your jar full?

Now I’m all for being spontaneous and living in the flow of life, feeling immense gratitude and trusting the universe etc etc. And I have manifested so many wonderful things this year because of this. Literally everything I wanted to happen happened. I set my intention, put things in motion and trusted it would work, removing fear and doubt.

But also….

Manifesting only works if you’re fully prepared and taking decisive action in the direction of your intention!

1. VISUALISE your desired goal

2. Set your INTENTION

3. Make a thorough PLAN

4. SURRENDER to the flow of life (see opportunities instead of obstacles)

5. Take continued ACTION (align your behaviours to your goal)

6. MANIFEST your dreams

My year in a jar

In this video you’ll watch a (contrived) scene of a professor giving a thought provoking presentation on how to live/manage/embrace/structure life.

He uses a jar to represent life and the time you have in it. Then he puts into the jar, in order, golf balls - pebbles - sand - beer. If the order is changed and priority given to one before the other then he wouldn’t be able to fit everything in to the jar.

This is how I plan my year:

1. I assign a word for the year. This year was “Growth”, 2024’s word is “SIMPLIFY”

2. Then I plot out the ‘Golf Balls’: the important things, events, programmes, business ventures, birthdays, intentional time with my wife and kids, self care.

3. Then I plot the ‘Pebbles’: The slightly less important things, smaller events, home plans, insurances/policies, podcasts, press and pr, festivals, social media, holidays.

4. Then I plot the ‘Sand’: the other stuff, the things I’d like to do, the desirables, the “if I have time” things.

5. Then I plot the ‘Water’ (because I don’t drink alcohol): This is all the behaviours, the routines, the discipline, the mindset, this is where I plan in when I take my MEDSS - Mindfulness, Exercise, Diet, Sleep, Sexual Energy. 

And…

• I plot in alternating date nights (1 a month) with my wife: We each take a turn in organising the whole night; child care, where, when, what, how.

• I plot in 1 time per week where each parent takes out one of our three kids for 1-1 time, alternating each time who and which kid.

And then...

• I focus on habits and skills I’d like to build in the year and plan them in. I might not manage them but they are goals like: Learn to play the Handpan my dear friend gifted me, learn to sing, read a book a month from my home library.

• We are also bringing in more focus on our home education calendar as we un-school our kids and want to give them a little bit more structure and input next year.

Ok sorry...

I know what you’re thinking. “I thought he said ‘simplify’ was his word for next year?!”. But this is exactly what allows me to stay on top of things, have a good work/life balance and a thriving marriage with intimacy, care and mutual support.

I have a template for all of this that breaks down the hours of the day that I assign to each element and then I put that into a block planner where I strictly adhere to working on each thing for a set time a day.

And it plots where and when things need to happen and tallies up the hours I will work in a week and I try to keep this as low as I can to be as present as possible with the kids at this stage of their lives.

This level of self-discipline and thorough planning is what allows me to manifest my dreams.

Because I am so prepared I can allow for flow, I can track things (like finances, client journeys, *my wife’s menstrual cycle, and more) very easily and I’m not as surprised by things going ‘off-piste’ or challenges being thrown my way.

And I can MANIFEST and DREAM BIG during meditations and visualisations because I don’t need to think too much about other things that might overwhelm me.

I still get overwhelmed form time to time though. I’m not perfect. But I love that.

I will be going over all of this in the Man ALIVE programme in 2024. As part of the 6 months transformational programme I bring in planning and productivity to take as much of the hustle and bustle away and allow you to focus on being the best version of you and manifest your dream life.

I want to give men the tools to thrive in life.

I’ve helped over 300 men this year do this and I want to help you too.