by kathilipp | Jan 10, 2017 | Clutter Free, Clutter Free Podcast, Overwhelmed, Podcast |
Clutter’s #1 priority is to keep us feeling overwhelmed.
Overwhelmed comes in many forms. Kathi and Overwhelmed co-author, Cheri Gregory, discuss how easy it is to be overwhelmed with clutter. They go through three of the top things clutter tells you!
- Clutter Keeps You In The Past – You hang on to things the crowd out the present.
- Clutter Keeps You Stuck in the Future – You buy things to be something. Because someday you might need it you hang on to all the clutter. You can’t live in the present when you have so much stuff and you are stuck in the future.
- Clutter Decides You Have Not Earned A Future – Because you have failed with various endeavors in the past, you won’t be good at something in the future. So yu are stuck in your current situation. Clutter says you don’t deserve to move forward.
Listen in and learn how decluttering will free you from the overwhelm.
Want more tips on being Clutter Free?
Check out Kathi’s blog posts and episodes of the Clutter Free Podcast by clicking here.
FREE DOWNLOAD
500 Item Challenge
Even though-Kathi mentioned the 2000 item challenge, she meant the 500 Item Challenge which is the #1 way to get started with decluttering.
Cheri Gregory is a teacher, speaker, author, and Certified Personality Trainer. Her passion is helping women break free from destructive expectations. She writes and speaks from the conviction that “how to” works best in partnership with “heart, too.”
Cheri is the co-author, with Kathi Lipp, of The Cure for the “Perfect” Life and the upcoming Overwhelmed.
Cheri has been “wife of my youth” to Daniel, her opposite personality, for twenty-eight years and is “Mom” to Annemarie (25) and Jonathon (23), also opposite personalities.
Cheri blogs about perfectionism, people-pleasing, highly sensitive people, and hope at www.cherigregory.com.
by kathilipp | Jan 9, 2017 | Blog, Guest Blog, Relationships |
by Shaunti Feldhahn
You know that colleague or family member who drives you nuts? The one who second-guesses everything you do, is super-sensitive, and doesn’t return urgent emails for help?
No, wait, that would be my colleague! You probably have a different relationship that drives you nuts. Your grumpy step-father or passive-aggressive sister. A daughter with an Olympic level skill in eye-rolling. Or perhaps it is your spouse, as your marriage has slid from happy to hurting.
Or maybe it isn’t a bad relationship, but a good one … and you want it to be great.
Well, I’ve got great news. I’m a social researcher; and after years of study on what we call the 30-Day Kindness Challenge, we found three actions anyone can do to transform any relationship. Because targeted kindness is a superpower that will soften any heart.
Including our own!
Here’s what you do. Pick the person with whom you want a better relationship. For 30 days, you will:
- Say nothing negative about your person—either to them or about them to someone else. If you must provide negative feedback (for example, to discipline a child or correct a subordinate’s mistake), be constructive and encouraging without a negative tone.
- Every day, find one thing you can sincerely praise or affirm about your person and tell them, and tell someone else.
- Every day, do one small act of kindness or generosity for them.
That’s it! So simple. And yet in our research for The Kindness Challenge, 89% of relationships improved!
What does this look like in practice? Well, suppose you and your husband have been irritated with one another for months. Now every parenting decision is a battle, and your feelings are regularly hurt.
During the 30-Day Kindness Challenge, you resist the urge to ask “Why did you let the kids stay up so late!?” And you completely stop yourself from venting about it with your girlfriends at work. (This is just for thirty days, remember!) Instead, you’re looking for things to praise. So you notice it was really nice of him to come home early to get the boys to football practice. You thank him for it – and then you tell your girlfriends at work about that nice thing he did.
You’re also looking for that little act of generosity to do each day. So when he’s super tired after work, instead of getting annoyed that he’s not helping with dinner preparation you sincerely say, “I’ve got this. You go watch the game for a few minutes.”
Trust me: Starting this process will show us a whole lot about what needs to change. Not just in the other person: but in us. You will see just how negative you have been, in ways you never realized before. (In The Kindness Challenge, I outline the seven distinct types of negativity we found in the research, ranging from exasperation to overt criticism to suspicion. I strongly recommend you find out your negativity patterns, so you can watch for them!)
One Small Win: But as you go, you will also see something amazing: you will see your feelings changing. You’ll start appreciating the other person more. You’ll see their defenses lowering. And you may see enjoyment and positivity in the relationship you haven’t seen in years. An effort toward kindness won’t solve every problem – especially the big ones like addiction – but it will make them easier to solve.
I hope you will sign up for the 30-Day Kindness Challenge! Get a group of friends to do it together. Be a part of a movement of kindness in our culture – and in yourself!
Shaunti Feldhahn
is a social researcher, speaker and best-selling author of books such as For Women Only. She thinks Kathi Lipp – and anyone who loves Kathi – rocks the world. She hopes all of you will go rock the world with kindness.
by kathilipp | Jan 7, 2017 | 21 Ways to Connect With Your Kids, Blog, Overwhelmed, Patience, Relationships |
Homework often feels like swimming in quicksand; it takes a lot of effort to make a small, microscopic bit of progress. I think my son often feels the same. His face, his voice, his delay of the inevitable all lead to a night of overwhelm, and there isn’t one of us who welcomes the arrival of it. Instead, we have had to reframe homework time in order to do more than simply survive the wade through quicksand.
Changing the homework atmosphere
In a moment of desperation, when overwhelm was about to suck every bit of joy from the house, I opted to change the atmosphere. It was time to think outside the box.
Atmosphere: Scent
Who knew that lavender essential oil was just as important as a No. 2 pencil? It was news to me but now I keep it on hand. Diffuse it or wear it on your wrists to erase overwhelm – yours and your child’s! I bet fresh baked cookies, freshly cut rosemary or flowers would work to invigorate and motivate as well.
Atmosphere: View
A clear space to work makes a big difference. It drives us all nuts to have to clear a spot or work around the syrup on the counter. Have a clear spot ready to go. Also, there’s something about a flickering candle that ushers in peace and shows overwhelm the door. The candlelight serves as a reminder of what home is – a place of peace, it serves to remind me not set a place at the table for overwhelm.
Atmosphere: Sound
Music is powerful and completely customizable! What type of music focuses and calms your child? Instrumental music, soft rock, a movie soundtrack, or white noise? One night I put on John Coltrane just as I was about to pull my hair out and the strains of the talented saxophonist melted the frustration so that we could all stay focused on what is important – our relationships with each other!
Atmosphere: Release
Sometimes everyone needs a break. “Finish that worksheet and we can go shoot some hoops.” “Let’s practice your math facts and then we can have a snack.” “Go ahead and finish that sentence and we can go dance it out.” Homework will feel less like a prison sentence when there are opportunities to blow off some steam.
Atmosphere matters in homework. I can’t do my son’s homework for him (I already passed 4th grade), but I can set the tone in our home. Homework is not always going to be fun but there can be more smiles in the midst of math, more patience in the writing of the report. It is possible to end the night tired yet satisfied, that together, we navigated homework well.
One Small Win: With a simple step outside of the box, homework becomes more than just school work – it becomes a lesson in being patient and kind while mitigating overwhelm.
You can read more from Bethany Howard at bethanyhoward.com. She writes about finding fuel for joy and growth in the details of the daily. Her greatest leadership exercise has been her roles as wife and mom to three. She is a graduate of Leverage: The Speaker Conference.
by kathilipp | Jan 1, 2017 | Blog |
Oh, I am no stranger to the New Year’s Resolution, my friend. I know that I made them as a teenager, but the first clear memory I have of making a list was in 1998, in my fourth-floor walk-up in Uji, Japan, where I was serving as a short-term missionary. I was full of energy, passion, and drive. I sat down, made a list of ten goals, and free of a boyfriend, American TV, and other distractions, I lost weight, had daily Bible study time, cooked at home, and generally crushed it.
And then I got back to my real life, and over the course of less than a month, all those resolutions slowly unraveled. Not only did I break each and every resolution, I was actually worse off than when I started.
For years after that, I would make resolutions, only to find myself in February again, feeling guilty about the resolutions I didn’t keep. I think to myself, “Why is it that everyone else can keep their New Year’s resolutions except me?”
It’s taken me dozens of years to realize, maybe it’s not me. Maybe it’s the resolutions.
Resolutions are All or Nothing
You don’t get credit unless you’ve done the whole thing. You said you wanted to lose twenty pounds, and only lost seven? In resolution-world, that’s a big old failure. You said you would exercise five times a week, and you only are getting to the gym twice a week. Well, why go at all?
When your goals are all or nothing, 99.9% of the time, they will be nothing.
As humans, we need to see our progress and we need encouragement along the way.
When it Comes to Resolutions, Turns Out That SMART Goals for Life Change Aren’t That SMART
We’ve all heard about SMART goals. That our goals should be:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Agreed-upon
- Realistic
- Time-sensitive
I use SMART goals all the time in my business, and for short term projects. But for lasting life goals? SMART may not be the way to go.
Peter Bregman, writing in the Harvard Business Review Blog Network, argues “When we set goals, we’re taught to make them specific and measurable and time-bound. But it turns out that those characteristics are precisely the reasons goals can backfire. A specific, measurable, time-bound goal drives behavior that’s narrowly focused and often leads to either cheating or myopia. Yes, we often reach the goal, but at what cost?”
So If Resolutions are Not the Answer, What Is?
Bergman says that instead of goals, we should be focused on areas of change. “An area of focus taps into your intrinsic motivation. It offers no stimulus or incentive to cheat or take unnecessary risks, leaves every positive possibility and opportunity open, and encourages collaboration while reducing corrosive competition. All this while moving forward on the things you and your organization value most.”
For over a year, my resolution has been not to make a list of resolutions, but instead, to create a personal manifesto.
A personal manifesto is a statement of your core values and beliefs, what is important to you, and how you plan to live your life. It is written in the present tense, even if not everything you state is one hundred percent true about you today, it is a declaration of what you are working to become.
So instead of a resolution that says, “I will lose twenty pounds this year,” my manifesto states, “I cannot buy good health. I must earn it. Daily.” Instead of short-term goals, I’m looking for lifetime growth.
Personal Manifesto
I sat down and wrote my manifesto in about an hour. (As an author and speaker, I spend a lot of time mulling such things over in my day-to-day life already. So when it came time to put it down on paper, it was pretty easy for me.) But others can get stuck in the creation of such a personal document. That’s why our team has designed this download “How to Write Your Personal Manifesto” as our gift to you.
I can think of dozens of reasons to create your own personal manifesto, but let me give you my top three:
- There is no “Breaking” a Personal Manifesto
Yes – there are going to be days when you don’t live up to your own hope of the manifesto. That doesn’t mean that you throw the whole thing out. The personal manifesto has built-in grace. There is a recognition intrinsically within your PM that this is who you are becoming. Slow growth is still growth.
- Your Get to Dream (and Pray) Bigger With a Personal Manifesto
Resolutions are all about temporary changes. Lose weight, eat healthy, quit a bad habit. But a Personal Manifesto enables you to not just focus on the behavior, but on the person you are becoming, and who God wants you to be. Plus, you get to include others in your dreams, plans, and prayers.
In resolutions, you only get to set goals for yourself. In my Personal Manifesto, one line says, “I help others be world-changers.” To me, that’s a powerful reason to get out of bed and do life every day.
- Your To-Dos are Born Out of Your Personal Manifesto
Don’t think that with the Personal Manifesto you will walk aimlessly through life with no goals. Oh no. your goals, daily to-dos, and even your routines are all born out of your Personal Manifesto. In fact, you will be more focused with a Personal Manifesto than with resolutions, but the focus will not be born out of your self-will, it will spring from your heart.
Are you feeling Overwhelmed?Do you want to leave behind “out of my mind“ and move to “in control“? Me too my friends! Introducing my new book, with my co-author Cheri Gregory, Overwhelmed: Quiet the Chaos and Restore Your Sanity.
Do not go another year living under overwhelmed. 
by kathilipp | Dec 30, 2016 | Blog, Overwhelmed |
24 hours.
That’s how long the marketing experts told us to offer the special pre-order bonuses for Overwhelmed, our new book that officially releases on January 1.
“You have to create a sense of urgency! Otherwise, nobody will buy.”
We almost did what the experts said. We almost ran a high-pressure, TODAY ONLY, Cyber-Monday special.
But at the last minute, we changed our minds.
Why?
Well, for one thing, we knew that the last thing our readers needed was us pushing a our “sense of urgency” on them. (If there’s anything overwhelmed women already live with 24/7, it’s a sense of urgency!)
But more than anything, we had a feeling that our readers are just the kind of women to prove the experts wrong.
So, we said “no” to 24 hours of pressure tactics and “yes” to two full weeks of sharing the love, instead.
Your response?
You proved the experts wrong!
We’ve been totally blown away, in the best possible way.
A Gentle Reminder
In just over 24 hours, the December pre-order bonuses will expire. For each and every copy of Overwhelmed you pre-order, you get:
- The “Get Out from Overwhelmed Planner: Do Great Things, Be Less Cranky” + 7 short coaching videos by Kathi
- FIVE of our most popular book titles in ebook format from Book Shout
Getting your freebies is as easy as 1, 2, 3!
1 — Order Overwhelmed from your favorite retailer. (Out of stock right now with your favorite retailer? You can still order now and enjoy your free bonuses while you wait for your book to arrive.)
2 — Fill out this form to receive your bonuses.
3 — Check your email for your bonuses. (Be sure to check those promo or spam folders in case it gets misdirected.)
About Overwhelmed
Feeling overwhelmed? Wondering if it’s possible to move from “out of my mind” to “in control” when you’ve got too many projects on your plate and too much mess in your relationships?
Kathi and Cheri want to show you five surprising reasons why you become stressed, why social media solutions don’t often work, and how you can finally create a plan that works for you. As you identify your underlying hurts, uncover hope, and embrace practical healing, you’ll understand how to…
- trade the to-do list that controls you for a calendar that allows space in your life
- decide whose feedback to forget and whose input to invite
- replace fear of the future with peace in the present
You can simplify and savor your life—guilt free! Clutter, tasks, and relationships may overwhelm you now, but God can help you overcome with grace.
by kathilipp | Dec 27, 2016 | Overwhelmed, Podcast |
Time for a Fresh Start
Overwhelmed co-author, Cheri Gregory joins Kathi to discuss creating a “Fresh Start.” Kathi loves the idea of a “Fresh Start.” As a self-described New Year’s resolution nerd, she has made dozens of resolutions and kept none of them. Kathi and Cheri talk about how resolutions can sometimes set you up for failure. Perhaps a “Fresh Start” might be a better option. You can start it anytime and you can start over whenever needed.
Personal Manifesto
A “Fresh Start” includes a personal manifesto that helps you live out your values. When you know what your values are you can make decisions based on values and not the emotion of the moment or the whims of others. Your personal manifesto is based on who you are and who you aspire to be. It acts as a guide to determine actions and decisions. A manifesto is NOT a resolution. It is who you are and who you are going to become. It is an integrity builder. Kathi and Cheri invite you create your own manifesto. There are tools to help you and you can review their manifestos and many others, check out the download links below.
Some Things to Remember About Creating a Manifesto
- Should be written in the present but is who you aspire to be. Include some of your current positive attributes.
- It is allowed to be changed. It is not forever, it can be updated as you change and grow.
- A manifesto can be as short or long as you need it to be. If you can only think of three things, start there.
Join us again next week as we talk about how to start living out your own personal manifesto. Remember every day is a new opportunity to have a “Fresh Start” and discover who you are and who you want to become.
FREE DOWNLOAD
Creating your personal manifesto is an amazing way to pre-decide how you are going to handle certain people or situations. Check out Kathi and Cheri’s and even a few of our favorites from those that sent them in that have already read Overwhelmed.
Click here to download.
Cheri Gregory is a teacher, speaker, author, and Certified Personality Trainer. Her passion is helping women break free from destructive expectations. She writes and speaks from the conviction that “how to” works best in partnership with “heart, too.”
Cheri is the co-author, with Kathi Lipp, of The Cure for the “Perfect” Life and the upcoming Overwhelmed.
Cheri has been “wife of my youth” to Daniel, her opposite personality, for twenty-eight years and is “Mom” to Annemarie (25) and Jonathon (23), also opposite personalities.
Cheri blogs about perfectionism, people-pleasing, highly sensitive people, and hope at www.cherigregory.com.
by kathilipp | Dec 20, 2016 | Christmas, Hard Stuff, Overwhelmed, Podcast, Relationships |
People Plan Options
In this podcast, they talk about three options that can help you when it comes to pre-deciding how you will behave:
- Personal Manifesto – Creating a “personal manifesto” sets up a code of ethics that helps you pre-decide what you need and want and how to ask for it. (Kathi and Cheri’s manifesto can be viewed here)
- Acknowledgment – Acknowledge a pattern and discuss it. Perhaps the person is willing to change or you can change your reaction to their actions.
- Leave – Don’t subject yourself to disrespectful behavior.
Kathi and Cheri run through multiple scenarios to help you pre-plan your responses and help you deal with the overwhelm.
Overwhelmed: How to Quiet the Chaos and Restore Your Sanity
Our new book is NOW AVAILABLE! And only until midnight on December 31, we are offering some amazing freebies. Check out all the details here.
Have you endured the Christmas Party where someone just pushes your buttons and you want to scream? Or the family dinner where Aunt Myrtle points out all the things wrong? We all have challenging people in our lives. Sometimes we can be the challenge. This is when a people plan can help. Pre-deciding how we will behave when we are in those challenging situations helps us be the best person we can be. Kathi and Overwhelmed co-author, Cheri Gregory, discuss various situations where a “people plan” can turn challenging events into less overwhelming situations.
Free Download
Creating your personal manifesto is an amazing way to pre-decide how you are going to handle certain people or situations. Check out Kathi and Cheri’s and even a few of our favorites from those that sent them in that have already read Overwhelmed.
Cheri Gregory is a teacher, speaker, author, and Certified Personality Trainer. Her passion is helping women break free from destructive expectations. She writes and speaks from the conviction that “how to” works best in partnership with “heart, too.”
Cheri is the co-author, with Kathi Lipp, of The Cure for the “Perfect” Life and the upcoming Overwhelmed.
Cheri has been “wife of my youth” to Daniel, her opposite personality, for twenty-eight years and is “Mom” to Annemarie (25) and Jonathon (23), also opposite personalities.
Cheri blogs about perfectionism, people-pleasing, highly sensitive people, and hope at www.cherigregory.com.
by kathilipp | Dec 15, 2016 | Blog, Overwhelmed |
HURRY! For this moment ONLY, you can get in on this DEAL OF THE DECADE!! But you must act QUICKLY! No time to think about it! This offer will GO AWAY any nanosecond! Just click, swipe, share and re-tweet RIGHT NOW with 500 of your closest friends! NO ONE WANTS TO MISS OUT!!! If you buy one product you get only one product, but if you buy 27 products you get 2 baby unicorns! ABSOLUTELY FREE! And if you buy 127 products we will give you something so amazing that legally we are not allowed to divulge, but it’s pretty darn fabulous and you WON’T BELIEVE IT’S AWSOMENESS! But only if you act NOW! If you take your next breath it may be TOO LATE!!!! Supplies are LIMITED!!! YOU MUST ACT NOW!!!
Does this seem Overwhelming to you? It does to us as well. So we’re not going to go that route. You have enough people screaming at you. But we do have something to share with you that we are pretty excited about it! There’s no big hurry though. In fact, why don’t you get a cup of your favorite beverage, put your feet up, and we’ll tell you all about it. Go ahead. Don’t worry you won’t miss anything. We will be here when you return.
Got that cup? Good! Take a sip. Relax…
We know how this time of year can be crazy, busy and overwhelming. Though feeling overwhelmed is not strictly reserved for the holidays, that’s for sure! So that makes us very excited about the birth our newest book, Overwhelmed: How to Quiet the Chaos and Restore your Sanity by Kathi Lipp and Cheri Gregory coming in January.
But we want to help you ease into the season with a little more balance and organization, so we’ve bundled some gifts for you early birds! And we chose these intentionally to help you implement your less overwhelmed life now. With your order of Overwhelmed we want to give you:
– A downloadable Overwhelmed calendar/planner (Can we just tell you how awesome this planner is? We have tested many of them and this could be very well be the last planner we will ever need! It’s customizable to fit your personal needs, you print out the pages as you need them, and it incorporates the systems you will learn in Overwhelmed. This planner will get you where you need to go faster! Also included are 5 FREE teaching videos tailored to get your planner up and running and perfect for you!)
– FIVE FREE ebooks (this offer ended 12/31/16) geared to refocus your priorities to live the life you crave. People, this is $80 worth of books for F-R-E-E (and some of Kathi’s favorites handpicked for you!)
– Get Yourself Organized for Christmas
-The What’s for Dinner Solution
-The Cure for the Perfect Life
-The Get Yourself Organized Project
-The Me Project
With these tools, you will feel more on top of this season than ever before. With more peace and joy too! We bet right now you are thinking of a few friends who would love to receive these free gifts, and we want them to as well! We hate for people to miss out because an offer was for one day only, so we want to give you ample time to share with your friends and decide for yourself.
For these next two weeks, December 15-31, we will keep this offer open to you and your friends. Wow! Christmas presents after Christmas even! That’s fun! No pressure. No gimmicks. No limitations. Just a heartfelt thank you for journeying with us on the road to simplifying and savoring life!
Order your copy of Overwhelmed here. Then jump over to http://overwhelmed.website/freebies to submit your receipt and get your bonuses!
Share with your friends here.
by kathilipp | Dec 13, 2016 | Overwhelmed, Podcast |
Tips for Surviving Survival Mode
No micro-managing! It doesn’t matter if you use pink or purple napkins, you don’t have time to worry about the little things.
It is not going to look pretty. We can’t control everything. Sometimes having things done is better than perfect or the way you would have done it.
We choose to take care of ourselves. Just like on an airplane, put your lifesaving oxygen mask on first so you can help others. If you don’t take care of yourself, you won’t be able to be there for others.
We ask others for help and trust them to get the job done. Let others help you. Just let it go and trust it will be taken care of.
When it’s all just too much, and things still have to get done, you have to just get in the boat! This is not a daily way to live but we all have these times of crisis where we go into survival mode.
Kathi and Overwhelmed co-author, Cheri Gregory discuss tips to help you get through when you have no choice but to kick into survival mode. When you have to narrow your focus and just “Get on the boat” you need permission, strategy and care for yourself! Take the time to listen in and be ready to tackle that next survival mode moment.
From the ends of the earth, I cry to you for help when my heart is overwhelmed. Lead me to the towering rock of safety, for you are my safe refuge, a fortress where my enemies cannot reach me. Psalms 61:2-3 NLT
by kathilipp | Dec 6, 2016 | Overwhelmed, Podcast |
Building a team can be a game changer. Whether it is a family team, a volunteer team, a job team or your own business, learning how to lead and manage a team makes a huge difference. Building a team sets you free to work on the things that only YOU can do. We all need help and building a team provides the help you need in an organized fashion that builds up everyone involved in the team.
Kathi and Overwhelm co-author, Cheri Gregory discuss 4 way to build your team.
- Reciprocal Help – What is overwhelming to you is not overwhelm for someone else. When you trade your talents, everyone uses their talents.
- Interns – Offering training and other perks in return for work is a win/win for all involved if you have the right person in the position. Your kids can be considered interns. You are training them to not need you! You want them to be able to take care of themselves.
- Paid Help – Everyone says they can’t afford paid help but it can actually save you money. It frees you up to work on the most important things. Paid help can be a babysitter, housecleaner, virtual assistant or groundskeeper, etc.
- Cooperative Help – Divide the work. It can be divided between family members, partners, etc.
Listen in and learn how building a team has helped Kathi and Cheri overcome the overwhelm of running a business.
Cheri Gregory is a teacher, speaker, author, and Certified Personality Trainer. Her passion is helping women break free from destructive expectations. She writes and speaks from the conviction that “how to” works best in partnership with “heart, too.”
Cheri is the co-author, with Kathi Lipp, of The Cure for the “Perfect” Life and the upcoming Overwhelmed.
Cheri has been “wife of my youth” to Daniel, her opposite personality, for twenty-eight years and is “Mom” to Annemarie (25) and Jonathon (23), also opposite personalities.
Cheri blogs about perfectionism, people-pleasing, highly sensitive people, and hope at www.cherigregory.com.
