Listen to this video and learn about the 4 F's and why you should do nothing that does not meet this criteria.

[00:00:02] OK. Hi it's Kathryn Watson with Marketing Your Care. And I'm here live today on this fabulous Friday, gloomy outside here in Houston But that's OK. We'll take it, right? It's not raining,at least not yet. Probably will be tomorrow.

But I'm here to talk about being overwhelmed.

And it's something that I think affects everybody from time to time. Some of us more than others. We all deal with it in different ways.

What you think is causing your overwhelm? How you deal with that?

I want to explore some different ways and different things that you can do. I know a lot of people that are working for themselves feel a lot of pressure and overwhelm. Because they feel like they wear so many hats and they've got to do everything. And they've got to do everything perfect. And I'm here to tell you it's OK to hire somebody to do some of it. It's ok to let go of some of the control.

Marketers Who work For Someone Else

And it's no different if you're working for somebody else. A lot of us that are high achievers ,especially marketers, we want to do good in the world. We,the people who follow me mostly, are people in what I call "helping professions". They try to. They want to help everybody. And so we try to do everything and be everything for everybody. And I think that's what really leads to our overwhelm.

One More Thing

[00:01:45] And now with social media it's just one more thing right. One more thing that we have to add to our plate that we have to do. So we've got to do all the outside stuff that we're normally doing with marketing our businesses. And now we've got to do all this stuff online too. And where do you find the hours in the day. How do you do it. And it's frustrating. And it can lead to a lot of feelings of overwhelm. Then you get in that overwhelmed feeling and I think most of you will agree.

[00:02:18] And if you're listening to this program just let me know what your thoughts are on this. But my experience with it is when I get in that overwhelmed feeling I'm just not as productive.

[00:02:33] My thought processes don't work as good. I'm not as quick. I seem to bounce from one thing to the other trying to get it all done. And nothing ends up getting done really well or the way I would like it to.

[00:02:49] So I have learned over the years that I have to step back. Just like a painter you know when when somebody is painting and they're painting and they're painting, a lot of times they'll step back to look at their work and then they'll go back to the painting again. And just like that sometimes we have to step back and look at what we're doing. Look at the reasons behind what we're doing .What do we really really want.

[00:03:21] And if you haven't sat down yet and written down your goals for the year,your your vision for the year- what you want to achieve. But more importantly "what you want to experience"- "what you want to feel" and "how you want to show up in this world this year!" If you haven't done that I highly HIGHLY suggest doing that on a rainy day tomorrow.

[00:03:47] Perfect time to do it. If you do vision boards. If you've ever done a vision board that's a great way to do it. Put all of your thoughts into pictures. All of your ideas. What you want and make a picture of how you want your life to really look. And really give it some thought. Don't just think about your business. Think about everything in your life. Think about your family. Think about yourself. Your physical self. How you want to feel.

If you want to be fit. If you want to get more fit this year and that's really a goal and that's important to you. Put it on your board. And then put it in a place where you see it every single day. So whether you do a vision board or maybe you're the type of person that likes to do a list, sit down. It will only take a couple of hours. That's all.

It's going to take just a couple of hours. This weekend do that. And I guarantee you it's going to help you move forward better with less overwhelm because any time you start getting a little sidetracked and we do don't we? We get sidetracked. You'll be able to come back to where you want to be.

[00:05:11] So if your goal is to be physically fit and you really really really want that goal this year. But you keep finding all these other things that you have to do. And you got to help your friend over here and you've got to work some extra hours to do this, and you never can fit in the time to go for a walk or go to the gym. You're not going to reach that goal. And you're going to feel frustrated. And you're going to feel overwhelmed and you're going to feel unfulfilled.

I'm going to tell you about the 4 F's that I put on my vision board a few years ago. Every year I put my 4 F's on there and I got it from a good friend of mine. JULIE BROWN. She said I don't do anything in life that doesn't fit into the 4 F's.

So here we go. The 1st of the 4 F's it's got to be fun because life is way too short not to have fun right?

#2 It's got to be financially lucrative. I've got to make a living. You know if I just help people all day long and I'm not making any money I'm not going to feel very good about myself at the end of the day and I'm not going to be able to help my family the way I want to.

[00:06:38] So it's got to be Fun.

[00:06:43] And it's got to be Financially Lucrative.

[00:06:47] And it's gotta be Flexible and I want the flexibility in my life. I'm at a stage in my life where I I want flexibility. A few years ago my husband and I were caring for his mother.

[00:06:59] We had to have flexibility. We had to have it. It was critical in our lives because we didn't know what was going to happen tomorrow. We needed to be able to jump and run as she needed us to. So we needed that flexibility.

Now she's gone but I have grand babies that live in El Paso and I want to spend time with them. I need that flexibility so that's important for me. Flexibility can look different for everybody. You have to see how it shows up and looks for you.

OK so we've got 3.

We've got it's got to be Fun.

It's got to be financially lucrative

and it's got to be flexible. Those are three criteria.

But the fourth one the Fourth F is probably to me the most important criteria. Because if I don't get the Fourth F none of the other stuff matters. And I'm guessing it's probably going to be pretty much the same for you guys.

The Fourth F is Fulfillment. I've gotta feel fulfilled. I've got to know that I've made a difference. I've got to know that I've helped someone.

So please help me with that by putting some comments below and letting me know that you heard this message. And if it was helpful ,if it wasn't that's OK you can post that to tell me what you're thinking. Tell me what causes you overwhelm. Tell me how we can help one another to get over this overwhelmed feeling. So the 4 F's.

Make The Time

[00:08:45] So this weekend I really urge you take the time. Like I said it's going to be a nasty, rainy day, probably on Saturday. What better day to do your vision board or to do a list. Or goal setting, how ever you do it. It's ok, it doesn't matter how you do it.

[00:09:08] Just do it. OK just do it. I love that Nike commercial. Always use their words. Just do it. It's so true. Now when it comes to your business the key to having a successful business that doesn't feel overwhelming all the time is having a plan. Having a strategy. If you don't have a strategy for your marketing efforts it will get overwhelming really really fast.

There Is Much To Do

[00:09:44] There are so many things that you can be doing marketing wise. You can go to outside networking events. You can call people on the phone. You can email people. You can go and make face to face visits with business prospects and clients. You can do events. You can get on Facebook, you can get on LinkedIn. You can get on Twitter. You can get on Instagram. I mean, I could go on and on and on. And it is overwhelming.

[00:10:13] So take the time to make a clear strategy. And have your strategy mapped out. At least a quarter in advance, for at least the next three months. Have your strategy mapped out. Know what you're going to do.

You Will Get Sidetracked

Yes there will be days when things happen and you get sidetracked and you start going down this road over here. But if you have a plan, you'll be able to look at that plan and say wait a minute. I'm going down the wrong road. Let me detour back and come back to where I need to be. Come back. And get on the right road. This road is leading me towards my success.

[00:11:06] So hopefully a few of these ideas will help you to eliminate some of the overwhelm that you have been feeling.

[00:11:19] I'm going to be posting live videos like this from time to time but I need your help. I need you to make comments below(on Facebook) to let me know what's working for you what's not working for you how I can help. How can I be of service if I don't hear from you? I don't really know what it is you need. And how I can best serve and best help you? So make your comments below. Tell me what you need and I'll try to deliver as best I can.

So this is Kathryn Watson with Marketing Your Care and I'm going to sign out now. Hope you have a wonderful Friday know a fabulous fantastic fabulous Friday.

[00:12:08] All right. Have a good one. Bye bye.