Ep #86: How to Create Your Ideal Workday

Episode 86, How to Create Your Ideal Workday.

Welcome to Clinicians Creating Impact, a show for physical therapists, occupational therapists, and speech-language pathologists looking to take the next step in their careers and make a real difference in the lives of their clients. If you’re looking to improve the lives of neurodiverse children and families with neurological-based challenges, grow your own business, or simply show up to help clients, this is the show for you.

I’m Heather Branscombe, Therapist, Certified Coach, Clinical Director, and Owner of Abilities Neurological Rehabilitation. I have over 25 years of experience in both the public and private sectors, and I’m here to help you become the therapist you want to be, supporting people to work towards their dreams and live their best lives. You ready to dive in? Let’s go.

Hi there, friend. I hope you’re doing well today. If you’re listening to this when the episode first comes out, I’m projecting into the future, I’m actually going to be coming back from vacation. And I am so super excited about it. So in anticipation of that, I’m actually recording two episodes this week before I go away so that I can have one ready for you when I get back.

And as I reflected on what I thought could actually be helpful for you, I’m really excited to share an exercise I actually do pretty often to make my own work that much more fun to me, and I think it could work for you as well.

Now, if you are drowning in your to-do list right now, and maybe that’s the reason that you’ve come to this ideal workday, I’d actually recommend listening to the episode that just came out the week before. That is episode 85, How to Make Your To-Do List Easier, because that one describes one of the tools that I use to make the details of my workday that much better.

But today, however, I want to share a tool that I use to think about how I want to make work better from a much bigger, and maybe even bolder perspective. Before I share this tool, I know so many of you know this, but I just want to share this podcast is a passion project of mine because I really do want all clinicians to have the ability to use these kinds of tool sets and tips as a way to magnify their impact, even if they never work with us at Abilities or alongside us as well.

And I want to do that because I love sharing these tools and information. I love the idea that this could make your job easier, because I know as we do that, that will help you to make a bigger impact for yourself and for the clients that you’re working with. So you can help me to do that by helping to spread the message.

You can do that specifically in a couple of ways. One, I’d ask you if you could follow, rate, and review this podcast wherever you listen to it. What that does is it helps feed the algorithm so that when a clinician is searching for information just like this, this podcast will come up for them. And then second, and actually even more importantly, if you could share this podcast or a favorite episode with a specific colleague that you know and think could benefit, that would be amazing.

If you’ve heard this before and you meant to do it and you haven’t done it, totally okay. Let this be the sign. Think of who you want, think of the episode and just send it to them with a little note. That’s really the way that you can help other clinicians.

If this is your first episode though, again, welcome. Thank you so much for listening. And hopefully as you listen, you can decide who of your clinical friends would love to hear more of this kind of information to help them at work as well. Thank you so much in advance for your action here. And with that, let’s get back to the episode.

So one tool that I really love to use to think about where I want to go next in my work is to really think deeply about my ideal work day. Because often when we think about goals at work, we think about things in maybe sometimes almost like a vacuum, like compensation, gaining specific clinical skills, or maybe more detailed goals.

Now, I do like some of that kind of goal-setting as well. But I really like the idea of my ideal work day because it helps to see how things like compensation specific skills or other kinds of detailed goals will or won’t affect my day to day work experience. Again, sometimes with the goals, we think, okay, if we achieve this, then life will magically be better. And I know so many of you are goal oriented, and you probably already know this kind of intuitively, you set the goal, and maybe you’re excited for a second or two, and then there’s this like void.

So we want to make sure that the goals that you’re setting actually really impact your day to day work. So when we often think about the outcomes, and less about the experience that we’re going to have while getting it, or again, what it’s going to be like when we achieve those goals, that’s where we’re missing the mark. So this is going to help us on this bigger level.

So if you’re interested and willing to use this tool, I’d like you to take some time right now and do this by going through this series of questions. So what we want to do is you want to think about a typical day in your ideal life. This is not a special occasion day, this is not a vacation day, not a weekend day, but it is an average, ordinary work day for you.

So I want you to think about that in your own virtual calendar and think about how far out this day is. I’d like to suggest you pick a time that’s somewhere between five to 10 years out from when you’re doing this right now. And I say that because it gives you the time that’s far enough that it feels easy to dream, but not so far that it’s hard to be more specific about some of the circumstances that would actually be ideal for you.

So pick a time five to 10 years from now and think about this. Again, this is your fantasy. Anything is possible in this, so don’t feel bound to your current circumstances. And I really want you to actually visualize it more than just think about the actual details. So the more you can picture it in your mind, the more successful it’s going to be.

So what you’re going to be doing is to describe what you see actually in your mind’s eye, and you’re going to describe it as you see it. So let’s begin with thinking about you on a typical work day in the future. So thinking about you arriving at your work. You’re arriving at your work, a typical day somewhere five to 10 years in the future, you’ve decided on that day.

What do you notice about when you arrive to work? Take a moment. Where are you? What time is it in the day? What are you hearing? What are you feeling in your body? Do you smell anything? When you look down, what do you notice that you’re wearing? And who is there with you? These are some amazing things to just picture, again, in your mind’s eye. And then if you can take a moment, if you want to, you can jot that down as well.

Then I want you to notice what do you do next when you arrive at work? Again, what time is that? What does the environment look like? Is anyone else there? What do you hear? What do you feel? And what else do you notice? Think about these things using as many senses as you can.

And then once you’ve decided that, ask yourself or answer this question, what do you do next? And when you see what you’re doing next, notice again what time is it? What does the environment look like? Who else is there? What are you hearing? What are you feeling? Do you smell anything? What do you notice about yourself? Notice those things.

And I’d invite you to do that, to ask that question, “what do you do next?” And describe that in as much vivid detail as possible using all of your sentences until you get to the end of your workday. And then once you get to the end of that workday, how do you feel at the end of the day?

So what you’ll notice as you do that is you’ll find these really interesting pictures that are coming up. Some of them will seem really familiar and will make sense. And maybe some of them might not make sense. Some of them may feel fantastical, that’s amazing. This is not about being realistic, this is not a smart goal that we’re doing here, this is your ideal fantasy workday.

And once you have that, what I would notice is just either revise that in your mind or take a look at the notes if you’ve taken some notes. And as you reflect on the description of the ideal workday sometime in the future, what stands out for you? And what aspects of your ideal work life are you actually already living?

What I really like about this and really looking at this as part of the tool is it can really help you to see what you’re actually doing now that can be part of your ideal workday in the future. And then it also gives some insights on maybe some of the goals that might not have been as normally important. It might not be about compensation or clinical skills.

Just notice the things that your brain is offering you about what’s really important to you in your ideal workday. And then it can help you to see what you actually enjoy about work, which may or may not be about compensation, clinical skills, or something else.

So give that a try and let me know how it goes. Again, yes, I’m busy. Aren’t we all busy? Of course we’re busy, but I tell you, this is my passion project and I am never too busy to chat with you. So feel free to email me, heather@abilitiesrehabilitation.com and let’s continue the conversation offline. With that, I hope you have an amazing rest of your week and I’ll talk to you soon. Take care.

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Thanks for joining me this week on the Clinicians Creating Impact podcast. Want to learn more about the work I’m doing with Abilities Rehabilitation? Head on over to abilitiesrehabilitation.com. See you next week.