Hey there Evolutionary Entrepreneurs! You’re reading my 2x weekly newsletter where I share actionable tips on business, mindset, and creating leverage so you can build a profitable coaching business doing what you love and sharing your dharma.

Welcome to the weekly Deep Dive!

This has been a popular quote circling the internet since James first said it in his book, Atomic Habits.

While there’s some truth to it, I don’t fully agree!

I believe we’re complex and dynamic beings. And speaking to our whole self in absolutes can be limiting.

I believe you DO rise to the level of your goals. AND you DO fall to the level of systems. It depends on which part of you that you’re speaking to.

More on this shortly.

If you’re new here and missed the previous 3 parts of the series, I recommend going back and binge-reading them. Trust me, it’ll be way more worthwhile than binging Netflix.

We talked about stabilizing noise and pressure, getting clear on your 3-Year and 1-Year goals, and then strategically creating an actionable and operational quarterly plan.

Today, I’ll show you how to redesign your Personal OS (operating system) to create unstoppable momentum week after week.

Today At A Glance:

• Goals and Systems

• Design your Ideal Week Map

• Weekly Planning System

• Daily Planning System

• Daily Review System

• Weekly Review System

• Build your Personal OS

Goals and Systems

As I was saying, I believe you DO rise to the level of your goals. AND you DO fall to the level of systems.

It depends on which part of you that you’re speaking to.

Your conscious self will rise to the level of your goals when you’re clear on your desired outcome, clear on who you need to BE to achieve the goal, and strategically clear on how you’re working towards it.

Your unconscious self, however, will fall to the level of your systems because it is designed to habitually operate based on programming.

So that’s why we’ve been redesigning and rebuilding systems in our business and life for both parts, our conscious and unconscious self, in this Momentum Series.

We’ve gotten clear on your long-term vision and bridged it back to the short-term operational plan, creating a Domino Effect of momentum.

With a clear outcome and clear plan, your conscious self can rise to the level of your goals.

Now we need to redesign your systems so that when your unconscious self falls, and it will, it’ll default to a standard of excellence that’s still in service of the goals you’re aiming for.

Study successful people and you’ll see this bridge between their conscious and unconscious self.

They have a clear vision of what they want and who they need to be to achieve it. And then they reprogram their unconscious behavior so that success feels natural to them. Success is practically automatic for them.

Pro athletes have mastered the art of this as well.

Where most entrepreneurs struggle is their unconscious behaviors are not reprogrammed to match the goals they’re trying to achieve.

So how do we reprogram our unconscious behaviors?

We redesign and upgrade the systems that our unconscious self falls to.

I’ll show you where to start.

Design your Ideal Week Map

Optimizing your Personal OS is all about optimizing how you manage your:

• Time

• Energy

• Attention

Now that you’ve created your 3-year Vision, 1-Year Goals, and Quarterly Plan, a good place to start is redesigning your Week for momentum.

You do this by designing your Ideal Week Map - what a momentum-generating week looks and feels like.

I say IDEAL week because not every week will happen exactly as you plan. But having a clear picture of what an ideal week looks like keeps you as closely aligned to it as possible.

When something is off, you’ll know why. When something is working, you’ll know why.

Here’s how to design your Ideal Week Map:

Step 1: Download my Ideal Week Mapping Template

Go to File and Make A Copy to duplicate the template.

Step 2: Start to map your Ideal Week

The first tab is an example. Go to the ‘BLANK TEMPLATE’ tab to build your own.

Create color-coded time blocks for the 4 main types of activities:

• Deep Work - for working on your Quarterly Objectives

• Rest & Recovery - to regulate the noise and pressure

• Management - daily operations, meetings, admin work

• Personal - for ****family time, eating, social and hobbies

Organize your time blocks to optimize for Energy, not for Time.

• Schedule your Personal time first (prioritize YOU)

• Schedule your Deep Work, then Management work

• Build in Rest & Recovery to elevate your energy

Plan AND be willing to adapt and redesign for each season of your life and business.

Step 3: Transfer your Ideal Week Map into your Calendar

I use this as a guiding map to organize my tasks and activities throughout the week.

I always notice that the weeks I feel off are the weeks I fall out of alignment with my Ideal Week Map.

This process is simple, but when done right, will help create unstoppable momentum.

Next step is to design your Weekly and Daily Planning System to keep you on track toward your Quarterly Objectives.

Weekly Planning System

Schedule a 30 min Weekly Planning session at the beginning of your work week.

Yup, time block this into your Ideal Week Map.

In this Weekly Planning session, you’ll plan your Weekly Commitments:

• List out: What CAN I do this week to move towards my Quarterly Objectives?

• Rate them: from most to least important, “1” being most important and impactful.

• Commit: What WILL I do this week to move towards my Quarterly Objectives?

• These are your Weekly Commitments.

What doesn’t make your Weekly Commitments list is now considered “Noise” for this week. It may be prioritized at a future week, but this week, it’s a distraction.

Your Weekly Commitments will now help drive your Daily Planning each day this week.

Daily Planning System

Schedule a 15 min Daily Planning session at the beginning of your work days.

Again, time block these into your Ideal Week Map.

In these sessions, you look at your Weekly Commitments and decide on your Top 3 Priorities for the day.

Write down:

• What’s my Intention for today?

  • This is not your To Do list. To Do’s are what you’re doing, Intentions are how you’re going to show up.

• Where is my Energy Level at today?

  • Am I holding onto anything that’s preventing momentum?

  • If so, what can I do to offload this?

• What are my To-Do’s? List out everything (tasks, meetings, activities)

• What are my Top 3 Priorities?

Everything else on your To-Do List is “noise”. Either delegate them, or let them come secondary to your Top 3.

Time block your Top 3 into your calendar.

Daily Review System

Schedule a 15 min Daily Review session at the end of your work days.

In these sessions, you reflect on and write down:

• What am I grateful for

• What are my wins today

• What was left (undone, unsaid, unfelt, unowned)

Do NOT skip your daily reviews.

Momentum is generated by a series of forward-moving cycles.

Reviews provide feedback and potential energy for Planning. Planning sets and resets the direction forward.

Weekly Review System

Schedule a 30 min Weekly Review session at the end of your work weeks.

In these sessions, you reflect on your week and write down:

• What went well this week?

  • What did I move forward or overcome

  • What created momentum

  • What are my wins

• What lessons did I learn?

• Where do I need support?

  • Where am I feeling constraint and friction

  • What’s slowing me down or disrupting momentum

  • What are the roadblocks

  • What help do I need

  • Who can help me

Again, reviews complete the cycle and provide feedback for forward momentum.

Build your Personal OS

If you followed all the steps above, by now you’ll have a pretty solid system for creating momentum week after week.

The next step is to bring all this into one system to easily track and manage your time and energy each week.

• Option 1: you get a planner or notebook and do this the old-school way with pen to paper.

• Option 2: you take it online with a digital notebook, even Google Docs can work. Here’s a template if you want it.

• Option 3: you get real nerdy with systems, like me, and build a tool for it.

I like Airtable and have built a Personal OS system on it for myself. I’ve shared it with my coaching clients and now I will be giving it away to the founding members of my new membership community that’s launching soon.

If you want it, get on the waitlist for the community.

Here’s what the Personal OS dashboard looks like…

One system where I can see my Quarterly OKRs.

And my Momentum Planner where I log and track my Weekly Planning and Reviews.

Same with my Daily Planning and Reviews.

Even my Vision, Values, and Goals.

One system that keeps everything visible and top of mind for my conscious self to stay aligned to the bigger picture and short term focus.

And designed to reprogram my unconscious self to behaviors for momentum and success.

You rise to the level of your goals AND you fall to the level of your systems.

In the next and final part of the Momentum Series, we’ll be talking about the most overlooked part of creating momentum - measuring your metrics.

Onwards!

Your Pal,

Colin

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