#290: How to Plan Effectively with Kristy Gayton, CEO of Start Planner

Hey, it's episode number 290. Holy smokes. How did we get to 290? You guys are awesome. Thanks for sticking around.

Hey.

Today's episode is with my friend Christy Dickerson, the founder of the Start Planner. So if you are a productivity and a planner nerd, just like I am, get ready. This one is definitely worth a listen. Let's talk about your business strategy and the juicy details of what actually works, from mainstream fashion to fashion on Main street and the entire ecosystem behind it. How do we scale your company and do it with the balance and the happiness that we all seek? Let's hear from those insiders, experts, and strategists that actually make it happen. I'm your host, Ashley Alderson from the Boutique Hub, and I can't wait to chat.

So, earlier this year, I feel like.

Our stars aligned when I had the opportunity to digitally meet my friend Christy Dickerson, who's the founder of the Start Planner. You may have seen her line of planners or heard her podcast. She's an entrepreneur, a productivity expert, a podcaster, educator, finance nerd, dreamer, overachiever, lover of design, among many things. She is a woman who means business and who also knows planning and productivity. It isn't about being a Pinterest mom. It isn't about perfection. It isn't about making. Making sure your New Year's resolutions are absolutely perfect and you never deviate from that plan for the rest of the year. In fact, the more I got to meet Christie, the more I. I loved her spirit because she's someone who loves planning and productivity and all the things that I know you and I are both into. But at the same time, it's not about perfection. It's about planning in the chaos and making that chaos work for you. Because it's the beautiful thing that's called your life, right? No one's life is perfect. And I think that is this oblivious lie we're told on social media every single day, and that somehow a planner is going to make it all perfect. And really, that's not what it's about at all. It's about doing your best to stay on track with the goals that you found for yourself. But after living through 2020, we know that sometimes a pivot may be the best deviation possible from our intended path. So today, I'm really excited to share this conversation with you because it's an honest conversation about what life is really like and what planning is really like. And also, we're going to set you up with some productivity tools that if you're someone who needs some structure and who needs a great way to set goals and to set up your week for success, Christy is definitely someone who understands that. So from one planner nerd to another, we're going to go down some rabbit holes in this conversation. If you haven't already had a chance to meet Christy, definitely follow up in the show notes after this podcast. Listen to her podcast as well. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to guest on her show as well this year, but check it out and if you don't already have a Boutique Boss Planner, you may also love a Start Planner. It's actually one of the very first planners I ever purchased and I think the brand is an awesome opportunity for all of us to stay more organized at home or in business. Now, you guys know our motto at the Boutique Hub is community over competition, right? It's about coming together with others that are just like you, that share interest and to provide tools to those that you serve in terms of whatever may fit them best. So I hope this is a great example for you guys to find others that are in community with you like you. Just like Christie is for me, someone who is a planner nerd and a planner junkie so we can come together and share our best tips for you. Now, guys, meet my friend Christy. I hope you love this podcast and don't forget to take a picture and let us know what you're doing while you listen and shoot it to us over on the gram. I hope you enjoy. Alright. Hey guys, welcome back to the show this week. I am so excited. If you have a notebook handy and you like productivity and getting things done in the new year, this is definitely the episode for you. Christy, thanks so much for coming on the show today.

Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited for this conversation.

I feel like we are about to be two planner nerds nerding out on getting things done. Sound good?

It sounds really good. We both know that a plan is how you get somewhere if you're wanting to get somewhere. So I'm excited to have this conversation and to leave some inspiration for everyone.

I love it. You know, the Start Planner was probably one of the very first planners I bought, man. Probably like seven years ago. So to see like your brain compartmentalize all the different areas of your life that you can be more productive in, more healthy, save time, energy, all of that, I'm all about it. So let me start here. What is as you're going into the new year and everyone has New Year's resolutions that they start and fail and start and fail. What's your best tip for getting your New Year's resolutions right?

Well, first, I want to back up and say the evolution of our planner has completely been refined and grown, and I think it's been through seasons of growth and realizing different things that we did need. And I think that's kind of a really big point that I want to make, because I think we also have to realize that for ourselves, that a lot of times the things that we're doing, it's not us that needs to be changed. Like, we are perfect and we're designed for something. But a lot of times our habits or our strategies for success needs to be tweaked. And it even can be an extreme in one way, meaning I am someone that is very driven and can hustle and can sacrifice and not sleep and do all those things. And that has consequences, too. So our star system has really been a cohesive system that helps you to align and balance, to have success. And we all define success differently. So I just wanted to make that point before I dive into answering your question, because I think a lot of times we have these expectations for ourselves, and we beat ourselves up for not hitting those expectations. What's exciting about the beginning of the year? It's kind of a fresh slate. It is the beginning of a year. It is a time where you can kind of let go, clean house. And so when talking about, I hate the word, like, beginning of the year, like, set goals and intentions, that is a huge time of the year to do it. But it's something that we should be doing all the time. Like, we're either growing or we're dying. So we always should be pushing growth, be pushing to have strategies for being better in multiple different areas of our lives. And it's hard. Life's hard. Like, we all have a lot that we have to juggle. So coming up with a plan and coming up with strategies for each of your goals is important. And I think that's where you should start.

I love it when you see people use your start system and they sit down. The beginning of the year is always kind of that marker. But you're right. We've got to do this all year long. What do you think is the best way to dive into creating intention for the new year and starting to lay out that plan? That's a great question.

And I actually think it's the reverse of maybe what most people think. And it's actually resting. It's actually taking a second to reflect. And we all get so busy, and a lot of times in that busy, we don't even. There's just noise and we don't even really know what we want. We're just having people tell us what we want or what we should do. So I think just taking some time and space for yourself to really reflect and recharge and map out, like, what is my vision? Like, where do I want to go? What does success look like for me and you guys that can change. Like, there's been seasons of my life, I look back and success for me, I valued being significant and having certainty in my life. And now success for me is I value love. And love is not just loving another person, loving what I do, loving other people, loving. There's just so much. So love is a big thing for me. So when I measure my success, that is a way to measure that success. It's not looking at external things. I think a lot of, unfortunately, in this day and age, like a lot of us look for external things for success, like the keeping up with the Joneses or the social media, the comparison and all of that. And I really want to encourage all of you guys to not do that, to not fall into that and to really just take some time as you're outlining your goals and your visions and what you want, take some time to yourself. And maybe even once you have that time to yourself, get with different people and subsections of your life life, which I like to call accountability partners or someone that will just help you see your blind spots. There's so much power to having someone else to hold you accountable or a coach or a mentor that can push you beyond your own needs, but then also see blind spots that you don't necessarily see for yourself. And then you come up with strategies to make sure those things happen. And so it's not just you have to gain this momentum, you have to want to do this thing. If it's health, you have to want to be healthy. You have to know that you have to get that sleep. Health is not just physical health. When I say health, it's spiritual and mental, emotionally. All of that ties together so that you're not just starting it, you're gaining this momentum and you keep doing it day after day after day. These habits that maybe we currently have, we look at those habits and we change strategies and their approaches so. So that we are heading in the direction towards our success and towards our alignment.

I love that. So it's not just the start of the system and getting with the person that can see your blind spots, but it's keeping momentum with that system. How do you recommend people follow up on those goals and what they reviewed at the beginning of the year with that accountability partner, what does that look like for months and quarters down the road?

So I actually, I like looking at a vision long term for a year or five years or 10 years. I think that's important right in our lives are important. But I really feel like planning, the act of like planning business, planning financials, planning big things, really, a lot of times can only be done a quarter at a time. And I think that the year that we just went through kind of taught us that, right? Like we don't quite know and we have to have the ability to pivot. So I like to say sitting down at a quarter at a time, you're planning out your financials, what are you going to be doing to rest and recharge? Which means, is there any vacations in there? What are your home projects? What are your strategies for your success and your relationships that are important in your life? What is your strategies for your health? And again, I talked about physical body health, and then also your spiritual, emotional, your mental health. So I like planning out a strategy around those 90 days at a time. I feel like that's quantitative. It's right in front of us and we can touch it, see it, and be able to go after it. But then every single month, I assess those months, I vision out those months, I time block out, and I always set projections for finances for a quarter. But then every single month, you're dialing those in, and so you're setting those projections and then you're saying the actual same thing with your goals. You're setting these goals, but then you're dialing them in. So every single month, and then every week, you guys, we sit down and we make a list for the week. And our list, our to do list, like, I think that a lot of people need to audit their to do list and then they need to audit their schedules. Our planners are set up in a very specific format. And the reason being is it's the things that we do every single day. It's those small things that actually add up to making those goals or the direction of our life head in the direction that we want. And when I say I'm saying this, I'm saying this from experience because I have had to audit my own schedule. I used to wake up, jump right into my to do list, like, try to get after it. But then I realized I had, I was burning out, I was reaching burnout points or I'd wake up and I had a really bad day. We all have good days and bad days. We all have more productive days and not. And ultimately where we thrive is when we see some sort of progress. So our planners are set up to help us to thrive. So just to talk about a day perspective, every single day, I'm all about priming your body for being productive. So instead of just jumping into that to do list, you're waking up. I'm Christian based, so I like to wake up with scripture. But it's quote scripture, whatever your spiritual calling may be, but it's getting its mindset work before doing that productivity. So then the next thing I like to do is gratitude. So you're either in a fear of being grateful or you're in a state. I'm sorry, you're either in a state of being grateful or you're in a state of being fearful. You really can't be both. And when you're in a state of fear, typically you don't operate the same as being a state of gratitude. So I like to list out three things that I'm grateful for. And it could be like I have running water in my kitchen, I just did kitchen renovations. It could be small things, big things, whatever it is. But again, it's that mindset work. And then you're already listing out your to do list from the day before, or you're building that prioritized to do list, you're finalizing it and you're then working through that list. And then at the bottom of our pages we have an entire section on self care, which is tracking your water, planning out what you're going to be eating, what are your vitamin supplements are you working out. And it's also weird things. Not weird, but very intentional things that are also important is like tracking your sleep. Also what is your energy level for that day? Tracking your energy level. And then what are you going to be growing that day? So I'm big on 30 minutes a day of growing. And that could be reading, it could be podcast, it could be for different things. But I really feel like when we're in a state of growth is when we are in our peak state to be like the best version of ourselves. And then on the right side of the pages or depending on if you're a weekly planner or a daily. But I'm big on time blocking out your day. I'm very efficient with technology. I'm all about zooms and I Calendars and all those things. But for me, I am someone that needs to vision out my day. I time block out my day very specifically and I put like minded things together to be efficient as possible. And also so that I'm being the energy that I need to be on all these different things and making sure I'm resting and staying balanced and alignment. And I just think there's so much power in pen to paper. It's been proven as far as retention, it's been proven as far as vision out. So I feel like pen and paper is just the way to go. So that is basically in a NutShell why our start system is set up the way that it is. Because it's all about our energy. It really backs into that whatever we do, the quality of energy that we bring to do it, whether we're at the gym and we're halfway at the gym or at home and we're like halfway at home and still trying to finish up work or all those different things. It's the quality of what we do. So a lot of things that are in the star system are really just to kind of grade ourselves mentally and to check ourselves like sleep. If we're having a week that we didn't get much done, you can start looking at these patterns like, was I not sleeping? What did my schedule look like? Is there some things on my schedule I maybe shouldn't have on my schedule or things on my to do list that don't back into my goals? Is there some boundaries I need to be put in place? Is there some things that I'm saying yes to that I need to say no to? So I think a lot of it too is just growth. It really helps us to be self aware and to grow our own personal selves because we're all on different journeys and we all have different needs and schedules.

I appreciate that. I feel like there's this misconception out there that life is a zero sum game. Like if you're 80% focused on being a great business owner, that means some other area of your life is going to suffer down to 20%. You know what I mean? Like if you're great at business, it's going to suffer at home. But I don't think life is that way. I think when you're committed to personal greatness or you know, improving yourself in all these different areas, a rising tide lifts all ships. How do you do that? Do you view like when you start to really focus on greatness in one area that it really spills over to.

Others, So, so you're talking to the author of Start balancing. So talking about this thing, it's like balance is something that I think is hard for us all. It's a common topic, but I've had someone explain it to me like this and I think that this will kind of answer your question. A lot of times people view balance as a pie chart, right? A lot of big people that speak in this area in development, they view it as a pie chart making sure it's equal or equal balanced or equal things. And here's the thing is I like to say it's all as spinning plates. And the plate that you must spin is yourself. Alright? So imagine a plate, you're throwing it up in the air and you're spinning it that plate, that is self care, that is yourself, which is embodying growth, yourself, taking care of your health, getting enough sleep, doing things that you like, like balancing yourself. That plate is essential. All right, so then that's putting you in your peak optimal state. Then that fills into another plate that's spinning, that it's work, professional or mission. Right. And there's another plate that's spinning. That's your home life, your relationships, your kids. There's another plate that's spinning, that's your contributing and you're giving back. There's another plate. So imagine all these plates spinning, right? So what you have to figure out is I got to keep my self care plate spinning, but then I gotta have to start to bounce to all these different things so that I don't get like one doesn't get depleted, Right. And here's the thing, not everyone's plates spin the same, not everyone's plates need to spin the same. But I do feel like that self care plate should be everyone's focus. And it's usually what we do last, we self sacrifice to make sure our family's taken care of. Yeah. And what ends up happening is we start suffering and then our relationships start suffering, right? Yep. So I like to look at it in that angle. Because balance, there's no such thing as like perfect balance or alignment. It's constant growth, constant pivoting, constant learning to spin those plates and different seasons of our life, you know, depending on what's internally happening in our world and externally happening in our worlds with our own needs and desires and wants. And it's really easy, like I said, to get on social media and to feel like, oh, this person's got it more figured out. You have no idea what plates they're spinning and what plates are actually you think they're spinning and they're on the floor. So it's just important that when you're talking about this and when you're looking at this that you just really ask what plates are you spinning? What different areas of your life. That's why in our planners and the goals, it's set up in a very specific format. It's got the goals section, then it goes into plans, which is all the things the celebrating, the contributing the home life, all the different strategies that can help those goals to happen. And then it goes into the actual months and the days and checkpoints for each of those. But it goes back to those goals and you have to have strategies for all those different areas of your life. Otherwise one is going to fall off kilter. And when that happens it's going to start affecting other ones. And the main one that most people do is that self care or that self sacrifice and whether they're taking care of their physical body but are they taking care of their mental body. We're all like one being. So that's just my opinion on it.

I love that when I think about planning. We've got this whole strategy called the four part to do list. And it kind of breaks down really what's essential every week that we can time block. What's most important this week our biggest rocks, what's our later list that we can put off till next week and then what can we outsource? And when I talk about that I always look at first, what's my personal boundary? And as I'm thinking about where my brain goes with that, it's essentially what you're saying, like if we don't sit down to time block first, our self care and the thing that really makes the entire train and the entire ship run right, then nothing else matters. It's easy for things to fall off. So as you think about someone sitting down maybe for the first time, or maybe they're just trying to stick with a system, you know, maybe they've tried to time block and tried some productivity hacks but it has not worked for them. Where do you think it's most important to start? Is it putting in that family time and those boundaries and the self care first and then coming at the rest of the approach.

I think there's no right or wrong answer for anyone because it depends on where they're at on their journey. Right? Where, where is there? Because I think you, you and my like problems might be different than someone else's problems. Like for me it would Be different even than my best friend that is a school teacher. So I think that for everyone that's really going to be idolized. And I would really, again, take time to reflect and figure out where do you feel like your thoughts are going the most? Where you feel like there's the most struggle? I think that we all have to learn how to master our emotions. And a lot of times our emotions are telling us a lot. So what is our biggest worries? Is our biggest worry that physically I'm not in the greatest shape of my life? Is our biggest worry that I feel like I don't know what my purpose is? I feel like I'm just coasting through life. Is my biggest worry that there's not love or intimacy in my world. I think that you really have to just self reflect and ask yourself. But again, all of that kind of goes together. And if you're someone that's feeling like, listen to this and feel like, I feel like it's everything. I don't quite know. I've been there, I get it. And I think that's part of growth, is we grow and we learn through the hard stuff. And the hard stuff is what helps us to change and to help us to pivot and to help us move into the direction that we're supposed to. So I just want to encourage you, if you're listening to this, I feel you. I've had to learn to say, step in uncertainty in every aspect of my life. And you know, when I say every aspect, I mean every aspect. And that's where we grow and that's where we learn and that's where we change. And so if you're someone that's feeling overwhelmed. A lot of times when we're feeling overwhelmed, we almost get paralysis. We don't know what to do, so we do nothing. And then we get to. We can even get to a point. I've been to a point where I'm like, I don't even care, which is depression. Almost like you don't even care what the outcome is going to be. So if you're in any of those two stages, I want to encourage you to, number one, seek help. Because someone else can see a different picture than you're seeing, which can help you embrace the hard stuff that you're in. But then also don't just sit in it like it's easy. It's okay to go sit in the hard stuff. It's not okay to, like, I know things are going to happen that is external, but it's okay to Go into that deep valley. Just don't stay in that deep valley. How do you need to pull yourself out? Is it getting help? Is it getting the knowledge that you need to. If you're struggling financially, do you need to learn how to repair your credit score? Do you need to, you know, if it's emotions that you're struggling with, do you need to do emotion work? Do you need to get a therapist? If it's your business, do you mean a mentor? Do you need a business coach? If it's physically, do you need a nutrition expert? Do you need to read a book? Do you need, like, there's endless ways that we can push our own growth. And like, the one thing that I just. I feel like I'm, like, put on this earth to do is I've been that depressed person, and I've been that person that has been in paralysis. And I just want to tell people that you can pull yourself out the other side and grow and learn from it, and you'll be amazed at what comes out on the other end and you'll be so proud. So I don't think there's. I know that was a really long winded answer, but there's no right answer or wrong answer for. For anyone because we're all on different journeys, and that's what it's about.

I love that. That's a thank you, number one. Because I think 20, 20 of all years, I think, has brought light to exactly what you're saying in so many people's lives. And it's easy to feel like you're alone and you're on an island trying to figure out how to deal with all these things and going back to what you said, I think reflecting, like you said from the very beginning and really asking yourself the hard questions so that you can get to the root of the issue and start to make that a priority, right? To figure out the answer to whatever that issue is. I'm sure you've heard the quote many times of, show me your calendar and you'll show me your priorities. And I feel like that doesn't just have to be a business thing. And I think so many times it's used that way. Like, if you want to be successful in business, you have to show me the learning that you're doing in your business on your calendar. But I think to your point, it's more the personal. What is the root of what you're dealing with and where is that landing on your calendar? I want to take this, you know, kind of back into the Nuts and bolts of how do you put it on your calendar weekly? Because I know you're great at this. And you mentioned time blocking. Can you explain that a little bit more in detail from someone who may not understand time blocking or hasn't had success with it yet?

Absolutely. So I'm very strategic with having three kids and multiple companies. I have to be very strategic with my time. Time. You know, we always hear the time is money, right? Time is really our life. Even more than that. And imagine that we get $1,000 every day, right? And they're like, you got $1,000, you've got to spend it. How are you going to allocate it? That's what our money is. I mean, that's what our time is. Like we don't get that money back. Like we don't get that time back. How are we going to spend it? So what I do is I have very specific things for very different days. So for me, I work. So then on Mondays is our office days. I'm in there with the employ employees. I'm actually in the warehouse. Tuesdays are my content days, Wednesdays are my meeting days, Thursdays are my flex days and Fridays are my wrap up days. So I have a formula for myself, number one, that keeps me accountable and number two, I communicate that to other people in my world so they know it's Tuesday, it's content day. Christy's working from home and I try to do my more creative stuff. I'm most productive in the mornings. So again, setting up an overall schedule and time blocking out days is something that I would highly recommend. If you're wanting to push growth in a different area or if you're wanting to tackle something, scheduling that stuff out and just assigning it to ourselves. Like when we used to get assigned to do things, assigning it to ourselves is a very powerful thing. But then even when you're talking about the actual day, being efficient with it, again, I'm more creative in the morning. So I like putting my creative stuff on the front part of my day. But if I'm going to have meetings on in a day, I like to schedule meetings back to back to back. So I only open up my schedule on certain days for meetings so that it's not interruptions. Because when we are jumping back and forth to different tasks or different things, again, it's just not efficient. I am that person when I have a doctor's appointment. Like I actually last week had my yearly checkups that I needed to go to. It was the doctor, it was the dentist, you know, that I go every six months. And it was also the ob gyn. I knocked all that out in an afternoon. Like, it was like all in the same area. And it was literally doctor's office, doctor's office. But again, it's like, it's not. Otherwise it would have been 30 minutes down there, you know, like, it would have taken up so much more of my time. Instead of just putting like minded things together beginning of the week, I also knew I was going to be in the area. I could hit Costco, which is like a wholesale store in the South. And so again, just looking at your schedule and seeing what is on your to do list, what do you need to get done? And can you tweak different things, putting like minded things together or things.