How to Run a Mid-Year Productivity Review

The days are long, but the years are short. We're 50% of the way through 2021 already. So that saying has been popping into my head a lot lately. And one of the things that we can do in the middle of the year, especially take an extra 30 minutes out of your day or out of your weekend to ask yourself 4 really simple questions, 4 simple prompts that I'm going to give to you in just a moment that help you review the year that you've had so far. So that you can better understand any kind of pivots or adjustments, or even just like giving yourself more confidence on like, hey, I'm on a really good path, I'm going to keep going this direction. So this is what we're going to talk about in the video today. Thank you so much for joining me. Let's go ahead and get into it. The method that we're going to be using for this MIDI review is the same one that we've been using for our weekly reviews so far this year. And it's that WRAP method, W-R-A-P. And what those 4 letters stand for are wins, results, aspirations, and pivots. So let me just break that down for you real quickly so you can know how I'm answering these and how you can use them as well. The first one is just very self-explanatory, is what are the wins? So think back to the last several months, the last 6 months, and thinking what were the wins? What were the things that went well? And the thing that makes this really useful as you're getting used to this is being able, obviously, to do a consistent wrap review throughout the weeks or even the months of the year. So that way you can actually look and see, like, this is what I've been writing about, these are the things that I've wanted to do. This is, to me, one of the best cases for being productive and being a planner and a reviewer, is that it gives you a really tangible record of looking back and saying, these are the things that I wanted to do, these were my aspirations. We'll talk about those in a second. So that way you can really see like, these were my wins because you've been reviewing them and accounting for them as the year has gone on. The second element in your wrap review are the results. And I'm gonna do the next two together because they work together, and it's the results of your aspirations. And so if you can think of those working together in tandem, like what did you aspire to do at the beginning of the year, and then what were the results of those aspirations? So basically what What were your goals and how are you doing on them? That's the easiest way to think about it. And then the fourth and final element of your wrap review is any kind of pivot that you need to make. So maybe something that you thought was really important at the beginning of the year, you found that's not as important. Maybe it's something that has become a lot more important. Maybe it's something that you need to change. And so just thinking mindfully, intentionally about what kind of pivots you want to make as you go into the remaining part of the year is an important way to think about how you can be successful and how you can be intentionally mindful and productive about the things that you want to accomplish. Now I want to give you a quick wrap version of my own mid-year recap because some of it involves you and has impact on you. Because the biggest thing that I've, you know, maybe ever done in my life besides get married and have kids is that I went full-time on my YouTube channel, on my email newsletter. I went full-time as a creator at the beginning of 2021. And so when you think about it in those terms, that's a really big win for me. I've been thinking about this for multiple years, and even if you saw my 10-Year Overnight Success story, this is something that's been on my mind for 10 years. And so it's a huge, massive, you know, win of a lifetime to actually make the decision and go forward for this. Another couple of big wins that I had from a content side is that I've been really prolific and productive with getting new content out. I've had over 100, about 100 written pieces Those are— that's a lot of written content, especially for someone who has kind of like made his audience on YouTube. Even though it's not something I expected, you know, I didn't aspire to do it. What were the results? We're going to talk about that in just a second for me. But those were like my two biggest wins. Now let's shift a little bit into the results and aspirations part of the review, because this is where you really look at this is what I intended to do, this has been the results again, and then how do I pivot? That's what we'll talk about next. So we talk about results and aspirations together, and the biggest thing that I aspire to do as a full time creator. This is what drove a lot of my decision. It drove a lot of my timeline. It also drove a lot of the anxiety before and even still after going full-time, is that I wanted to replace my salary-level income as a creator within 3 to 6 months. And I had been building up, saving up to do that, so I was pretty close to it. The thing that I find really cool within like some of this stress and how it's like forcing me to grow and come to grips with some of the, like, money mindset issues that I've had in the past. I haven't at all had the moment or, like, sinking feeling of, oh my gosh, I can't do this. Oh no, I need to go get a job. I'm not making enough money. I had a bad month. No salary is coming in. What the hell am I gonna do? What it's inspired me to do is, like, like an entrepreneur, to figure it out, to create better things for you, to do like coaching or consulting. It's a little tricky talking about money on YouTube. In fact, it's not really that tricky. If I had— and I'll probably do a video about like, here's how much I make on YouTube or as a full-time creator, because those videos actually do really well. That is the biggest one for me that in terms of aspiration and kind of the results of that not lining up to what I want it to be. The other thing from a content perspective that, you know, aspiration versus results didn't really line up actually is that I wanted to like do weekly YouTube videos. And I definitely thought to myself before this year started, like, well, I'm a full-time creator now, full-time YouTuber. I'm easily going to be able to get a new YouTube video out every week. And that obviously has not been the case. I want to experiment with maybe being a little bit less consistent on YouTube, but making videos that A, I'm really excited about, that feel like I'm— is challenging me to be a better YouTuber and a better video creator. Yep. And point A —towards the front door. Because I can be honest, the videos that are easy for me to create and just like crank out every week, brain dump information on you and be like, cool, got a new video out. I don't know if that's the best thing. And so I have a video coming out like the week of July 12th that was just a fun, only 3-minute video, but a fun, more highly produced video that I'm really excited to share with you because I want to see what other kind of videos I can make on YouTube and how can I increase the, like, the, the just the production level. How can I make them better for you? How can I be a higher quality YouTuber for you? So that's one of the questions that I'm asking myself and I guess if you were to say there's going to be a pivot, it's going to be a pivot towards like, how can I make something super high quality that I'm really proud of? The final element of the RAP review method is that P, that P for pivot. The final pivot that I'm going to make, and this feels a little scary for me to say, and I don't know even now how much I'm actually going to lean into it, but I'm going to be talking a lot more about, say, like lifestyle productivity, doing more with apps and systems and workflows than just focusing on the Bullet Journal as much as I, as much as I have in the past 3 years. I'll probably be talking more about the creator economy, talking more about how creativity and productivity overlap, like how do creators and artists get more work done, how do they focus on the right things. I'll be totally honest with you, I think I, I wouldn't say I've said everything about the Bullet Journal that I'm capable of saying, but I've said most of those things. And I'd rather say and share and make more videos about things that I I'm really excited about talking about for the first time publicly instead of being like, hmm, what is the 100th video that I can make about the Bullet Journal? And like, how can I talk about collections in a way that is really interesting? That to me, even just when I say it out loud, isn't very interesting. I want to be sharing things with you that I am interested and excited about because I think that, you know, you'll be interested and excited about those things as well. So thank you so much for watching this video. I'm excited to share it with you. I'm excited for the second half of 2021. If I'm being totally honest, and I want to be totally honest with you, there are still those like anxieties and fears and stresses around, you know, like, is that, you know, how much of this is the right thing? Like, I know it's just an alignment of the head and the heart, you know, it's like, I know this is the right thing, but then like my heart gets a little scared sometimes, like, ooh, is it going to be the right thing? And then sometimes I'll believe something so strongly, be like, the heart is in the right place, but the head is like, well, you know, logically this probably isn't the right decision to make. So I'm working more on aligning like the head and the heart. Maybe that's a whole other thing that I could talk about, but thank you so much for watching this video. Thank you so much for listening to the podcast. This is also going out as a podcast version. So you check this out as well. We're going into the second half of 2021 and I'm so excited to be on this journey with you. If you You want to make sure that you're getting emails from me, please sign up to my email list as well. There is a link in the description below so that you can get these regular emails from me. Also a bunch of these like email courses that I'm going to be launching over the next couple of weeks. Okay. Thank you so much. I'll see you in the next video, on the next pod. And yeah, let's have a great second half of 2021. Thanks everybody. Bye.