8 Unexpected Lists to Accelerate Your Business Growth

Lists are great if you actually use them and you set up a system to go back and use them time and time again to help you create consistent habits. They're even better if they help you make more money in your business. Am I right? Hit that like button if you want to make more money in your business. Otherwise, if you don't have a process to use these lists consistently, you're just going to have a pile of notebooks with pretty much the same list written in it time and time again. And you're going to be wasting your time creating these repeated lists instead of focusing on the things in your business that are going to make you money. So in this video, I'm going to talk about the eight lists that you can create today and start implementing them in your business. Let's be clear here. The more you use these lists and you repeat them over and over again, the more likely they're basically going to become habits. And that's really what we want to accomplish. The sooner they can just become like second nature habits, the quicker you're going to be able to focus on the things in your business that are going to move the needle forward, that may be making more money, that may be booking more clients. Right? Because really you can watch all the habits and all the productivity videos that you want, but if you don't actually stop watching and start implementing, basically watching all these videos are pointless and a waste of your time. So let's make sure you're not wasting your time anymore. List number one is your idea list. Now, if you're anything like me, ideas pop into your head at any given time. In the shower, in the middle of the night, while you're driving your kids to school, ideas will hit and we will get very excited about these ideas, but we don't ever want to lose them. So if you have a dedicated place inside of what I like to use Asana to keep a list of all my ideas, I never will lose them, especially with the notebook. Because notebooks are huge products around this house. And if I have a notebook, it could potentially have a smiley face drawn in it a week later. So I'm going to keep things digital for now. I actually learned this technique from a friend of mine, meredith, from learngrant writing.org she likes to put her ideas into what she calls a parking lot, which is really great because again, if you get an idea and you're super excited about it, you're ready to implement it immediately. But what happens is these ideas basically become a shiny object syndrome. So what she did and she shared with us. And what I'm doing now is I'm going to put my ideas in my asana list in my parking lot of ideas and schedule to come back to it 30 days later. That way I have time to complete what I've been working on and not get sidetracked by a shiny object or shiny idea. And then I have a little bit more clear of a approach to my idea and not so much of the excitement of a brand new idea. Otherwise you're probably going to end up chasing idea after idea like shiny objects, like a squirrel, right? Instead of just parking them into an ideal parking lot and coming back to them, reevaluating them and finding time to implement them at the right part of your business. The next list is a list of quotes or learnings. Again, if you're like me, you're always learning, whether it's through online courses, podcasts, books, conferences, you're always consuming. But when it comes time for you to post something on Instagram or talk about something on social media, we instantly go blank. So one way to combat this problem and to possibly get recognized by other entrepreneurs is to jot down those quotes that you see. Are those key takeaways that you have immediately into a list of quotes or a list of learnings. There are countless times that I'm sitting, listening to a podcast and I'm nodding my head thinking, yeah, that's right. That's awesome. That's when I recently started pulling out my asana or pulling out my notes app on my phone and writing that quote down real quick. Or maybe you're scrolling through Instagram and you see like a really good quote that you connect with and maybe you even save it. But then you totally forget that you saved it and you never go back to it. Instead, copy that link of that quote, put it into your asana, and then you can start incorporating it into your social media plan or what you're posting on Instagram. Now, the last two lists that I just shared with you, the idea list and the list of quotes and learnings, can be added to at any given time. When one of these hits or you see one of these, you just pop it in that list. Now, the next few lists I'm going to share with you, I highly encourage you to start incorporating them into your routine. So these lists can become habits. The next list is a brain dump list. On every Sunday afternoon, I like to just sit down a moment and list out everything that's going on in my brain so that when I start Monday, I Have a completely fresh mind. I feel like I got all those ideas out there on paper and I can think clearer. While I was writing this brain dump on notebooks, not only did my notebook collection start multiplying, but I started to get little drawings inside my notebooks as well. And I really never had a system to go back to these brain dump lists either to make sure I actually got done the things that I had in my head initially. So again, I created a place in Asana for me to write my brain dump list by week. That way I can go back, I can refresh on what I did the week before or two weeks ago. We have a team call and we're like, yeah, remember we talked about XYZ and oh, that's on my brain dump list. I can go back and remind myself where I was at during that period of time. I can then take a look at my list and decide, okay, can I delegate? So many things are a couple of these ideas that I need to put on my idea parking lot list. But doing this every single Sunday, I feel like just gets my brain fully committed for the week ahead and there's not as many ideas or things running through my mind. Next up, a list of stories. Now I can credit this idea to my friend Ashlyn Carter of Ashlyn Writes. While I was going through her Copywriting for Creatives course, she actually recommended story banking, which is kind of like a list of stories. So when I was talking to her, I used to always mention like, I have no stories. Like nothing significant happened in my life. I don't have that much of an interesting life. I literally just walk to the bus stop every single day. And some days I don't even get into my car. So there's like nothing story wise happening in my life. And she mentioned to just start tracking the everyday things that you are doing that you could create a story about or go into a little bit more detail to share a story about it. Everybody can relate to the boring, mundane day to day life schedule that you have. So at the end of my day, as part of my work day wind down routine, in my full focus planner, there's like a notes list and I try to remind myself every single day to just jot down one or two things that happened to me that day that it could potentially turn into or create a story about. Now while I write it there, I then also have to put it into my Asana story list as well because I'm cycling through my full focus planners every 90 days. And so I don't want to lose them. So I just do that to initially write them down, but then always put them into asana to basically save them. And these can be super simple things that happen in my day. Like we had a team meeting that day and I could talk about a story on how we got to successful team meetings or how I used to run team meetings and now how I do them. Like nothing significant but there's a story about that or maybe as I had a call with a friend that day that I hadn't talked to in three years and kind of how that ties into remembering to reach out to people and the importance of connection. Because if I don't just take a moment to think about something that happened and how a story could be pulled out of that, obviously I'm never going to have any stories to tell and what am I going to talk about on social media every day. And these are also great examples of stories I can tie in to my YouTube videos as well. And like I said, not every story needs to be super exciting, they just need to be relatable. The next list is my done list and this is a play on a to do list. We all have a to do list that is a mile long and we're never really actually getting them done. Am I right? Let me know if you've ever completed your to do list down in the comments below because I'm going to tell you, I feel like mine constantly runs from the next day to the next day to the next day. And what this does for me personally, it makes me feel like a failure because I'm never able to get everything done. And I think I wanted to get this done. Why can't I get this done? I'm failing at this. And for me, after chasing the completion of this to do list for so many weeks in a row, I eventually crash. I'm overwhelmed, I'm exhausted. And what happens for me in that instance is I get sick. It doesn't matter if anybody around me is sick or not, I will get sick. I will get whatever cold and you will find me in my bed just mind numbing out to reality tv. I will avoid work at all costs. I have no creativity, I have no motivation and I start looking for job want ads. So I've decided to change the way I approach to do lists. And at the end of every single week when I'm doing my weekly wrap up, I list things that I actually got done that week instead of looking at the things I didn't get done. I've also like the theme of this video is going created a done list in my Asana board so that at the end of the year I can come back to it and look at everything that I accomplished. Because if I'm not keeping track of things in a weekly basis, some of those little things that were big for me at the time, I may not remember come December, I may just remember the big things like I launched two times or I created a new coaching program. But there are lot of major wins throughout the entire year that we totally forget about when we're not tracking the things we actually got done and we're only focusing on the things we didn't do. And sometimes, maybe that week we just want to celebrate that we got through our email list because we have so much on our plate. So don't worry about these done lists being like something significant. Celebrate getting through the week that week. This next list is something that I have really leaned into in 2022 and have been forever grateful to have this list. And that is a list of friends, mentors, or business buddies. There's really no candy coating this, but running a business is hard as hell and most of the time you're doing it all by yourself, sitting at home in a room by yourself and no one else usually around you even understands what it is that you actually do. Even if you have a partner. My husband has no idea what I do here on a given day. And then you also start to question, am I doing it right? Are these numbers that I'm seeing for this launch normal? Are the subscriptions subscriber numbers to my channel normal? Is it normal to create three reels or seven reels? Like, what are other people out there doing to see success? And for me, particularly in 2022, we really blew up our agency services in a good way, but was also incredibly stressful for me. I had never done a service package at that level or juggled that many clients or even that many employees at one time. We literally quadrupled our business in the first six months of 2022, and I had no idea what I was doing and if it was the right things to do. So to be able to have. There was at least three business buddies that I had that were also growing an agency and had been in agency work a lot longer that I could easily reach out to and be like, oh my gosh, I'm feeling this way, or we had this problem or we're trying to hire and this happened and they had been there and they have were able to share their experience or they were Able to also reach out to me and vent with what was going on with them. And I could understand it. And you didn't feel so alone, and you kind of had that support system to get you through a super stressful time in your business. So had I not actually, and this may not be a physical list, but at least a list in my mind for now of who I can reach out to. If I didn't have that this year, I honestly don't know if my agency would have survived the entire year this year, or I maybe would have just said, forget it all, burn it down and move on. It also really pulled me out of a funk and a depression because. Because like I said, running an agency is so hard and there's so many different pieces of it. And you don't realize going into it, you think, oh, this is great. I got more clients, I got more clients, and you just kind of go numb and your creativity disappears. And I wasn't excited to create YouTube videos and I wasn't excited about my business anymore. So again, having somebody to talk to through that just definitely change your whole outlook in your business. This next list, I might say it is my favorite. And it will really help if you struggle with decision fatigue. So, like having to make too many decisions that you're just tired of making decisions. As a business owner, on any given day, we're making so many decisions, we don't want to make a decision outside of work. So this list, a list of life areas could be just what you're looking for. So what the heck is a list of life areas, Trina? So if you're running a business and you're trying to hit that next level or that next goal on your revenue plan, that's probably not all you're doing. You might have kids, you might have a family, you might have a partner, all of who you've got to take care of once you're out of your business door, so to speak. So to help me manage with all the other things that go on in my life outside of my business, here are some of the life lists that I created that helped me my my standard grocery list. So my kids and I are pretty routine in what we eat. We eat the same breakfast, we eat the same lunch. The only thing that changes up is our dinner. So every single week, we're basically buying the same grocery list. And the only thing that's changing is what we're doing for dinner. So we just have an already populated grocery list. So I don't have to come up with Everything, every single week. And the only thing that we need to add to it is what we're going to eat for dinner. The next list that I have is a list of meals that we all enjoy because I hate coming up with meal ideas. This was probably a few years ago. My husband and I sat down and we listed about 14 meals that we like and we don't mind making. And so anytime we are planning our grocery list and deciding what we want to eat for dinner that week, we have like 14 meals to select from. And I'm not having to scroll through Pinterest and try to figure out a recipe or a meal. And we've updated that list. Occasionally if we have something with the kids that we try new and they like it, we'll add it to it. But we do have a list of meals that we really heavily rely on and cycle through. So again, I don't have to decide what's for dinner. My cleaning list. So knowing what I need to clean that day so that I don't have to do all the cleaning on a Saturday, because if you're working all week in your business, the last thing you want to do is spend an entire day cleaning. So we know like, Mondays are the days we clean the bathrooms, Tuesdays are the day that we start laundry, so on and so forth, so that we are slowly chiseling away with our clean meaningless. So that Saturday we can actually chill. A few other life lists that I also have before I move on to the next thing is books list. So just keeping a running list of books that I want to read. Netflix list. So you aren't sitting on Netflix in the evening trying to decide what to watch, and you spend the whole time just scrolling through it. In fact, we did this about two years ago with the Marvel movies. We decided we were going to go through all of them. So I literally created an asana list with all the marvels in the order that we should watch them. And that was the. Was the easiest, like six months of our lives because we knew exactly what we were watching, like every Friday night and Saturday night with the kids, and we didn't have to scroll through for hours to find something. And you can get really creative with these life lists in your life as well. What can you list out outside of your business life so that you can limit the decisions that you need to make? Because decision fatigue is so real and it will honestly start affecting your business life as well. Before I jump into this next list, let me know if any of these lists are pretty exciting for you and you're going to try them out. Go ahead and comment below list and hit the like button on this video so that I know you're bought into this idea and you're going to start creating some of your own lists. And this next list is a little harder than the other ones that I've talked about, but I will tell you it is a total game changer for hitting those next big goals in your business and this list as a list of ways to respond to your emotions. I really like to be transparent about entrepreneurship and business owner and I've told you multiple times before, it is super hard to do. It is really an emotional roller coaster. And through the seven years that I've been an entrepreneur I've seen so many friends start a business, grow a business, quit their business. Some of them dealt with a burnout from their business, some of them dealt with depression because of their business and some of them just felt entrepreneurship became too unhealthy for them and their mindset. And I've been right there with them. I never knew what a panic attack was until about three years into my business and I dealt with my first panic attack. Because of all the things that you're trying to do in your business and all the hats that you're trying to do and all the people that you're trying to keep up with, it is a lot. You don't have the time to really deal with your emotions because you're so busy as it is doing everything in your business. Now you want to add another thing on your list list. Find a way to deal with your emotions. So you know how like some people go out for a run to clear their mind. That's not me. I gotta be in a really bad state to result to running. But I'm using that as an example. But you need to figure out what it is you need to do for yourself to handle your emotions. And we call this self care. And this doesn't necessarily mean going to get a massage or like going to get a mani and petty. You need to figure out what you what is self care for you to help you deal with your emotions. So the way I tackled this is I dug into learning more about my enneagram type. So I'm an enneagram 3 and what the enneagram is is a nine sided figure used in a particular system of analysis to represent the spectrum of possible personality types. So once I figured out what enneagram I was, I dug into learning more about this personality type and I started to realize the Emotions and the feelings that I have are pretty normal, especially for an enneagram 3. So first of all, I didn't feel alone anymore. And then I started to dig into healthy ways to handle these feelings and emotions as an enneagram3 because I really wanted to figure out a way to deal with my personality. That is the type of personality that needs to be perfect, that needs to get things done, that needs to be as productive as possible. And what that results in for me is pushing all my emotions aside until I ultimately crash, like I said, with a panic attack. So I found certain Instagram accounts that I love to look at and read to help me figure out ways to deal with my emotions. So some of those Instagram accounts are Enneagram Ashton and reading memes about my number. Also looking she has morning mantras for threes. She also posts different types of things like being aware of what might upset me. So again, I can list these in this particular list so that I'm looking at it maybe every single morning as I start my day to be aware of the these feelings right from the bat and figure out what I need to do to fix it or manage it. Another Instagram account I like to read for help as well is Sarah Jane Casey to learn healthy what a healthy 3 looks like, what an average 3 looks like, and what an unhealthy 3 looks like so I can make sure like I'm adjusting to where I need to be. So if I'm reading about the unhealthy three and I'm like, oh, that's kind of where I'm at right now. Going to the other Instagram account to figure out what my way of self care is and going to my list of self care there to get back to average is how I use this list. Like I said, just having this basically in my back pocket and reviewing, you know, every morning or once a week just to recognize and acknowledge where I'm at so I can course correct as needed so I don't go down that path of pushing all my feelings aside and crashing. Now if you haven't done so already, share with me down in the comments what list you think you might start creating right now. And I'll tell you, running a business and being entrepreneur puts a lot of pressure on you and you shouldn't be doing this alone. But how do you find a community to help support you and help you build your business? Friend list Watch this video on your screen right now where I share with you how much I spent on masterminds in 2022 and how I finally found one that helped me find my people to lean on. Click on that video and I'll see you over there.