Ever wondered how tackling your toughest tasks first thing in the morning could transform your productivity? Uncover the secrets of the "Eat the Frog" method on this episode of Tea with Tina, and learn how this powerful strategy can help you conquer your most challenging tasks with ease. We'll guide you through the process of identifying these daunting tasks, which are often important but not urgent, and explain why addressing them when you’re at your mental peak can set the tone for a successful day. From professional demands to health and fitness routines like meal prepping or morning workouts, discover how this method can revolutionize your daily habits and reduce anxiety.
Imagine starting your day by clearing the most intimidating item off your to-do list. In this episode, we delve into the importance of establishing an optimal morning routine, focusing on how to leverage your mental strength to overcome procrastination. We'll discuss why the morning is the best time for these tasks and how building this habit can lead to continuous progress. Whether you're aiming to boost your career or get a grip on your fitness goals, our insights will help you develop a proactive approach to your daily challenges. Transform your routine, reduce procrastination, and step into a more productive and fulfilling life with the strategies we share.
Ever wondered how tackling your toughest tasks first thing in the morning could transform your productivity? Uncover the secrets of the "Eat the Frog" method on this episode of Tea with Tina, and learn how this powerful strategy can help you conquer your most challenging tasks with ease. We'll guide you through the process of identifying these daunting tasks, which are often important but not urgent, and explain why addressing them when you’re at your mental peak can set the tone for a successful day. From professional demands to health and fitness routines like meal prepping or morning workouts, discover how this method can revolutionize your daily habits and reduce anxiety.
Imagine starting your day by clearing the most intimidating item off your to-do list. In this episode, we delve into the importance of establishing an optimal morning routine, focusing on how to leverage your mental strength to overcome procrastination. We'll discuss why the morning is the best time for these tasks and how building this habit can lead to continuous progress. Whether you're aiming to boost your career or get a grip on your fitness goals, our insights will help you develop a proactive approach to your daily challenges. Transform your routine, reduce procrastination, and step into a more productive and fulfilling life with the strategies we share.
Welcome to the Tea with Tina, your favorite podcast, where we talk all things health, fitness, lifestyle and maybe a little bit of tea gets spilled.
Speaker 2:
We chat all about this in a super casual environment, so grab your beverage of choice, sit back, relax and enjoy relax and enjoy.
Speaker 2:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Tea with Tina podcast, and today we're talking about eating the frog Eat the frog method. Have you ever heard of this? It probably sounds a little weird, right? This has to do with getting shit done, pretty much, right? So what does eat the frog mean?
Speaker 2:
Eat the frog is the process of identifying your most difficult task of the day and completing it before you do any other work. If you have to eat two frogs, eat the bigger one first, right? And you know, the best way I can describe this is you've had this looming anxiety over you, right? Because you're thinking about this thing that you have to get done. You're like, oh my God, and I don't know why our brain does this, but our brain is really good at blowing things out of proportion and going this is going to take forever, it's going to be so terrible and you get so frozen in time that that thing never actually gets done. And because it never gets done and it gets pushed off, your anxiety grows even more. And when you do finally muster up enough courage to face it and do it, you're like, holy crap, that was not bad at all. That was maybe like an eighth of the anxiety that it took me to think about it. Right, so this is why we just got to do the thing and get it out of the way.
Speaker 2:
First, eat the frog, okay. So like, why does this work right? It sets you up for success early in the day, usually when we wake up. Now this can vary person to person, so I want you to be in tune with your body and think about when you are most mentally like, ready, strong in your mind. You know, because it could be different for everybody. You know, maybe the nighttime you get a burst of energy. Maybe it's not the morning for you, but for most people it's probably going to be when we first wake up. But you know, if your work schedule is chaotic and maybe you have to wake up, go to work and you have no time to actually do something, maybe it is going to be the nighttime for you, or the afternoon. Again, everyone's different. But it does set your day up for success when you get that big thing out of the way first, if you can, even though it's scary, and it does allow us to take advantage of our most efficient working hours.
Speaker 2:
I noticed for me it does tend to change, usually in the morning. I think it has been my best time, especially now that I work for myself. I kind of have to make my hours and I have to create my own to do list, so I deal with this a lot more. But you know you can apply this to your work life. You know, when you're at the office and you're at a nine to five. You can also apply this, obviously, to your health and fitness life, because this is a health and fitness podcast.
Speaker 2:
So maybe you're eating the frog, is meal prepping on Sunday, going grocery shopping, maybe it's getting up and getting that workout in before work, because you know, after work you're going to be a tired, immobile potato, right, right. And then also, this does promote deep work, because one you know, when you eat the frog, you eat that big thing. It requires extreme focus because that's something that's big and important. But I also think it promotes deep work because now that you have that big stressful thing out of the way, you can kind of be in a relaxed, creative mindset and anything else that needs to get done for the rest of the day will get done in a timely, easygoing fashion. There's no stress or anxiety behind it right? So, even though I gave a couple examples, how do we identify what the frog is? Because sometimes we could have a frog and we don't even realize that we have it right. We maybe have this looming to-do list and there's like 100 things. You're like do I have 100 frogs? Which one's the most important, right? So let me give you some boundaries to think about.
Speaker 2:
Frogs require more time than other tasks, so frogs typically require more than an hour to complete, which is why you probably push it off. Usually, that frog task will take between one to four hours right Now. Remember, these are just guidelines. It doesn't have to be exact. Frogs are important but not urgent. So it is a big task that might need to get done. That's looming over you, but it's not something that needs to get done like right now. I think your brain would naturally take care of it. If it needs to be done like now, your motivation to get it done is going to be getting it done because of urgency, right? But the frog is usually something that's looming like maybe, oh, I got to make this doctor's appointment, I gotta make it, but like it's not, you know, it's not the end of the world if you don't make it.
Speaker 2:
Um, going to the gym again. You know, nothing bad's gonna happen short term if you don't go to the gym, but it's like a big deal, right. It's very important to go to the gym. It's very important to meal prep. You're going to face consequences, but it's not like a deadline, right. So those are often frogs. And then frogs often come with some resistance, right, because nobody does actually want to eat a frog if we look at it literally. So when you think of your task, if you do hold resistance to that, that's probably your frog, okay. So let me give you some tips for eating your frog. Frogs are best eaten habitually, while your frogs are the biggest task of the day. You'll need to accomplish many of those big tasks regularly In order to make progress Right, and it gets easier when we do it often.
Speaker 2:
I can attest to this. I was in a phase. It's actually kind of funny how this happened to me. I was in a phase. It's actually kind of funny how this happened to me. Um, pretty much from high school to my early 20s was a big period of growth. I was very uncomfortable all the time. That's when I got into my fitness journey. That's when I lost weight. I was job hopping a lot. I became a trainer, um, I was doing all these new, challenging things. My husband was deployed, I was figuring out my hormones and then which I think this is normal there was a period after COVID and moving which was a whole nother realm of stress.
Speaker 2:
I was just tired and I took, like quote unquote the easier route where I was just coasting and that's where I was working, you know, a nine to five at a gym job and it was challenging up to a certain point. But then I got comfortable. I got really comfortable. My routine, you know, covid was dying down. I was like, wow, finally I can relax, I don't have to be uncomfortable.
Speaker 2:
And this happened for maybe about two years, I would say. I was like I'm finally comfortable. But it got to the point where I almost felt too comfortable, right, I was so comfortable that I was like, oh, I'm like not even feeling challenged every day. This is not good. I was like I'm not growing, I was like I'm stagnant and I was like that's not good. So I purposely created kind of some chaos for myself. I was dealing with some health stuff at the time too, which didn't help but me quitting my job, with some health stuff at the time too, which didn't help. But me quitting my job, my nine to five, was a big step. That was a big, scary step, because that's the hardest step for any entrepreneur is transitioning from, you know, having some backup money to going all in full time. And that's what I did, because you have no idea how much money you're going to bring in every month. There's no way to predict that. Like I do have some.
Speaker 2:
Also, also for people listening. This is why we have contract agreements and things. I mean it's to protect you as the client, because we want you to stay committed for a period of time. We don't want you to just give up when it gets hard. Um, quote, unquote, an easy out. But also this, you know, gives me a good idea of like hey, how long are you planning on sticking around? At least you know, because imagine living your life like month to month, not knowing because I've had this happen that like five, five clients, you could lose 1000s in monthly recurring revenue in one month at the drop of a hat. Okay, I can get that many clients.
Speaker 2:
It's weird how that works. Like I'll get like three or four clients at one time and then, like I'll have three or four cancellations and it's all legitimate, valid reasons. It's just funny how it works, but it's very, a very unpredictable business, very unpredictable. So that was probably the number one thing that was scariest for me is cause I'm like is this going to work? Like I was confident in myself and now it's a mindset thing. I'm confident that I'm a good trainer and when I show up and I talk to people like I am going to get clients, it's not like like sometimes you know life happens and it's like, wow, you know you're, you're talking to more people and you should have gotten a client but you didn't. And then there's times where it's like they fall into your lap, right, it just all depends. But if you keep going the course, you will progress.
Speaker 2:
And that that was getting out of my comfort zone. And since I believe I've been getting out of my comfort zone for so long, it's gotten so much easier. So many things about social media has gotten easier for me, like getting on camera. I used to hate it, I'd be so nervous. Now I'm just like yeah, yeah, it's whatever. Teaching class, like so many things I used to get so nervous about. It would stress me out, drain my energy, and just from taking so much messy action and getting out of my comfort zone, it just I don't even think about it anymore. Right, and you can do that for whatever it is for you.
Speaker 2:
Maybe you're scared and self-conscious to work out in the gym. Keep doing it, keep pushing through. It gets easier. Do not avoid it, do not run away. It could be the meal prepping, it could be structuring things, it could be all those things. But keep doing it.
Speaker 2:
All right, don't plan your frogs too far in advance. Frogs should be planned at most one day ahead. Yes, because then that's going to create its own anxiety. If you're like, oh, I'm going to tackle it next week, you're going to be thinking about it and then you're going to get an excuse and then you're not going to do it right the night before, be like I'm doing this and do it. It's just enough time to get you motivated. A little scared, and then you jump in and you eat the frog. And then three always eat your frogs.
Speaker 2:
First thing in the morning Again thing in the morning Again. We talked about this. This kind of depends on the person. You know. If you're an overnight worker or whatever, you know, maybe your morning is different than our mornings, but when you feel mentally strongest and freshest, that's when you're going to want to do it, and for most people that is in the morning. Okay, but yeah, so I hope that helps a little bit. Just chatting, I heard this concept multiple times over the past couple months and I thought it would be a good topic to talk about, because it can apply really to anywhere in life, and one of the biggest struggles I see with people in health and fitness is they think about their frog and it just becomes this looming, terrible thing and the thought of it is worse than actually just eating the frog, right? So again, hope this helps and I will see you in the next one. Guys, that's all for now. Have a good rest of your day. Bye.