{"id":570,"date":"2009-09-05T09:01:14","date_gmt":"2009-09-05T16:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=570"},"modified":"2025-11-07T10:26:46","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T17:26:46","slug":"that-spinning-plates-guy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=570","title":{"rendered":"That Spinning Plates Guy"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve referred to my chaotic lifestyle a like that guy who spins plates on long poles… running from plate to plate to keep each one spinning.\u00a0 That’s me… a million projects and goals to do and I’m running from one to another.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Before you roll your eyes and compare me to your own life, let me admit that I KNOW everyone modern woman is doing this today.\u00a0 Some do it with their kids activities, some do it through work and most do it with a combination of both.\u00a0 We are all rushing to accomplish all these things… these spinning plates.\u00a0 And I’m reminded of the relaxation of the no-task electronic-free day I had last month.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

So\u00a0one day I\u00a0tried a bit of slowing down.\u00a0 When the kids finally let me get some work done, (i.e. I gave up parenting them and parked them in front of the television) I sorted ALL my work into a few categories.\u00a0 Its my favorite way of organizing myself.\u00a0 I whipped through a few of the easier tasks,\u00a0conquered the bank statements for 2 of the 3 accounts and then tackled the Licensing Job that’s been hounding me for months.\u00a0 And I can proudly say I finally got some completion.\u00a0 2 of the 4 Licenses are finalized and I was able to email them to the many clients waiting for them.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The last two need some adjusting and pricing and then this arduous chore hanging around my neck for a year will be finished!<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

And the relief off my shoulders is palatable!\u00a0 I know the reason I multi-task so many things at once is that I get A LOT of good, minor Completion (which is my personal compulsion) every day making sure these plates spin smoothly in the air.\u00a0 And when it’s expertly organized it only takes a few taps a day to keep things even.\u00a0 Check 7 email addresses daily, fill orders weekly, update mailing lists monthly, file bi-weekly, answer the phone when it rings… all little taps that run the job smoothly.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s the new job that always puts a screw into the works.\u00a0 And every business will always have a new job.\u00a0 You have to or your business stagnates and stops.\u00a0 Filming a new video, getting our existing videos up as previews online, filming our own online course, putting the videos into a pay per view system on our website.\u00a0 Big plates I have to take baby steps to begin the spinning process.\u00a0 And like every new plate, they wobble a lot at first!\u00a0 But also like every plate I currently spin, if I keep at it eventually I’ll get it to the point where it only takes a few taps to spin it.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

And sometimes a plate gets dropped.\u00a0 There have been times I’ve realized I’ve got too many and take one down.\u00a0\u00a0 Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned by my 40’s is that I don’t HAVE to do everything.\u00a0 It’s okay to pass it on to someone else or just walk away, even if I know I’d do a much better job.\u00a0\u00a0 (Reason number one I’m NOT on the PTA or Room Mom or active in the Cub Scouts… I’d take it over and overwhelm myself.)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sometimes you just have to walk away, say “No, thank you” or quietly pretend you are completely inept for the sake of your own sanity.\u00a0\u00a0 Because the crashing sound of all those plates dropping is the last sound you’ll hear before your mental breakdown and the quiet Lithium induced silence of the mental ward.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sometimes it sounds appealing.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve referred to my chaotic lifestyle a like that guy who spins plates on long poles… running from plate to plate to keep each one spinning.\u00a0 That’s me… a million projects and goals to do and I’m running from one … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-just-ramblings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=570"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3406,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions\/3406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}