How I Ditched Multitasking to Discover Clarity, Aligned Productivity, and Purpose

After my third son was born in 2016, I felt like I was spiralling out of control. I felt like I was failing at work, even though I was working longer than I needed to and meeting deadlines. It felt like I was never showing up 100% for my role.

At home, the mom guilt was HEAVY. Since I spent so many hours at work, I felt like I needed to be an extra super mom at home so my kids didn’t feel neglected. I was constantly cleaning, doing laundry, and trying to cook massive, healthy meals the “experts” said would help with brain development and growth.

As I continued to spiral, I thought productivity was my issue. Perhaps I wasn’t optimizing my time. Maybe I was letting myself get out of shape, which was why I was always exhausted. So, I tried time management hacks and productivity strategies. I added running and spinning classes to my weeks while also trying to multitask laundry while getting my work done. (I’ve been fortunate to be a remote worker since 2010, long before COVID hit)

Unfortunately, I wasn’t headed for the success I thought I wanted. The “success” society says we “should” want. Instead, I was headed for massive burnout, depression, and feeling like I was running on a hamster wheel with no meaningful progress in my life.

Not to mention, I could see my kids getting older. This added to the already massive mom guilt I was grappling with, as I felt like I was losing their young years to hustle and chronic productivity.

Finally, I snapped. Something in my mind shifted, and I realized I couldn’t go on like this. I needed to change. I realized the world around me wouldn’t change, and my work life wouldn’t shift until I made the change in myself.

At first, I tried changing jobs. I thought a shift in my duties or a new department would be the fix. It helped at first, but I quickly fell into old habits and hit that burnout mark again.

That’s when I decided a drastic change was needed – I quit corporate.

I wouldn’t recommend it to everyone. I didn’t have a backup plan or a new job to jump into. I just walked away. I hoped that a small business I started on a whim the year before would be enough to bring in a six-figure income (wow, was I wrong…) and stopped receiving that bi-weekly paycheck.

Would I change what I did?

Heck no. It has made me who I am today – a more focused and present mom prioritizing aligned productivity and harmony over hustle, and time with my family over a large paycheck.

Do I miss that bi-weekly paycheck?

Hell yes… If I could do it all over again, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t quit that quickly. Instead, I would have used my aligned productivity and mindset routines and rituals as part of my workday. I would have approached my corporate role with harmony, not hustle, and figured out a path to bring me closer to my future vision and values, not climbing a ladder society says I “should” want to climb.

The Shift: My Aligned Approach to Productivity

After one of my first burnouts, I decided to develop leadership skills. At that point, I still thought it was because I wanted to “climb the corporate ladder,” but I’m so glad I started taking those seminars and classes. Through them, I fell in love with coaching – the ability to help others realize the future they desired and create achievable action plans to pursue their goals was amazing.

Except, I realized I wanted to do that for myself as well.

Through those seminars, I dug deeper into my values, the things that were the most important to me. Those classes and teachers helped me see that climbing a corporate ladder wasn’t actually what I wanted; it was what society told me I should want.

I was “should-ing” all over myself – no wonder I was miserable, burned out, and feeling stuck.

Once I had my values figured out, I wanted to go deeper. I came across an assessment that had me rank different areas of my life. These are similar to the Wheel of Life exercises (and similar to the Harmony Blindspot Scale I’ve created for my clients – which you can try for free here).

Download Harmony Blindspot Scale

That exercise was an eye-opener.

I realized I wanted to make some changes in my career, but I was also neglecting other significant aspects of my life. I now realize this is common – we frequently focus on only 2 or 3 aspects of our lives and neglect the rest. We don’t ignore them on purpose; we just don’t approach our days intentionally, which leads to neglect in other areas.

That was a small but mighty step on my journey to harmony and the life of my dreams.

Now that I was packed with my values and paying more attention to all aspects of my life – physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, relationships, and mission – my days were less stressful. I felt less overwhelmed and more curious about what I wanted from life, not what society wanted me to do.

Slowly, through learning different techniques and figuring out which worked for me and which didn’t, I eventually ended up with my aligned goal-setting method. Now, I set goals more aligned with my passions and purpose, even though I had no idea what those two words meant when I started.

I stopped trying to do everything at once and instead focused on being more intentional with my time. I was more intentional about what projects I said yes to and about spending time with my kids. This forced me to stop multitasking and instead pay more attention to one thing at a time to do it well and enjoy the process. 

My Results: Clarity, Fulfillment, and ENERGY

The most significant change I’ve noticed since starting this quest for harmony through more intentional, aligned action is that I now LOVE Mondays. I used to grumble and complain about what was coming up on Monday - going to bed on Sunday night already worried about what might be coming up when I logged into Teams and my email the next day.

Now, I can’t wait for Monday. Don’t get me wrong – I love weekends like the next person. I love spending time with my family and going on mini-adventures (although, to be honest, I still love to spend some time writing on weekends). But I can’t wait until Monday to get back to working on my missions.

Let me explain – I have a big vision for the future Keely that I’m working to create. However, I prefer to look at the journey to get there as the fun part, not the destination itself. I know my destination may change, as there will be things that I can’t control along the way. But by looking at the journey as the fun part, as my quest, as I like to say, it doesn’t matter if my destination changes slightly as I go.

I am focused on bringing that fun and how that future Keely will feel on the way to achieving that dream life. This helps me live a piece of that dream life today – I’m actively doing what future Keely would be doing to reach that destination.

I’ve been reading Feel-Good Productivity by Ali Abdaal, and he also talks about this, so I think it is a common thing to find if you are looking for a more aligned, intentional life. He talks about focusing on “experiments” to achieve his goals. That is what I would consider my weekly and quarterly goals – but I consider them more like “sub-quests.”

(If you can’t tell – I also play video games and absolutely love questing. I play World of Warcraft, Stardew Valley, and many other games that require strategy and quests. So why not bring that fun into my daily life?)

By changing my approach to goals, having a clear vision for my future, and using the journey as the fun part of the quest, I have found that my stress levels are much lower. Of course, I still have some stress – just like everyone else, I’m dealing with the impact of increasing grocery costs and the cost of living. My kids are still dealing with issues at school. There will always be some stress involved in life.

However, I take that in stride because I have methods to declutter my mental space and keep my thoughts clear on what I am working towards, even when an obstacle or slight sidestep is required. It doesn’t completely knock me down or make me miserable. I take it as an opportunity to learn and then try something slightly different or prepare for another side quest that will end up close to the same destination but take a slightly different path.

I also have made it NON-NEGOTIABLE to have some form of self-care weekly. As a writer, if I’m being honest, writing is part of my self-care. I love spending time writing articles like these or working on my fiction stories. There is something about writing that has always been a creative outlet for me to relax.

However, because writing is now part of my job, I still have other self-care practices that I schedule every week, no matter what. This includes my weekly bath ritual, which involves a good book, candles, music, and an hour of uninterrupted time to myself. (my husband is very helpful in making this happen)

I also take time during the week to have coffee with a friend or someone new. I attend networking events to meet new people and get out of the house without the kids doing something different.

Discover Your Harmony Blindspot Today

Some surprising changes have come to my life with these shifts:

• My kids are more open in communication; each has their own time of day when they sit down with me to talk. I’ve learned that they always felt I was “too busy” to talk with before I made these changes (likely because of my day's stress and chaotic flow). It broke my heart to hear them say this, but I’m so grateful for the time I get to be present with them every day. And I notice them becoming more interested in things like journaling, meditating, and letting their creativity flow more frequently because they see me doing those things.

• My quality of sleep has improved. I used to be plagued by anxiety attacks in the middle of the night, waking up and not being able to fall asleep for hours. Now, those attacks are rare, and I fall asleep faster than ever. It likely helps that I’m finally putting my health goals as #1 in my weekly schedule, but I’m sure it’s also the reduced mental clutter and stress that helps me sleep better at night.

• My productivity has skyrocketed, even though I work similar, sometimes even less, hours than I used to. I typically receive looks of shock when I tell people that I’m currently working on publishing my second book, have a weekly radio show and podcast, own two businesses, have two YouTube channels, blog up to twice a week, and also find time to hang out with my kids, go on date nights, and schedule in self-care regularly. Honestly, though, I attribute it to the fact that I am now more intentional with my time, and I have alignment between what I do every day and the future I’m striving to create. I’ve been calling it “aligned productivity” lately because that’s what it feels like.

• I have more energy. I used to be exhausted ALL THE TIME. I used to worry it was something wrong with my thyroid or because I wasn’t able to lose weight. But my energy levels have increased significantly since I’ve shifted to focusing on at least one task each day that moves the needle on my quest to that future identity. Again, it likely helps that I have dance parties in my office regularly and that I’m exercising regularly and sleeping better. Still, I genuinely believe that knowing my mission and working even the tiniest of steps on it every day is a significant contributing factor to my increased energy levels. This reminds me of the quote by James Clear:

“If you can get 1% better each day for one year, you’ll end up thirty-seven times better by the time you’re done.” – James Clear, Atomic Habits

Of course, I can’t promise anyone that making these changes will bring you the same results I have. This has just been my personal experience with making these changes. As I’ve said under each point as well, these results will also be impacted by other changes I’ve been making – exercising more, stressing less, spending more time with my kids intentionally – but I wouldn’t have made those changes if I didn’t first start this quest for harmony and alignment. They all have compounded together to create a life I love, and I can’t wait to see where it takes me next.

If you do want to try to start your own quest for harmony and alignment, though, here are some tips that helped me. Hopefully, they will help you as well, but remember, your results will be different as our journeys are different:

1. My version of “time blocking.” You likely have heard of “time blocking” before, but I have my own spin on it. If you’re like me, breaking your schedule into 1-hour chunks feels overwhelming and scary. As part of my weekly harmony routine (which you can steal via my free Weekly Harmony Compass download), every Sunday, I sit down to reflect on my previous week and plan my upcoming week. As part of this planning, I consider my big priorities for the week based on the aligned goal-setting I’ve done for the quarter. Then, I create time blocks for things I don’t want to miss – which aren’t just goal or work blocks. I block time for my health goals, self-care non-negotiables, and appointments. Then I consider the big projects I want to move the needle on – these don’t get 1-hour time blocks; these get day blocks. This means I decide what day this upcoming week will be best to focus on a specific project. Then, I give that project as much time as possible on that given day – whether it’s an hour, 3 hours, or the entire 8-hour day.

2. Remove distractions (as much as realistically possible). We all scroll on social media or watch TV periodically (or both). I do these things, too. Sometimes, relaxing and seeing what is happening in the world can be nice or catching up on your favourite show. The vital part of this is to ensure that these habits and behaviours aren’t holding you back from making progress. That’s why I only watch TV when I have completed my day's work. I have also moved all social media apps to a separate phone that isn’t my primary cell phone and keep it in a drawer away from my office or bed so that I only look at it with intention, not habit. As I tell my clients, I made my primary cell phone boring. That way, when trying to focus on something that will move the needle toward my goals, I don’t have the urge to pick up my phone and check something “quick.” I’d have to physically get up and find my old Wi-Fi-only phone to open an app. This extra step between me and scrolling helps me be intentional when I look at it.

3. Pick only 3 missions. There has been a lot of research on tackling too many things at once. This leads to being overwhelmed, stressed, and burnt out and slows us down from reaching our goals. It doesn’t speed things up. That’s why, as part of my annual, quarterly, and monthly goal methods, I always only choose the top 3 missions I want to focus on (check out My Monthly Harmony Roadmap for how I approach aligned success planning each month). These are my main goals for the quarter (and sometimes even the year) that I focus on to completion. These influence the weekly time blocks I talked about in Step 1 and my tasks and goals in Step 4. I am trying to move the needle on these every week, even if it’s a tiny step in the right direction.

4. Write down tasks and goals to improve chances of completion. The research that has been done on people who actually complete their goals finds that writing them down is a big step in the right direction. Many say you should write them down by hand, meaning with a pen and paper. Still, I think as long as you have them written down somewhere – whether in a notebook, planner or on your computer – and check in with them regularly, you will still be increasing your chances of completion. At least, that’s what’s worked for me personally - which I talk about in my free Weekly Harmony Compass download. This process means that I review my main 3 missions every week and write down the main needle-moving tasks and goals that I will prioritize each week.

5. Know your direction. Of course, none of the steps above are important unless you know your direction. Before I had a clear vision for the future I wanted, not the future others told me I “should” create, these steps led me down a path I wasn’t interested in. This still led me to hit that burnout because I was running on that hamster wheel, trying to move toward a future that wasn’t meaningful to me. Until I had an idea of the destination I wanted my path to take me, all my progress and productivity were meaningless. That’s why knowing your direction is so important and why I have created an entire program called Align Your Goals that focuses on this exact process.

I hope these steps help you get started on your path to the future you are trying to create! We all will still have obstacles and difficult times along the way. Still, embracing the journey and reminding ourselves that it’s the fun part of reaching our future destination will hopefully make it more fulfilling and enjoyable. There are still days I wake up feeling tired of pushing forward, but in the end, I always come back to these steps, and my Weekly Harmony Compass and My Monthly Harmony Roadmap keep me motivated and on track. Besides, pause and rest are also important – sometimes, we need to take a break, reflect, and reset before continuing on the path we are trying to carve out.

Let me know in the comments if this article helped! I’d love to hear if there is a specific action you plan to take after reading.

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