It’s time for another link roundup! Here are my picks for this month’s best reads around the web to help you with your Personal Development, Productivity and Business! Enjoy!
As always, I hope you’ve enjoyed these articles and I’d love to read anything you found informative this month, so please feel free to leave links in the comments below!
No matter how much I write about productivity, I still receive numerous messages each week by loyal members of my community who are swamped with too much to do and too little time to do it! They feel overwhelmed, they want to focus more on the things they love and they want to know the secret to my productivity. I can completely relate to feeling like you are cagged in by your work and a slave to your schedule, but the truth is their is only one productivity tip that will help you, me or anyone else tame our workloads. This tip isn’t much of a secret, unless of course, no one has ever told you about it, so today, let’s unpack this #1 Secret No One Told You About Productivity!
What is the #1 Secret No One Told You About Productivity?
The biggest secret about productivity that you may not know is that You Can’t Do It All! I know, I know, this goes against everything we have been taught to believe about human ability and persistence, not to mention every girl power message I’ve heard for my last 30 years on this Earth, but it’s true. No one single person can do everything. Yes, I do believe you can achieve all the things you want to achieve in life, but you certainly won’t be doing it alone and if you’re clever, you’ll find ways to hack your daily life and to do list so that you are focusing on the key tasks, routines and decisions that will support your quickest route to success. Now, I want to come back to this point on hacking your life to optimize your success in just a moment, but first, I want to give you some practical strategies for taking this productivity secret and using it to your advantage!
If I Can’t Do It All, How Does Everything Get Done?
You’re probably asking yourself, if I can’t do it all, how does everything get done? You do important work, you have lots of important priorities, and much of what you handle must be done, right? Absolutely! Much of what you handle probably does need to get done, but not necessarily by you. So, if you find that you have too much on your plate, you put in the work and still find that everything isn’t getting done, you really need to start doing two things.
You Need To Delegate And Delete!
First, you need to take a look at everything you do, all your priorities, projects, work, and personal obligations. You need to have a complete understanding of all the elements that take up your time because you will need to Delegate some and Delete others. To delegate, you need to understand what tasks on your list can be completed by someone else. I know many of us, especially the type A’s out there, have a hard time giving over control of tasks to others because we want to know something has been done right, but if something does not require your hand to complete it, you need to assign it to someone else. This could mean an assistant at work, a spouse or child, or even hiring help like a cleaning service or handyman. Not every option is going to be available for every one of us, but wherever we can, we should try to delegate important tasks to someone who is capable of completing the task, even if it means we have to train them how to do it and then reap the time benefits in the future.
Once you do that complete evaluation of your obligations, you will certainly find that you have some things you are doing that can be deleted from your to do list altogether. Like I said earlier, most of what you do probably needs to get done, which means some of what you do can be let go of completely to help you lessen your load. Think about all your extras first, like voluntary obligations outside of work or home. It’s great to be a team player and responsible member of your community, but if you are overwhelmed by everything you need to do and frequently find that you are missing important tasks, you really need to delete any priorities that you signed up for. This doesn’t mean you can never add them back in, but be honest with yourself about what is truly important and be ruthless with anything that takes up your time. Of course, it won’t just be voluntary tasks that you need to delete. Ask yourself what tasks are repeatedly missed or forgotten. Sometimes when we frequently push a task off it means its not actually required to be done. Any extras like this should be deleted from your list until you have reached equilibrium with your time and tasks.
Optimizing Success By Hacking Your Productivity!
Like I mentioned earlier, all of us can improve our productivity and succeed in achieving more of what we want if we optimize our lives with a few hacks here and there. If this sounds interesting to you and you’d like to learn these tips for working smarter, not harder, I’m very pleased to announce that my Planning for Success Master Class is now available! This Master Class and Q&A replay are four information-rich hours of actionable strategies designed to solve your most pressing productivity issues. Included with the class are numerous downloads and worksheets to help you put the strategies taught in place for your specific situation. This class is a tremendous value filled with the precise information you need to optimize your daily life for productivity, but don’t take my word for it! Here is what students from the class are saying:
“The Planning for Success Master Class was so timely for me! I am in constant struggle (more now than ever) with time management and project/tasks all being priority that this class gave me major amounts of tools and guidance that will allow me to gain some sanity again. As a business owner, wife, mother and a person who wants to be all things to most people, this class gave me perspective to what is manageable and plan-able! It has been what is missing in my many years as a professional. I am so glad that I can watch the master class and q & a as much as I want in order to help me build better planning habits. I loved this class and it was time and money well spent! Thank you Alexis!”
– Beth, MO
“The Planning for Success Master Class was a truly great experience! As someone who has run workshops and training, I am in absolute awe at Alexis’ planning, delivery and thoroughness. It has been incredible value for money and I hope that many more will be able to experience this amazing product. I have been given so much information and feel so inspired! Alexis has managed to address most of the organizational, time management and motivational issues that have been plaguing me. I am in-between careers and had hit a dark and sticky rut. This workshop has not only showed me the way forward, it has also turned all the lights on! Many of the concepts were new to me so it has helped to go through the video more than once. It is invaluable that I am able to keep referring to it and I can see how it will all become second nature with some practice. The Q&A session is also extremely interesting. Alexis’ generosity with her time and information sharing are what make her such a great Mentor. I was a fan, now I am a convert! Thank you!!”
– Maria, Australia
“The Planning for Success Master Class was amazing! I have been feeling overwhelmed and almost paralyzed lately in regard to achieving my goals and completing projects. This Master Class provided me with a clear and manageable blueprint that I believe will help me to begin living my life fully again. The value I received from the Planning for Success Master Class was far greater than what I paid for it. Thank you for being so generous with your knowledge and your time. And, I think your online presence is both impressive and beautiful; how you manage to communicate with complete strangers you can’t even hear or see, with such a high level of compassion and grace, is beyond amazing!”
-Cynthia, NV
Don’t let your dreams and goals sit by the wayside any longer!Sign up for the Planning for Success Master Classand join the countless members of my community who’ve benefited from this informative and actionable class!
The 3 Quick Steps for Feeling Productive RIGHT NOW
Overwhelm can strike at any moment and turn a seemingly organized, well-planned day into a downward spiral of confusion and self-doubt. When this happens, it’s so important that you quickly recognize the pattern and take immediate action to halt and reverse it. You can take back your day no matter how deep a spiral you have fallen into, but you need to take these 3 quick steps to get you feeling productive right now!
Step 1: Turn off Distractions
When I get overwhelmed, even the slightest distraction can cause me to panic, so I need to make sure everything that makes noise or has an alert/alarm is silenced. Silence your phone, kill the music, and turn off your computer’s audio and display. If you can’t avoid all noise completely, put on a pair of headphones or put in some earplugs to give you peace and quiet for a few moments as you gather your thoughts.
Step 2: Do a Brain Dump
When your head is spinning out of control and can’t focus on a single task to work on, you need to make space in your mind by performing a brain dump. Take out a piece of paper and a pen and just start listing out everything you are thinking about that is causing you stress or overwhelm. The items don’t even need to be task related. Jot down those negative thoughts, what they are saying and how you are feeling inside. By writing it down, you are figuratively transferring that energy out of your brain and onto the paper. This works well with anything that comes to your mind that for one reason or another, your brain just won’t let go of. So write it, dump it out and get your brain clear to focus.
Step 3: Breathe
Hopefully by this point, you have significantly reduced any distracting noise or screens around you and have completed a brain dump to get everything out of your head and onto paper. Before you get back to work and process through your to dos, take a moment to sit and breath in the silence. Close your eyes, sit comfortably and inhale deeply through your nose, exhaling from your mouth. Breathe in for five seconds, hold your breath for 2, and breathe out for 7 seconds. Repeat this process for at least five minutes before getting back to your work.
I hope these tips help you to regain your control and sense of productivity when overwhelm strikes! Let me know in the comments if you have any other tips or suggestions that you use in this situation.
I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “a little bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing,” and in the case of those looking to do their best work and be as productive as possible, mistakes are commonly made when we take concepts at face value without understanding how to apply them. So, today I want to cover the 7 common mistakes I see people make, that are most likely killing your productivity as well!
1. A Disorganized To-Do List
Anyone will tell you, if you want to get more done, you need a to-do list, but did you ever stop to recognize that your to-do list may be the cause of your productivity woes? A disorganized to-do list can often be more dangerous to your productivity than no list at all. When a daily to do list is too long to complete, fails to batch like-items together or lacks a structure for prioritization, it will debilitate even the most productive person. To remedy this, keep one master to-do list with all your open actions but make a separate daily list with a reasonable number of tasks so that you aren’t overwhelmed by the expectation you are setting. Next, list like items together or use a symbol or color code to match up items that should be done together or maximize efficiency. Finally, identify three items on that list that are the most urgent and complete those as soon as possible before moving on to the rest of the items on your list.
2. Multitasking
The concept of multitasking is an example of when common knowledge doesn’t equal common sense. Years ago, the concept of multitasking was the hot productivity tip that led countless workers into the deep end in terms of poor quality of work, focus and overwhelm. Yes, humans can do more than one thing at a time, but study after study shows they can’t do more than one thing at a time well. Work on only one task at a time, give it your entire focus until completion and then move on to the next. Don’t juggle multiple items at once or you will find all your work crashing to the ground around you.
3. Accepting Tasks Without Question
You probably think that cheerfully accepting tasks from your superiors without question makes you an excellent employee, team player, and asset to your workplace, but when we accept work without asking at least some questions, we waste time and dilute our productivity. Whenever you are given an assignment, you should always get the most important details of the task before agreeing to complete it- if you don’t you may find yourself in deep water when you either overcommit or fail to complete the assignment properly. When you are given a task, activity or project, find out specifics about the due date, expectations (quality, format, budget, goals), and possible support if you experience a conflict (who can you go to for help or information). Most of all, ensure you that understand fully whether this task belongs to you, so that you are not being saddled with someone else’s responsibility or tasks above (or too far below) your pay grade. Failing to understand these important details before committing to work can cause you to spend too much or too little time completing the assignment, cause embarrassing delays or make you look disorganized/irresponsible in the mind of your superior if you keep having to come back to them for more and more details.
4. Doing Everything Yourself
Either out of a sense of perfectionism (“only I know how to do this right”), control (“it’s my responsibility because I’m in charge”) or guilt (“I don’t want to burden anyone else”) individuals commonly kill their productivity by failing to delegate. Most of us work in teams, have a system of family and friends and/or have the ability to delegate or outsource our work, but choose to go it alone and take on everything ourselves. This can put us in a terrible situation of feeling overwhelmed, overworked and isolated, not to mention being a complete waste of our time. Understanding what constitutes the best and highest use of our time, builds key productivity and management skills that we may lack, while simultaneously shaping us into more effective people. To start this process, identify the activities that aren’t the best use of your time and figure out how and who to delegate these tasks to, both inside and outside the office. A busy working mom may see that hiring a cleaning service (or her cousin who works part time) makes her more successful at home as well as in the boardroom or PTA meeting. A junior level sales manager may opt for a virtual assistant to handle their scheduling and finances to have more one on one time with clients and climb the corporate ladder. Likewise, an amateur writer may partner with an amateur photographer to trade copywriting for headshots, capitalizing on their talents in order to delegate work to someone better suited to the task. You may think that you have no one to delete to or no way to afford assistance that may not already exist but if you think strategically, you can delegate any productivity problem.
5. Procrastinating
Procrastination is the productivity killer that comes in many forms. By accepting perfectionism, we procrastinate. By overthinking a problem, we procrastinate. By failing to make decisions, we procrastinate. By leaving tasks unscheduled, we procrastinate. By over-planning, we procrastinate. The only way to end the habit of procrastination is through action. Do something (but not anything), make progress, advance a project, and action will beget action.
6. Drinking Too Much Water
I say it all the time, keep hydrated during your workday to stay sharp and prevent fatigue, but drinking too much can inevitably cause frequent interruptions in the form of bathroom breaks that can kill productivity and create bad work habits. To manage this, drink from a larger bottle and get into the habit of finishing it before getting up to relieve yourself. Drinking from smaller cups means more trips to the water cooler to refill, which increases the time you will spend out of your desk and the number of trips you make to the bathroom. Now, to clarify, it’s not the amount of water at fault, but our hydration habits. Water runs right through us, and if you like to sip, sip, sip throughout the day, you will be running to the bathroom just as often. The point here is to swap sips of water for gulps to absorb your recommended volume in fewer intervals.
7. Sticking to Only One Productivity Strategy
Nothing demonstrates the danger a little bit of knowledge can pose to your productivity as much as someone who is partial to a single strategy and blindly applies it to every situation. The point of productivity is to get more done with less time as often as possible, but humans do not live in a single-situation loop. Every moment of everyday we experience variety, which is why life isn’t a cake walk. We experience new situations constantly, so to say that one single strategy for productivity applies to everything is missing the whole point of being productive. Instead, we must learn about many productivity strategies, what they are best used for and when/how to execute them in our lives. To help make this information more accessible, I have recently started a new YouTube series called Work Smarter, Not Harder. You can check out my first installment of the series here to learn three popular productivity strategies and when they best apply. Keep up to date with the series by subscribing to my YouTube channel so you don’t miss an installment and opportunity to expand your knowledge base and learn how to work smarter, not harder!
Which of these common mistakes is holding you back from maximizing your productivity? Let’s share in the comments!
Are you ready to seriously jump into the halloween spirit this month? There is no better way than with an awesome playlist of spooky Halloween hits! I don’t know about you, but I have a diverse pallet when it comes to my music taste and there are so many great songs that totally embody the spirit of Halloween for me, so I have put together a fresh playlist for you to feast your ears on! Feel free to use it at an upcoming Halloween get-together or on your car ride to the pumpkin patch!
Enjoy!
If you enjoyed this playlist, I’d love to hear about it and I’d be thrilled if you would share it with your friends and family through social media so we can all enjoy some spooky October tunes while we wait for our candy covered comas to arrive!
We talk a lot about productivity and achieving more of your goals here on my blog, but have you ever stopped to ask yourself what a productive day would look like to you? The first step when you are trying to achieve any goal is to understand what the results should look like, and that goes for designing your day as well. I gave some thought to this idea and I came up with a framework that I believe is the basic anatomy of a productive day. Now, granted, this may not be a one-size fits all schedule, but I do think that we should all be making time for each of these daily activities and integrating them into our days more often to regularly establish a habit of productivity into our lives.
A productive day…
…Starts on Time: It’s hard to have a productive day after oversleeping and starting your day off on the wrong foot, so make sure you have a hard wake time for your day, even on the weekends, if you want to set yourself up for success.
…Includes a Morning Routine: Whether your morning is 6am or 6pm, you should have a simple routine established to help you get ready to start your day. Click here if you’d like to learn more about morning routines and establishing one for yourself.
…Happens in an Organized Space: For most of us, being productive requires a bit of organization. I realize that people do have different working styles, and some of us need organized spaces to work while others can work in clutter, but be aware of your work style and make sure you are starting your workday in the proper environment.
…Requires Time Spent Planning: There is no doubt that in order to have a productive day, you need to take time, first thing, to look at your plans, schedule and tasks. During this planning time, you should prioritize your top 3 activities for the day and keep a to-do list with next action items ready to go.
…Manages Time in Blocks: Depending on your work for the day, in order to create and sustain your focus, you should divide your day into time blocks of anywhere from 20 minutes to 4 hours. Assign specific work to your blocks of time and keep a timer or clock in sight to make sure you stay on task and on time.
…Makes Time for Regular Breaks: Within those time blocks, make sure to give yourself regular breaks for meals, decompression, and to stretch your legs. You should take 15 minutes off for every 2 hours of work, and 30 minutes off after 4 hours at work.
…Wraps Up Your Workday Seamlessly: At the end of your workday, take time to wrap up and recap what you have done and what you have left to do. Make a to-do list for the next day, clean your workspace and turn off any work related devices. Don’t forget to leave work at the proper designated time because after a productive day, you need to shut off and remain on time for your personal life.
…Treats Dinner as a Scheduled Event: While you were doing your daily planning or even at some point before that, you should have planned out what you are having for dinner. After a long work day it’s so easy to get lazy about your last meal of the day but doing a little bit of planning or prep ahead of time will transform dinner from a chore to a treat.
…Prioritizes Self Care: When you work hard, you also need to play hard, or in this case, you need to ensure you spend time taking care of yourself so that you are in tip-top shape to have another productive day tomorrow. Click here for some great self care ideas if you need some.
…Winds Down with an Evening Routine:Just as your morning routine helps you prepare for the day, your evening routine helps you transition from productivity to sleep. Spend time on your nightly hygiene, reviewing your day and swap screens for books an hour before bed.
…Ends with a Scheduled Bed Time: Just as it is important to start your day at a regular time, you should also end your day with a scheduled bed time to optimize the amount of sleep you will get to be refreshed and prepared for your next productive day!
I’d love to hear how you add these elements to your day and what a productive day looks like for you so make sure to leave me a comment down below!
A lot of the content I create on my platforms is strategy based, where I’m sharing a process for how to do something specific or how to course correct your already established processes. But making new change is always difficult. I’m not blind to that fact. It’s hard for me, it’s hard for you, and most of all, when we badly want to make a change and try to put a new strategy into place, it can be discouraging if we don’t see that we are making progress. Most of us have a very bad habit of giving up before we reach our goals and I bet if you asked, quitters would say they gave up because “it wasn’t working” or “I wasn’t able to do it.” If you’ve ever given a similar excuse, I bet what you really meant to say was “I tried but I didn’t see any progress so I quit!” It’s hard to see progress, especially if you are really making progress because usually, when you are in the thick of it trying hard and actually moving the needle, you don’t notice anything different because you’re too close to the change to notice a difference. To see progress we need to step back and look at the big picture. So today I want to share with you a few different ways you can do that so you can tell if you are making progress on your goals!
3 Ways to Tell You’re Making Progress
1. Track your actions and results:this works very well with any goal or project that includes measurable objectives like weight loss or sales. You should keep track of your actions, what you are actually doing to make a change, as well as your measurable objectives. This works because when you see your actions, you become more accountable. And when you see the results, you connect the dots between how your actions made a difference. Don’t be surprised if this simple act of tracking ends up being your greatest motivator moving forward because connecting those dots can be very powerful and give you a sense of control over your goal and your life.
2. You’ve hit a roadblock: Change always brings with it a new set of challenges to overcome, and luckily for us, most people see their roadblocks clearer than their progress. So if you are working towards a goal and aren’t sure you have made progress, think about the challenges you’ve faced in the process. The presence of a challenge alone means you were making change, and if you were able to solve the problem and overcome it, you are seriously moving forward.
3. The plan keeps getting tweaked: If you think that having to change your original plan towards your goal means you have failed to make progress, think again! Just like roadblocks, alterations and adjustments are part of the path of progress. If you find that you are negotiating a lot more than you used to as you plan your life around your goal, this means big things are happening. Progress is difficult because it involves adjusting life as you know. Even if you think you set a goal or established a new routine for a minor part of your life, you’ve really started a domino affect that will shift your whole world around you, even if it’s ever so slightly.
Think about an area of your life where you are making change but don’t feel like you’ve seen any progress. Can you apply any of these insights to your situation? If you can identify measurable objectives, start tracking your goal immediately!
What Nobody Tells You About Self Care, and How to Start or Break a Habit
If you remember, my theme for the month of September has been self care and throughout this month, I shared some different topics in my blog and on YouTube to outline my experience of learning to take better care of myself and my priorities. So, I thought that for my link roundup this month, I would try to focus on self-care, habits and motivation to help you make a positive change in your life as well!
I hope you enjoyed these articles, and if you have anything you read and loved in the month of September, please let us know by sharing a link in the comments below!
As some of you may already know, this month I had the book Smarter, Faster, Better by Charles Duhigg on my reading list. I picked up this book via Audible as soon as I heard it has been released on audiobook because I was such a fan of Duhigg’s first book, The Power of Habit. For his second book, Duhigg aimed his focus on the topic of productivity and like his first book, used a selection of case studies to illustrate situations where following or ignoring certain essential productivity principles lead to triumph or disaster. The interesting this about this book, however, is that the productivity principles discussed aren’t exactly the topics you normally think of when you think productivity like list making and setting timers, they are much more scientific and psychological, and like in The Power of Habit, speak to the essence of human nature and how we can learn to control it. There were a number of principles covered in the book, some that pertained to personal productivity and others that were relevant for businesses and teams, but there were three major productivity concepts that really spoke to me and I want to share those with you now.
1. Locus of Control
Reading through the chapter on motivation, Duhigg discussed the concept of the locus of control and how to stimulate your own internal locus of control to inspire you to get things done. What I had remembered of this concept from college psych that Duhigg illustrated via a story of how the U.S. Army trains new recruits was that the locus of control is the degree to which people believe they have control over their own lives. If you have a strong internal locus of control, you see the correlation between your actions and your life and are probably naturally a more productive person. People who have an external locus of control, on the other hand, do not see how their day to day actions affect their lives and often believe that a greater power dictates there situation. If something good happens to them, it was a gift from God, if something bad happens, it was a streak of bad luck- is how the thinking goes for example. The jist is, if you feel like you have power over your life, you are more likely to achieve more than someone who feels powerless or as though someone else has the wheel in their life. Now, to get back the internal locus of control, you need to take power back and motivate yourself into action, and Duhigg explains that you can do this two ways. First, you can frame the actions of your life as choices that put you in control of the outcome. Need to work on an important presentation at work, but keep getting distracted? Give yourself a choice to make like “Work on the reports first or design the slides?” By giving yourself a specific choice to make towards the option, you are taking back the internal locus of control to motivate yourself to act. The second way you can motivate yourself is to explain to yourself why you need to do something and tie it to something you value. For example “I need to work on this presentation now because if I do a good job and win the client, I can ask my boss for a raise!” So the next time you need to motivate yourself, try stimulating your locus of control with one or both of these methods.
2. Cognitive Closure
The need for cognitive closure was a new concept to me, but one I could recognize in my own life. Essentially, to varying degrees, humans experience a need for firm answers and decision making, and some people experience this need more so than others- hello type-A over here must always have cognitive closure or she goes nuts! So, essentially, the need for cognitive closure isn’t a bad or good thing, it’s just a human thing, and what can tend to happen is that those who have a high desire for it, tend to be better workers because they get things done and finish tasks. However, and this is a big however, sometimes the need for closure can cause people to avoid taking the right path or making the right decisions because those paths or decisions may create ambiguity. Now, the way I interpreted this whole discussion for my own personal productivity is that sometimes I avoid doing things that I don’t know how to do, or close myself off to opportunities because I’m not sure I see where they are going. I’d prefer to stay on a firm path and because of that, I may make decisions that make sense but are too safe. Now, in order to get yourself out of this mindset, the best thing to do is to find a mental model. Mental models are examples that you can use to evaluate how you should be doing something. I’ve said this many times before here on my blog, but until you try something you don’t know how to do it. This is why experience is so highly valued in the workplace, not just because it means you have been in a specific situation before, but because you have a breadth of other experiences to help you model different situations that may be new to you. So, if you are setting yourself goals or trying to accomplish something new and your sense of reason is holding you back, find a mental model, an example, an anecdote, anything that will help guide you so know if you are on the right track!
3. Idea Brokering
I think by far this is my favorite concept from the book, and although I see this as more of a problem-solving technique than a true productivity strategy, I think more people need to understand and utilize it. Duhigg introduced the concept of idea brokering with a story about how West Side Story was developed into one of the best known and highly celebrated musicals of all time by some of the best minds across the genres of opera, ballet and musical theater. Essentially, idea brokering is a way of solving problems and creating innovation by taking inspiration from solutions in one area of study and applying them to a different area. We see examples of this all the time. Engineers who design vehicles that mimic the aerodynamics of birds, scientists who use viruses to create new living tissue, and designers who develop new faucet systems based off automotive valves. Idea brokers use an interdisciplinary knowledge to find creative solutions, and the way that you achieve this is by disrupting your own thought patterns and forcing yourself to look a problem from another angle. Now, most of you reading this probably aren’t worried about innovative design ideas, but you can apply this to issues in your own life when you have a problem, by forcing yourself into another perspective. Ask yourself how someone else might approach the problem, like a friend or family member. Ask someone else to look at your problem and give you feedback. Or ask yourself if you know of any situation that your current problem reminds you of. Then, compare and contrast the situations to see if you can approach solving your new problem based on how you overcame a slightly different situation.
Overall, Smarter, Faster, Better definitely lived up to high standard set by Duhigg in The Power of Habit. In both books, he approached a common subject by illustrating uncommon strategies through compelling story telling and interesting case studies. If you haven’t read either book yet, I would suggest picking them up for an eye opening experience!
As I recently shared in my weekly email newsletter (sign up here if you aren’t already) I am kind of obsessed with ASMR videos on YouTube. ASMR stands for autonomous sensory meridian response and it is essentially that relaxing, tingling feeling you get down your spine when you hear, feel or see a relaxing trigger. What these triggers are can vary from person to person and not everyone experiences ASMR. If you are someone who gets those chills or tingles when someone brushes or plays with your hair, you are most likely susceptible to it. I am majorly susceptible to it- to the extent that it relaxes me, puts me to sleep and makes me feel euphoric. Now, it just so happens that there is a community of creators on YouTube who make videos for the express purpose of triggering the ASMR response for those who, like me, enjoy it. I’ll be honest, sometimes these videos seem a little odd, they often include lots of soft whispering and even role-play, but I have been using these videos to relax and fall asleep at night. If you have trouble sleeping or relaxing, you may want to check out some of my favorite videos, I will leave some for you here to enjoy. Just a word of advice for you, you should definitely wear headphones while watching, make sure you are in a comfortable seated or lying position, and keep an open mind. Some of the content may seem strange but it’s oddly soothing and if you are someone who experiences ASMR you will know it after one of these videos. Enjoy!
Do you experience ASMR? Let me know how you enjoyed these videos and if you have any others you want to recommend to me, leave me some links as well!
