4:13 Podcast: Can I Juggle a Lot and Accomplish What Matters Most? With Crystal Paine [Episode 247]

Crystal Paine: I'm choosing to spend my time differently. And that makes you not a victim of your calendar, but a victor in your life that you have some control that you can be intentional, that you can make choices, that choices have consequences both good and bad. And so to allow yourself to say I want to make the choices that are the best choices so that I am able to use my time intentionally, and at the end of my life, that I'm going to look back and say I lived a life that I wrapped it in the things that mattered.

Jennifer Rothschild: Exhausted, burnt out, stressed. Moms are tired and they are in desperate need of a nap, a shower, or some alone time. Or, better yet, how about all three? Well, today, best-selling author, podcaster, and busy mom of six, Crystal Paine, will share the strategies and systems that she uses to maximize your time and energy. You will learn the two questions that you need to ask yourself, the four-step system that will bring you more joy and peace, and the mindset that will help guide all of your decisions. And by the way, this is not just for busy moms. This applies to every single busy human who wants to live a meaningful life. So let's lose the frenzy and get free.

K.C., here we go.

K.C. Wright: Welcome, welcome to the 4:13 Podcast, where practical encouragement and biblical wisdom set you and I up to live the "I Can" life, because you can do all things through Christ who strengthens you.

Now, welcome your host, Jennifer Rothschild.

Jennifer Rothschild: Hello, our friends. We're super glad you're back. And what I got to tell you is I've been meeting so many of you on the road, and I love meeting my 4:13ers. I wish I could get K.C. out of the closet and put him in my suitcase to come with me everywhere I go for Fresh Grounded Faith to meet you. But we're just so happy we're together, that we get to be in your ears and in your heart today, because you are definitely in our heart.

My name is Jennifer, if we're new friends. My goal is to help you be and do more than you feel capable of as you're living this "I Can" life. And you hear us say it often, it's just two friends and one topic and zero stress.

K.C. Wright: Zero stress.

Jennifer Rothschild: And today we got an old friend on the podcast, because Crystal Paine --

K.C. Wright: Yeah.

Jennifer Rothschild: -- she's back with us. And I'm so glad. I loved her last episode. I love her.

And so anyway, we had this amazing conversation. Super practical. As I said up top, this is not just for busy moms. This is for any busy human. And I know a lot of busy humans, male and female, kids, no kids. So I want us to get right to this conversation. In case you're not familiar with Crystal, K.C., why don't you reintroduce Crystal.

K.C. Wright: Sure. Crystal Paine is the founder of moneysavingmom.com. She's host of the Crystal Paine Show Podcast and a New York Times best-selling author. Crystal is passionate about her local church, raising awareness for foster care, going on adventures with her family, and finding great deals at the grocery store. All right? She lives with her husband and six kiddos in Nashvegas, Tennessee. Today she and Jennifer are talking about her latest book called "The Time-Saving Mom."

So pull up your chair. There's room at the table for you. Here we go.

Jennifer Rothschild: All right, Crystal, I have a lot to ask you about your new book -- or your most recent book, "The Time-Saving Mom." And we're glad to have you back again because our listeners love you. But before I even get to the book, we have to talk about your family. You had something really special happen in your family's life -- finally -- last December. So tell us what happened.

Crystal Paine: Yes. So we adopted a sweet little boy. His name is David. We are foster parents and we had been fostering him for 21 months. And we actually had not planned on adopting him. There was another family that was going to adopt him. He has a lot of special needs. He has Down Syndrome. He came to us very malnourished, with a cleft lip palette, had a lot of surgeries and a lot of just specialists. And we just learned all sorts of things right from the get-go. I'd never done a feeding tube, and I had to, like, straight up, right after we got him, figure it out and all that.

But over the course of about six months that we had him in our home, God just knit our hearts to him in just the most beautiful way. And when this other family said that it wasn't going to work for them to adopt him, we just knew that we were supposed to say yes. And it was one of the most significant yeses I've ever said in my life. We were talking about how with the adoption, adoption is kind of almost -- in a sense it's like -- you know when you say yes to marriage, it's like you're choosing to love this person for the rest of your life, and it kind of feels like that weight and that gravity of that. But he is just such a gift to our home.

And the funny thing is is -- so I wrote this book, "The Time-Saving Mom," when we found out -- we didn't know at the beginning, when I said yes to writing it, that we were going to be adopting, and we also did not know that I was going to have another surprise pregnancy. And so I wrote this -- about four weeks after we said yes to adopting him, I was having all these weird symptoms. And, in fact, Jennifer, I came and spoke at one of your conferences --

Jennifer Rothschild: Yes.

Crystal Paine: -- and I remember I just felt so off. And I was like, what is wrong with me? Like, I'm really, really off. And again, I was just thinking we -- I thought, well -- I mean, the doctors said there's no way we could have any more kids. And so I just was thinking, well, this must be early menopause. And so we ended up -- I found this random pregnancy test that I had, I didn't know that I had, and I just took it so that I could just tell myself, like, no, it's just all in your mind. And it was immediately positive. And I just like -- I hadn't even told my husband, like, I was going to take this pregnancy test. And so I called him in there and I said, "Honey, you might want to look at this." Because we had just wrapped our heads around we were going to have -- David was going to be, you know, the caboose, he was number five, and, like, how we were going to do this. And, like, we had just wrapped our heads around all of that and we're like, okay. Yeah. And then it was like, "Sorry."

I had also said -- I was in the middle of writing this book and I was like, how do you write a book whenever you have two toddlers, one who has a lot of special needs, and you're super sick, and you have three teenagers? But it was a crash course in does -- do the principles that I talk about in this book, do they actually work? I got to become my own case study.

So I'm here to tell you I survived and now we have a sweet little boy, another little boy, Micah. He will be a year in June. And he has just been such a gift to our home, and it was the caboose we didn't know that we needed, so God --

Jennifer Rothschild: I love that.

Crystal Paine: God is so good like that!

Jennifer Rothschild: I just love that. And some of the ladies in my office, I mean, they're constantly coming in with Crystal updates about your family and your life on Instagram. So our listeners, if they don't already, need to follow you, because it's just so delightful the way you invite everybody in.

But what I love about that story, besides all the beautiful things about the unexpected gifts of adoption and having a baby, I love the instant credibility it gave that you were trying to write this book during all that, when most women would say, I just have no time. So let's move to the book and let's start with that. All right? Because I do hear it all the time, and I probably have said it before, too, I don't have time. I don't have time. There's not enough time. So let's start with that. Is that phrase even true? Do we have enough time?

Crystal Paine: Well, I truly feel like we have enough time to do what God has called us to do. And if we understand the limitless power of God -- like, he cannot be limited by time. He is also the Creator of time, and to sit in that and to recognize he's not going to give us more to do than he's going to give us the ability to do. Now, I have seen in my life over and over again where it literally feels like he expands my time, like, he multiplies my time. I'll hand up the little crumbs that I feel like I have to offer him, and he turns it into enough to -- you know, we have baskets left over to feed all the people. And so he's so faithful.

But I think when we have this idea of I don't have time, in a sense we're limiting ourselves, but we're also limiting God. We're saying God can't use me and he can't give me what I need. And so I really challenge people it's okay to say I'm choosing to spend my time differently. And that's how I like to view it instead of I don't have time. You don't have to necessarily say that to someone if you're telling them no to something. But in your mind, no, I'm choosing to spend my time differently. And that makes you not a victim of your calendar, but a victor in your life that you have some control, that you can be intentional, that you can make choices, that choices have consequences both good and bad. And so to allow yourself to say I want to make the choices that are the best choices so that I am able to use my time intentionally. And at the end of my life, that I'm going to look back and say I lived a life that I wrapped it in the things that mattered.

Jennifer Rothschild: That's good. I love what you just -- you know, just exploring the difference between being a victim and a victor, and this recognition that, yeah, the calendar is not the boss of us. God has given us the ability to have that kind of authority over our schedule and our time.

And by the way, before I even move on, can I just say this? You did mention, as I asked you about your adoption, that you had been at one of my Fresh Grounded Faith events and you thought, "I was so off." Girl, you were not off. In fact, you were on. So you may have felt it on the inside, but you were so sharp and so on. And what made me think of this is what I wanted to ask you next, because you are very systematic and very clear. So just in case you need to remove that rewind button, please do. You were good. Very effective.

But what I realized in your book, which I already knew about you, is you're a systems girl. Okay? So I happen to be a systems girl. So I love your four-step system -- I don't know what you call it -- but kind of your four-step system for managing time. And you say that it helps you feel less frazzled -- okay, we need that -- it gives you more breathing room -- okay, we need that -- it makes space for investing for what is most important -- yes, we need that -- and the result, joy and peace. All right? Who doesn't need that? So that means we need to hear the four steps.

Crystal Paine: Well, it's interesting you said that I'm a systems girl, because my publisher actually came to me and they said that they wanted me to write this book. And I was sort of like, "There are so many time management books out there." They're like, "No, Crystal, we want you to write about your systems." And I'm like, "Mine are so simple. People are going to be like, why did I spend money on this book?" The more time that I spent just paying attention to routines and systems and principles and practices, I was like, oh, I think I've done these for so long that it just happens naturally, and so it removes so much stress from my life. And so I just deduced it down to these four P's -- because I love alliteration -- and that is pray starting from the posture of understanding that God's got this and that we can rely upon him, that we don't have to do this in our own strength.

I alluded to it earlier when talking about leaning into God's limitless power. We are supercharged super humans, as Alli Worthington talks about, because we have God's Spirit in us. And so leaning into his Spirit to allow him to use us and see ourselves as just conduits to approach our day. And so there are sometimes -- I mean, I'm being honest. I have three under three and one that has a lot of special needs. They all sleep in our room right now, all three of them, and there are a lot of nights when I don't get the great sleep that I would love to get. And so I have to wake up in the morning and say, "God, I trust you with the sleep that I got last night, that you are going to give me the energy that I need to do what you've called me to do." And also starting out my day from that posture of prayer, I actually get on the treadmill and I pray over the day while I walk. I find that it helps me to stay focused in prayer if I'm doing something with my body, so walking and praying, and praying over all the details of the day, and just handing it over to the Lord and saying, "God, this day is yours. It's already been yours, but I just want to acknowledge that to you." So starting by relying upon Jesus.

Secondly is prioritizing. And this is something for me -- it's so easy that we can try to do all the things every single day. And I talk to so many moms who are like, "I'm overwhelmed because I have all of these things I need to do." I have two hands, and so I feel like I can do -- I can hold two things basically at once. And so only doing two priorities a day, only focusing on two priorities.

Now, that doesn't mean that you do parts of other things. You know, it's not like I don't cook or don't talk to my children on those other days. But that I focus on my home or my marriage or my health or the business or my kids or relationships and friendships, I focus only on two areas per day. And I call it the six times two priority system. And I really outline this in the book. How if you focus on two priority areas every single day, and you rotate those throughout the week, over the course of a week you have invested really quality time in those areas, but you're doing it in a way that allows you to still have space to breathe and space to really focus so that you aren't, while you're with your child, thinking, Oh, my goodness, I got to do all these ten other things, and you can't just focus and be present with them. So step one, pray. Step two, prioritize.

Step three, plan. I find that having a plan and then working the plan saves so much time and mental energy. So I use a hybrid planning system, Google calendar and a time block To-Do list. I like the ease of having it electronic, but I like writing it actually out on paper. There's something about that that's really beneficial, and being able to cross it off. So that's what works for me. So in the book I outline Google calendar, how I use it, and then the time block To-Do list, how I use that.

And then also habit tracking. So I have goals that I set, but then I break those down into weekly and then daily bite-sized pieces that I'm focusing on to help me just be taking little tiny baby steps to get where I want to go. So habit tracking is something that keeps me on track, as I can see on my habit tracker over the course of the week the areas that I was able to focus on and making sure that I'm hitting those priority areas in my life. So step three is plan.

And then step four is prep. So you've laid the foundation and you have set yourself up with good priorities and you've put a good plan in place, then it's time to prep so that you can actually follow through. So that is with an evening routine, a morning routine, and then your own personal mindset of taking ownership, not blaming or making excuses, taking ownership, and then also figuring out ways to simplify and make it easy.

Jennifer Rothschild: Wow. Okay, this is brilliant. And I understand that you described it earlier as, well, it's so simple. But just because something is simple doesn't mean that it's always easy, because what you just described for some listeners are like, oh, my gosh, I want to be that person. That is my ideal self she just described. So for the person who might feel overwhelmed and has been writing everything down you said, and she is ready to hit it, and then by tomorrow morning she'll be so discouraged, how would you help that person who's not naturally a systems person?

Crystal Paine: Yes. So one of the things that I did in the book is I wanted to really make it very hands-on. So at the back of the book there's a lot of resources and a lot of practical things that you can print out, but also a seven-week plan that walks you through each of these systems and helps you to set them up and just -- so that you don't have to feel like, I don't know what to do. It's a step-by-step plan for you.

But if you're saying right now, like, I can't even think of that, I can't think of a seven-week plan, I can't even think of all of those systems, I just need to start somewhere, start with prayer. I wanted this to be different than any other time management book that I ever read that was just about all the practical tips. Start with Jesus. Like, if I can give you one thing, one thing that makes the most difference in my life, it is that understanding that I don't have to control everything and everyone. It's that understanding that all I have and all I am is God's and I'm his first. And so starting by just releasing my day to him and asking him for the energy and the strength. I call them flare prayers, where you just shoot up a prayer and ask God for help. So many times if I'm walking into a situation, if I'm needing to have a conversation with a child, if I'm just feeling overwhelmed by a messy house or a long To-Do list, just crying out to the Lord and saying, "God, help me right now, give me what I need," and looking to him and finding my strength and my hope and my joy in him. And when I release my hands instead of clenching my fist, there's just so much more peace in my heart.

Jennifer Rothschild: Okay, that's such a good word. And I will say as I'm listening to you, to stick with your P's, what you did not end your four system with was a fifth word that starts with a P: produce. Because some of us, when it comes to time management and coming up with systems, it's so that we can produce more. And what I hear you saying is you are structuring a life based on God's calling for you, how he wired you, and then this is giving a framework within which you can operate in a meaningful way to be -- well, like I say on this podcast, to be who he's called you to be and to do what he's called you to do.

And so for my Type A friends out there who are thinking number five should be produce, produce, produce, no, it really isn't about that. It's not about the destination; it's about the path. And I love the path that you set out, Crystal. That's super helpful. And even for those who might already have the system, I think this is a really good system to review and put up against what we're already doing and just see how this might help inform or change something that we're doing or not doing. So I love that.

Now, something else you say in the book, Crystal, is that you ask yourself -- two questions that you're constantly asking yourself. Okay? How can I make this easier, and what can I do to simplify this? So I would love for you to explain to us why you chose those two questions, and how do they help?

Crystal Paine: Yes. I think so often we overcomplicate things. Like, we feel like we have to do things a certain way. So often I'll be talking to someone and they'll just be like, "I cannot come up with any solution and it's just not working." And if we just zoom out and look at the big picture and say, Okay, is there a creative alternative here? Can we make this easier? Can we simplify this? And so I ask myself that all the time. If I'm kind of coming up against something where I'm like, huh, this is not working. How can I make it easier? And it almost feels, like, wrong, like, we shouldn't be asking that, like we're encouraging laziness or something, but I'm like, no. I want to make as many things in my life as easy and simple as possible so, like you said, I can focus on the most important things.

So for me right now -- I have three teenagers. I have a senior -- she's graduating -- and she's 18. We're getting ready to launch her. And then I have a 15-year-old and a just turned 14-year-old. And, you know, it's just -- this is a season where I want to be able to just sit with them and laugh with them and enjoy them and spend time with them. And if I am getting stuck in all the minutiae of all these details and making life complicated, I'm not able to just be with people.

And so that might look like taking some shortcuts. It's okay. For instance, we have cleaners come and clean our house, and it saves me hours and hours every week. There was a time when financially we couldn't do that. But if you're in a financial place where you can take some of these shortcuts, you can provide jobs for other people. You can maybe buy veggies at the store that are pre-washed. You can ask someone else to help you. You can delegate stuff. You can work together as a team with your spouse. As moms, you don't have to do it all yourself. If you have kids at home, let them help you. You know, I think with my teenagers, I want them to know how to do the laundry and how to do the dishes and how to clean up. And if I'm just feeling like, well, I'm the only one that knows how to do it well -- sure, they're going to do it differently than me. Sure, they're maybe not going to do it quite as well as I could do it, but it's going to help me out and it's going to help them out. So how can you make it easier?

Jennifer Rothschild: When I read those two questions, I thought, you know, I have known people who I call complicators. It's not that they're not lovely people. But they can take something that should be what I think is simple and complicate it with overthinking or too many questions or too many redundancies. And one of the things I've learned from that is -- of course, I have that tendency too. We all do in certain settings. But what I've learned from that is there is a virtue in simplicity. So making something easier, simplifying a process is smart. And like you said, it can actually help others. Sometimes we think, oh, well, you know, this isn't laudable that I'm delegating. No, it's actually generous. So I'm grateful you gave that example.

And you mentioned something a couple of questions ago that you mention in your book. I think it's a hack or a tool for managing time. You called it time blocking. So I would like to circle back to that and have you explain what that is and why it works. Well, and tell also someone how they could get started with time blocking.

Crystal Paine: So this is one of those things that people ask me about all the time. And it is truly, I feel, like my brain on paper. And, for instance, today, the day that we're recording this, I woke up and it was one of those days where from early until late, there are a lot of responsibilities and tasks and to-dos and things that needed to -- people that needed to be taken to different places and all of that. And so this list has been so helpful for me.

Before I go to bed at night, I look at my Google calendar -- which I talk about in the book how I set up my Google calendar with all day tasks, that basically it's just me brain dumping everything in my brain. I have a system for that so that it's out of my brain and somewhere safe. And then I look at my Google calendar to see what I have to do the next day, and then I actually outline it in time blocks, and so from the time that I get up until the time that I go to bed.

Now, for some people that feels really rigid. That feels like, I don't want to do that because I don't want to be boxed in like that. And maybe this isn't going to work for you. But if you don't have some sort of plan, life is just going to hit you. Like, you're just going to be putting out fires, walking around in circles, and you're going to look at the end of the day and you're going to be like, I have so much to do and I got hardly anything done.

Jennifer Rothschild: Yeah.

Crystal Paine: A plan is what really helps you. And so I will put down, you know, 6:30 to 7:30, this; 7:30 to 8:30, this. And I prioritize it based upon not only my priority focus areas, but also the things that maybe I don't want to do as much, like, I need to get them done, putting those early in the day. And then I always add wiggle room into my schedule because life is going to happen. Like I said, I have three little children and three teenagers, and so there's lots and lots of interruptions.

Jennifer Rothschild: Yes.

Crystal Paine: And I try to not even think of that. Like, I plan for the interruptions, because when you plan for them, then they're not something that's really frustrating. It's like, oh, I planned for this. I knew this was going to happen. And so planning for that and padding it with a lot of space and wiggle room. But then also toward the end of the day, putting in time for fun and things that I can look forward to. But this allows me to then be able to just be fully focused wherever I am, because I know that the other things, they have a plan.

And so it's like for me with a budget. With moneysavingmom.com, I am big on budgeting. Anybody who follows me knows that. We have a very meticulous zero-based budget that we've had since the very beginning of our marriage, and it's saved us hundreds and -- I mean, I don't even know how much money over the years. Thousands and thousands of dollars. But it's allowed us to have that freedom, because we know when we spend this money here, it's not taking money away from something else because we've pre-designated that money to go for that.

The time blocking for me is the same sort of thing. It's me pre-deciding how my day is going to be and pre-deciding my priorities for the day and then just following the plan. But planning for the interruptions, planning for the Holy Spirit to move that I am going to go talk to this person or whatever. But giving myself that plan ahead of time, so then I just follow the plan. Like this morning, just waking up and being like, okay, today doesn't feel overwhelming, even though there are a lot of things going on, because I have a plan and I just follow the plan.

Jennifer Rothschild: And then you're not thinking with stress brain. I mean, you're creating non-issues out of all the things that could be happening in your day. Because sometimes when there is a lot, as you described, we can be so stressful, we can't even think straight. So even if we are managing our time well, we're so stressed out about it that we're not even effective. So I think it is -- I happen to be a natural time blocker, and for me I do it in general tasks. I'll put in the three-hour -- like, a 9:00 to 12:00, I'm doing such and such, from 1:00 to 4:00, I'm doing such and such. And like you said, it gives the space for interruption or flexibility, or whatever we want to call it.

I just love, Crystal, how pragmatic and grace filled your approach to this is, and I know that our listeners are going to love this book. So I'm glad you've written it because we have to get to our last question. All right. So one of the things that I remember from Stephen Covey -- as you know, he talked about beginning with the end in mind. And I thought of that when I read a little bit about your suggestion that deals with what I would call having a 25-year mindset. So I would love for you to finish up by unpacking what that is, having a mindset that's 25 years. And then I want to know personally for Crystal, when you look forward, what do you hope to see?

Crystal Paine: So it's interesting, as I was writing this book, I remembered back to my high school graduation. And I didn't write this book thinking of that, but as I was just planning for it, I remembered -- so I was 18 years old and I gave a speech, not because I was the valedictorian, but because I was homeschooled. And so you get to give a speech at your graduation because you're [audio glitch]. I graduated with a few of my friends who were also homeschooled. And my speech was all about time is short. And since the time that I have been young, I've had this burning passion to use my days well. And a question that I ask all the time is, what's going to matter in 25 years from now? What's going to matter at the end of my life? And I really feel like that helps to simplify and streamline, because there are so many things that we can get hung up on, stressed out about, overwhelmed by that in the grand scheme of things aren't going to matter at all. And so wrapping my time and my life and my energy and my thoughts around what is going to matter in 25 years from now, what's going to matter at the end of my life. And so that's really what I seek to do, what I seek to focus on.

And so for me, I said, you know, what does that look like? It is people. God's Word and people, those are the two things that we're going to bring into eternity, and so I want to wrap my life around that. And so pouring into my kids, loving them well, loving the people right in front of me. And so that's spending so much time with my littles right now.

And you were talking about how the fifth P is not "produce." I think foster care for me has taught me that taking the time to build attachments is so important for the health of someone for the rest of their life. And so it might feel like it's monotonous work, that you're just sitting there and you're rocking a child and you're changing their diaper, and when they cry, you're picking them up and you're holding them and you're comforting them. But that is actually creating attachment pathways for them that is going to provide health, and so much that's going to give them -- instead of dysfunction, it's going to allow them to function for the rest of their life. And so recognizing that that is important work that I'm doing right now.

And also then investing in my older kids, and just loving them and pouring into them. Investing in my marriage. Because I think -- you know, someday these children aren't going to be in our house, and so I want to invest in my marriage. And then investing in our local community and just loving the people right in front of me and just building relationships and being available. That's just one of -- my word for this year is "space," making space in my heart and my home for the people that God has put there, to be available and present with them.

K.C. Wright: People are what matters most. People. Let's keep investing well. We aren't spending time; we are investing it. So I'm really pumped about her strategies and principles. This was really, really good stuff today on The 4:13.

Jennifer Rothschild: It was. I totally agree with you, K.C. I loved it and I love Crystal.

So if you want more -- and I know you do -- go to the Show Notes at 413podcast.com/247. That way you can get her book and you can also read a transcript of this conversation.

K.C. Wright: Actually, I was thinking I could even add a fifth P to her list there.

Jennifer Rothschild: Really?

K.C. Wright: Yeah.

Jennifer Rothschild: Okay. What?

K.C. Wright: Peace.

Jennifer Rothschild: Oh, yeah.

K.C. Wright: Peace. Yeah.

Jennifer Rothschild: Yeah.

K.C. Wright: Because Jesus is the Prince of Peace. And that is what you get when you ask God to help you with your calendar. Peace, peace, shalom peace.

So remember, no matter how busy you may feel right now, we get it. You can pray, you can plan, you can prioritize, you can prep, and we speak peace over you, because you can do all things through Christ who gives you supernatural strength. I can.

Jennifer Rothschild: I can.

K.C. Wright: And you can.

Jennifer Rothschild: Yes, you can.

K.C. Wright: True story.

Jennifer Rothschild: Wasn't it good? So practical.

K.C. Wright: So good.

Jennifer Rothschild: So practical. I liked your peace, though.

K.C. Wright: Yes.

Jennifer Rothschild: Peace, peace like a river.