We have a few days to go before Christmas and the hustle and bustle can certainly be stressful. However, there are ways to make your holidays more mindful and heartfelt. Here are some Intelligent tips you can start with.

Plan ahead and be more intentional
Planning ahead is the first step for staying more mindful, intentional, and focused on what is truly important. It gives you the time and energy to think of different ways you can make gifting and the overall festive experience more meaningful and joyful.

Take a notebook or use your Productivity Planner and make a list of everything you need to do, from planning holiday activities and meal preparation, to gift shopping. Then, explore your why behind giving the gifts and think of what is significant to the recipient. Reflect on these questions:

• How do you understand and measure the value of a gift?
• How can your appreciation and love be transformed into holiday gifts?
• How do you want to share your positive energy...

In his book, Finding the Life You’ve Always Wanted, best-selling author John Ortberg uses a sports metaphor to explain a tried and true method to maximizing your motivation.

He says, “Suppose you woke up tomorrow morning and decided to run a marathon. You put on some running shoes, don the right apparel, and head out the door to begin your 26.2 mile run. Could you do it? What if you tried hard? Really, really hard? If you gave it the ole’ 110%? The obvious answer is, for most of us would be no, of course not.”  

“Too often, we “try to do better” in an area of life. The problem is that trying won’t get us any closer to our goals. Only training will do that.”

No matter how hard we try, most of us couldn’t simply head out the door and run 26.2 miles. If we want to run a marathon, we’re going to have to train for it. Effort alone just won’t cut it.

But what if you woke up each morning and trained to run...