The player is loading ...
52 | Throwing (some) courses into the sea
Signed up for too many courses? It's fine to get rid of them.
A few weeks ago, a student in my Grow course shared a sentiment that's all too familiar.
She wrote:
"Having bought too many courses that are on backlog feels super burdensome. I want to just throw them all into the sea, as they represent time I don’t have."
So relatable, especially after almost 3 pandemic years.
Here are my suggestions:
#1: Make an inventory of the things you signed up for
Write it all down in a Google/Word doc (or anywhere you'll be able to find later) with links & expiration dates if relevant. Include free stuff.
#2: Decide which ones are a priority now
A reasonable number. Think 3-4 over the next few months.
#3: Keep other interesting ones for reference later
They're on your inventory list if you need them. Stop thinking about them for now.
#4: Pitch the rest into the sea
Actually delete them. Toodles.
To reiterate, you are allowed to get rid of trainings, classes, webinars, cheat sheets, templates, etc. for any reason, even if you’ve paid for them.
Don’t like the teaching style? Chuck it.
Already know most of the material? No need to keep it.
Not interested? Can't remember why you signed up? Have 17 sales page templates that are all basically the same? It’s fine to delete.
Time to do some fall cleaning.
Other episodes mentioned:
-- Send in a question for Camille: https://intheclinic.com
Thanks for listening.
I'd love to hear from you. Leave me a voicemail with feedback or submit a question (click the pink "Send Camille a Message" button on the side of the page) 💚
Camille's Helpful Links for Practitioners
Transcript
Camille (00:00)
Well, hi there. Welcome to in the clinic with Camille. My name is Camille Freeman. I am a licensed nutritionist and registered herbalist, and in this podcast I share little tips and tidbits that might be interesting or helpful for other practitioners.
Camille (00:21)
Hello. Hello. Today we are going to talk about what to do with all of those courses and trainings and webinars and conference proceedings and handouts and other similar things that you have signed up for, whether they were free or whether you paid for them and you've never quite gotten around to doing them. This episode was inspired by Louise, who wrote to me, and I quote, having bought too many courses that are on backlog feels super burdensome. I want to just throw them all into the sea as they represent time I don't have.
Camille (00:50)
I love this and I know Louise is not the only one of us who has an overflow of things that we've signed up for that sounded really good at the time, or they were having a big sale, or it was free and you were like, why not? Why not? Why don't I sign up for this in case I ever need it in the future? It seemed like a great idea at the time. And now you are still getting emails about this, or it's taking up space in your inbox or on your to do list, or you've got it saved in a folder and every time you come across it, you are sort of like, oh, I probably should do that.
Camille (01:22)
It weighs on you, it takes up space in your brain. So what should you do? What is the process? Here are my recommendations. First of all, I recommend that you put a moratorium on purchasing or signing up for any other new things until you can really go through this process.
Camille (01:38)
I know that's easier said than done. And I have a separate podcast episode about how to decide if you should purchase a course or sign up for it. If it's free, I'll link to that in the show notes in case you need it. But what do you do about the ones you already have? Again, whether they're free or whether this is something that you paid for, the first thing I want you to do is open up your practice notebook.
Camille (02:00)
If you don't have a practice notebook and you have no idea what I'm talking about, I have a separate episode on that. But if that's the case for you, just open up a Google Doc or a Word doc or perhaps just a piece of paper. This is going to be a little bit easier if you do it electronically, but you do you whatever works. Open up a fresh page of some sort and take an inventory of things that you already have purchased or signed up for. Just list them all down.
Camille (02:26)
If you've been at this for quite a while, this might take several days or several weeks even to really remember all the different things that you have purchased or signed up for. And over time, you might add to your list. You might have forgotten a few things and you're like, oh yeah, I need to add that to the list. That is okay, you can add to the list as you go, but for right now, put as many of them as you can find all on your list, things that you have access to. Once the list is as complete as it's going to be.
Camille (02:56)
For right now, I want you to keep adding later on, but once it gets to where you feel like, okay, I've pretty much got almost everything, I want you to start to think about it. Side note, if you sign up for any other things, please do add them to the list. Okay, like I said before, I don't recommend signing up for any other new things right now. But if you do, but if you can't help yourself, add it to the list as well. So keep it going.
Camille (03:22)
All right, now you have a comprehensive or mostly comprehensive inventory of what you already have. If you can also write down expiration date information that is actually really helpful. And if you're doing it electronically, I also like to just put a link to the dashboard or how to access whatever thing it is that makes your life a little bit easier in the future as well. Again, if you can't get to that, if you're doing a hard copy, that's fine too. Okay, so now you've got one big list.
Camille (03:50)
It's not filtered. It's just a bunch of things that you thought you might need or you purchased. Okay. Now, next, go through your list. Highlight, circle, star, move to the top.
Camille (04:01)
Do something with the ones you think might be helpful for you to do or take in the near future. What do I mean by near future? For most of us, that's going to be in the three to six month range. If your brain extends out to a year, perhaps that would work for you. Most of us, I think, are going to be in the three to six month range.
Camille (04:19)
For example, if you sign up for a whole bunch of webinars about different clinical topics. But right now you have a client who has Ms, and one of the webinars or trainings that you signed up for is about Ms, that would be a good one to do soonish. Versus if you have another one about Alzheimer's disease and you don't happen to have a client who is dealing with Alzheimer's right now, then that one isn't as urgent. All right, so we want a short list of things that you'd like to get to first. For whatever reason, it can be because you need it right now, because you're just more interested in that because it's expiring, whatever else.
Camille (04:54)
Now look at your list of things you've starred and ask yourself, is this a reasonable amount of things for me to accomplish in three to six months? Given my schedule? Some of you can get through a lot of these in a week. Others of you might really just have an hour or two a week. So you're going to need to put them in order of priority.
Camille (05:11)
So maybe you're like the Ms one. Absolutely. That's the first one I want to do. If I have time, then I'll get to this one, this one, and this one. Okay, so you've got your priority list of ones that you think that you could use right now or you're interested in doing now ish okay.
Camille (05:28)
So you should have a reasonable number on there that you could legitimately complete over the next few months. Now you've got all these other ones. So first of all, all the other ones, are there any that you can legitimately throw out into the sea? As Louise said, it's okay to throw them out into the sea. You get to decide if something is worth your time and energy, whether it's a free thing or whether you've paid for it.
Camille (05:58)
It is okay to not do it. It's okay to only do part of it. It's okay to just pick out the pieces that are relevant to you or that are interesting to you and not do the rest. Most of these things, there is not a gold star if you do every single thing okay, so it's totally fine if you only want to do some of them. It's also totally fine if you started it and it really didn't work for you.
Camille (06:22)
You didn't align with the way that the material was presented. You didn't align with the content of the material. It was boring. It wasn't relevant. You already knew the things they were going over.
Camille (06:32)
Or it's just not important for you, and you don't think it ever will be. You can just delete them. You can delete all of it. You can unsubscribe them from the email list, take it off your to do list. You don't have to do it.
Camille (06:44)
Just get rid of it. All right, if it's something that you got and you think I might use that later. Let's say, for example, you signed up for a big course on SEO, and you realize that SEO is not a priority for you right now. You've got a bunch of other things you need to work on. But in the future, there may come a time where that's all valuable information for you.
Camille (07:07)
Then you can put it into your library. All right, so your library is all the courses left on your list that you don't want to take right now, but that you might need or want to take in the future. So you could just have a big list of them. Or if you have a different system, for example, if you've got a place where you keep SEO related things, you may want to copy it into that as well. So that when you go looking wherever you would naturally look, when it's time to do SEO, you'll remember, oh, I have this course.
Camille (07:36)
So those are two options. One, you just keep it on your sort of inventory list of things you have access to, and hopefully you'll remember to check back there. Or two, copy it to somewhere else where you might find it if you need it. Okay, so there we have it. Hopefully, by the time that you do this process, you will feel a lot better about what you have.
Camille (07:57)
If nothing else, just having the inventory helps to make decisions, so I recommend from now on, keep that inventory going every single time you sign up for something, you can look and see, oh, do I need it? Do I already have something that covers the same thing? And then you will later know what all you have access to, right? So, in summary, don't buy any new things until you complete this process. Go make your inventory.
Camille (08:24)
Decide what's your priority to work on over the next three to six months. Look through everything else. Chuck things into the sea if you don't need them, want them, feel like doing them, or think you're going to need them in the future, and everything else, keep in your inventory and circle back. Once you finish up going through the priority courses, programs, workshops, you can go back to some of the other ones, or if a new thing comes up, you can look through and say, hey, do I have anything going over Alzheimer's or Adaptogens or whatever else? All right, so there you go.
Camille (08:57)
A short program for you to consider for all the different things that you have purchased or signed up for. If you have any questions or if you have a topic that you need help with, please let me know. I'd love to talk to you. I'm about it and share some thoughts with other folks. Right?
Camille (09:14)
Have a wonderful day, and I'll talk to you again soon.
Well, hi there. Welcome to in the clinic with Camille. My name is Camille Freeman. I am a licensed nutritionist and registered herbalist, and in this podcast I share little tips and tidbits that might be interesting or helpful for other practitioners.
Camille (00:21)
Hello. Hello. Today we are going to talk about what to do with all of those courses and trainings and webinars and conference proceedings and handouts and other similar things that you have signed up for, whether they were free or whether you paid for them and you've never quite gotten around to doing them. This episode was inspired by Louise, who wrote to me, and I quote, having bought too many courses that are on backlog feels super burdensome. I want to just throw them all into the sea as they represent time I don't have.
Camille (00:50)
I love this and I know Louise is not the only one of us who has an overflow of things that we've signed up for that sounded really good at the time, or they were having a big sale, or it was free and you were like, why not? Why not? Why don't I sign up for this in case I ever need it in the future? It seemed like a great idea at the time. And now you are still getting emails about this, or it's taking up space in your inbox or on your to do list, or you've got it saved in a folder and every time you come across it, you are sort of like, oh, I probably should do that.
Camille (01:22)
It weighs on you, it takes up space in your brain. So what should you do? What is the process? Here are my recommendations. First of all, I recommend that you put a moratorium on purchasing or signing up for any other new things until you can really go through this process.
Camille (01:38)
I know that's easier said than done. And I have a separate podcast episode about how to decide if you should purchase a course or sign up for it. If it's free, I'll link to that in the show notes in case you need it. But what do you do about the ones you already have? Again, whether they're free or whether this is something that you paid for, the first thing I want you to do is open up your practice notebook.
Camille (02:00)
If you don't have a practice notebook and you have no idea what I'm talking about, I have a separate episode on that. But if that's the case for you, just open up a Google Doc or a Word doc or perhaps just a piece of paper. This is going to be a little bit easier if you do it electronically, but you do you whatever works. Open up a fresh page of some sort and take an inventory of things that you already have purchased or signed up for. Just list them all down.
Camille (02:26)
If you've been at this for quite a while, this might take several days or several weeks even to really remember all the different things that you have purchased or signed up for. And over time, you might add to your list. You might have forgotten a few things and you're like, oh yeah, I need to add that to the list. That is okay, you can add to the list as you go, but for right now, put as many of them as you can find all on your list, things that you have access to. Once the list is as complete as it's going to be.
Camille (02:56)
For right now, I want you to keep adding later on, but once it gets to where you feel like, okay, I've pretty much got almost everything, I want you to start to think about it. Side note, if you sign up for any other things, please do add them to the list. Okay, like I said before, I don't recommend signing up for any other new things right now. But if you do, but if you can't help yourself, add it to the list as well. So keep it going.
Camille (03:22)
All right, now you have a comprehensive or mostly comprehensive inventory of what you already have. If you can also write down expiration date information that is actually really helpful. And if you're doing it electronically, I also like to just put a link to the dashboard or how to access whatever thing it is that makes your life a little bit easier in the future as well. Again, if you can't get to that, if you're doing a hard copy, that's fine too. Okay, so now you've got one big list.
Camille (03:50)
It's not filtered. It's just a bunch of things that you thought you might need or you purchased. Okay. Now, next, go through your list. Highlight, circle, star, move to the top.
Camille (04:01)
Do something with the ones you think might be helpful for you to do or take in the near future. What do I mean by near future? For most of us, that's going to be in the three to six month range. If your brain extends out to a year, perhaps that would work for you. Most of us, I think, are going to be in the three to six month range.
Camille (04:19)
For example, if you sign up for a whole bunch of webinars about different clinical topics. But right now you have a client who has Ms, and one of the webinars or trainings that you signed up for is about Ms, that would be a good one to do soonish. Versus if you have another one about Alzheimer's disease and you don't happen to have a client who is dealing with Alzheimer's right now, then that one isn't as urgent. All right, so we want a short list of things that you'd like to get to first. For whatever reason, it can be because you need it right now, because you're just more interested in that because it's expiring, whatever else.
Camille (04:54)
Now look at your list of things you've starred and ask yourself, is this a reasonable amount of things for me to accomplish in three to six months? Given my schedule? Some of you can get through a lot of these in a week. Others of you might really just have an hour or two a week. So you're going to need to put them in order of priority.
Camille (05:11)
So maybe you're like the Ms one. Absolutely. That's the first one I want to do. If I have time, then I'll get to this one, this one, and this one. Okay, so you've got your priority list of ones that you think that you could use right now or you're interested in doing now ish okay.
Camille (05:28)
So you should have a reasonable number on there that you could legitimately complete over the next few months. Now you've got all these other ones. So first of all, all the other ones, are there any that you can legitimately throw out into the sea? As Louise said, it's okay to throw them out into the sea. You get to decide if something is worth your time and energy, whether it's a free thing or whether you've paid for it.
Camille (05:58)
It is okay to not do it. It's okay to only do part of it. It's okay to just pick out the pieces that are relevant to you or that are interesting to you and not do the rest. Most of these things, there is not a gold star if you do every single thing okay, so it's totally fine if you only want to do some of them. It's also totally fine if you started it and it really didn't work for you.
Camille (06:22)
You didn't align with the way that the material was presented. You didn't align with the content of the material. It was boring. It wasn't relevant. You already knew the things they were going over.
Camille (06:32)
Or it's just not important for you, and you don't think it ever will be. You can just delete them. You can delete all of it. You can unsubscribe them from the email list, take it off your to do list. You don't have to do it.
Camille (06:44)
Just get rid of it. All right, if it's something that you got and you think I might use that later. Let's say, for example, you signed up for a big course on SEO, and you realize that SEO is not a priority for you right now. You've got a bunch of other things you need to work on. But in the future, there may come a time where that's all valuable information for you.
Camille (07:07)
Then you can put it into your library. All right, so your library is all the courses left on your list that you don't want to take right now, but that you might need or want to take in the future. So you could just have a big list of them. Or if you have a different system, for example, if you've got a place where you keep SEO related things, you may want to copy it into that as well. So that when you go looking wherever you would naturally look, when it's time to do SEO, you'll remember, oh, I have this course.
Camille (07:36)
So those are two options. One, you just keep it on your sort of inventory list of things you have access to, and hopefully you'll remember to check back there. Or two, copy it to somewhere else where you might find it if you need it. Okay, so there we have it. Hopefully, by the time that you do this process, you will feel a lot better about what you have.
Camille (07:57)
If nothing else, just having the inventory helps to make decisions, so I recommend from now on, keep that inventory going every single time you sign up for something, you can look and see, oh, do I need it? Do I already have something that covers the same thing? And then you will later know what all you have access to, right? So, in summary, don't buy any new things until you complete this process. Go make your inventory.
Camille (08:24)
Decide what's your priority to work on over the next three to six months. Look through everything else. Chuck things into the sea if you don't need them, want them, feel like doing them, or think you're going to need them in the future, and everything else, keep in your inventory and circle back. Once you finish up going through the priority courses, programs, workshops, you can go back to some of the other ones, or if a new thing comes up, you can look through and say, hey, do I have anything going over Alzheimer's or Adaptogens or whatever else? All right, so there you go.
Camille (08:57)
A short program for you to consider for all the different things that you have purchased or signed up for. If you have any questions or if you have a topic that you need help with, please let me know. I'd love to talk to you. I'm about it and share some thoughts with other folks. Right?
Camille (09:14)
Have a wonderful day, and I'll talk to you again soon.
Listen On