A village in Tyrol taught me how to prioritize

It was a normal Wednesday when my partner was called to do a big presentation in Tyrol. He was about to decline the offer when I screamed "DON'T YOU DAAAAARE".

(Yeah, our neighbors love us. 😂)

Of course I had no idea of where Tyrol is. I just thought that if the train takes 3 hours to get to Budapest or Prague from Vienna, it couldn't be that far away. I was wrong.

We ended up in a 9-hour long trip (two trains and a bus) . Only when we got there I realized in that amount of time we would have managed to get to the airport, landed in New York and even probably tasted the first authentic American burger.

BUT I can say that the little village hidden in the mountains we ended up in was taken straight from some fairytales books. Kids playing in the streets, nice people saying "hello", they even smiled! (764 km away from grumpy Viennese - that's why).

The first night we needed something nice and calm for dinner, as the big presentation would have been the next day.

Just next to our apartment there was a restaurant. It seemed perfect. But when we opened the door w found ourselves in the entry hall of a family house. Big and small shoes on the floor, hanged coats on the wall, some toys in the way.

"Is this right?" I asked my partner. It felt like we were breaking into someone else's property.

But we kept going and opened the first door on the left. We found ourselves in the living room. There were also big wooden tables, centerpieces, and a family with two kids in their pygiamas playing cards.

The Mum told us to sit and she then brought us a menu. Let me say: I didn't miss the American burgers. Authentic Austrian food, big portions, and absolutely perfect crunchy fries...what a dream.

Of course I started referring to this family as "our neighbors" and told everybody that "our neighbors" had invited us to dinner. (We paid for dinner, just to be clear - but the romanticized version is so much more poetic).

We went to bed at 8.30 (what a luxury) and I already felt perfectly integrated in this little village's world.

Also, we truly needed to rest cause it wasn't a real holiday. We were there for work. And what a preparation: my partner was given 3 days to come up with a 45 minute presentation where he had to prepare a 90 day work plan. Not a piece of cake.

I saw this as a perfect opportunity to help and also to take my mind off from my business for a couple of days.

The moment my partner got on the taxi to go to the presentation, I sat down in the living room of the apartment. Everything was covered in snow, silent and beautiful.

Come on Lisa. It's time to finally enjoy. You did the work. Now REEELAX.

Nope. There was something bugging me. I couldn't stop thinking about the presentation and the requirements: a 90 day work plan based on timing and priorities.

Priorities. That's an interesting work.

Cause everything I do in my own business always screams priority to me:

• I open my homepage and OOOPS - I have to chance the color palette (AGAIN).

• I write the draft of a sales email and OOOPS - it should be less "salesy" and more "authentic".

• I create a Ebook and OOOPS - I am not satisfied until I have another 20 revisions.

No doubt about the fact that I work A LOT. But do I work SMART?

I actually don't. What if I started making a new list after the To-do List that I do every week? And the second list would be the priorities of the first list. I wouldn't probably save time cause the things have to be done, but still I could manage them better.

So - I started making that list. And boy, the picture was different.

More clarity.
More focus.
More calm.

Will it last? Making this list has officially become my #1 priority (and yes, it takes more time than actually doing the things on the list).

Will I still change my website's palette color for no reason? OH YEAH.

But at least now I know it's not a priority. (Or is it? Let me check real quick...)