My SIMPLE (super productive) step-by-step MONTHLY PLANNING ROUTINE ✨ - Plan the month with me

A December reset centers on two moves: cutting burnout by restructuring work into energy-saving “batch days,” and using a 12-week-year framework to slow down for reflection while still pushing key goals. After stepping back from clinical neuros psychology work—driven by compassion fatigue and personal stress—Dr. Tiffany Shelton reorganized her schedule so business and creative output can run on predictable blocks. Mondays become mostly admin and email marketing; Tuesdays shift to behind-the-scenes content creation like scripting YouTube videos and producing blogs and short-form marketing; Wednesdays act as an overflow buffer; Thursdays are reserved for neuros psychology responsibilities with interns plus a seminar; and Fridays focus on filming (including YouTube lives and short-form), plus a weekly family meeting with her husband. She plans to test this structure through December and then lock it into her habits system.

The planning routine is built around a “habits and routines organizer” that turns monthly intentions into weekly and daily trackers. She drafts a rough monthly schedule on paper first, then transfers it into her habits organizer and a Notion “second brain” once it feels stable—keeping both paper and digital versions so she can mark up changes quickly. The organizer includes early morning, morning, lunch, and evening routines, plus weekly routines tied to her batch days. It also tracks habits across time horizons: daily habits, monthly resets, quarterly goals, and yearly house-maintenance items. On the monthly reset page, she lists the specific outputs she aims to produce—one YouTube story-driven moment, one SEO blog, one newsletter, and a Pinterest collage repurposed to LTK—along with home priorities like decorating.

Her December planning is also framed by the 12-week-year “Q4” mindset: flourishing and momentum, followed by a deliberate pause in the final month to reflect, enjoy progress, and decide what to carry into 2025. With only four weeks left in the 12-week cycle, she treats December as both a finish-strong sprint and a reset—slowing down to evaluate who she wants to become next.

She walks through November’s performance to set December with intention. Areas needing improvement included daily journaling consistency, largely because her kids wake early; she’s trying “Hatch” lights that keep children in their rooms until green to protect morning alone time. Other November wins included weight loss progress (targeting 5 lbs), adding one healthier meal per week, practicing “daily grace” with her kids, making progress on a Christmas card, and strong launch work tied to Black Friday promotions. Challenges ranged from solo-parenting stress when her husband travels, election-related depression and nightmares, searching for a new editor to protect posting timeliness, and not promoting her planner enough during a transition out of clinical work.

December’s intention is “flourish and reflect,” with how she wants to feel: relaxed, in a flow state, and joyful. Her priorities are family memories (Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and a Mexico trip) and an email campaign announcing a printable A5 planner version. Monthly goals then branch across wellness (morning journaling, sleeping by 10, Elf-on-the-Shelf setup, and continued routines), nurturing family (including daily grace, prayer, and holiday traditions), and business growth (a weekly newsletter, a December campaign, and an ambitious target of 11 YouTube videos). Weekly “lead goals” translate these into measurable tracking: cardio and pilates, healthier snack planning, two YouTube videos per week, launching projects, newsletter cadence, and family rituals like daily grace, mailing the Christmas card, and the Elf-on-the-Shelf schedule.