- Good morning, good life.
Welcome back to Amy TV where we come together
to help you go after the life you want,
and this is another episode of the Freedom Five.
(light music)
Working from home continues to be the norm for many people,
but it is difficult to figure out what it takes
to get the swing of things from a productivity standpoint.
The worst thing you can do
is think that you have loads of time to get things done,
and without a commute or useless chatter,
that may feel like the case.
But this is actually a little bit of a dangerous trap
because you might forget to check out of work altogether
and live your life.
What I've learned is that anything that can help you
be more focused and effective is what's actually
going to get you to find any potential of balance
while working from home.
So in today's Freedom Five,
I wanna share five essential items in my home office
that help me to achieve just that.
The first item on my list is also the sponsor
of this episode of Amy TV,
and that is my HP OfficeJet Pro 8035 all-in-one printer.
Even in the digital revolution,
even with most of my business taking place on the Internet,
as a business owner, it's very important for me
to have a printer in my office to help me with my work.
Administrative tasks in business are just a fact of life,
but they are a huge annoyance for me.
So anything that I can use to help me get them done quicker
and more efficiently is vitally important.
This is why my printer is on the list.
The OfficeJet Pro 8035 allows me to get things done
in half the time, with increased printer speeds,
and this particular printer has self-healing WiFi,
so if there's any connectivity issues,
it just resolves them itself.
I also tend to print a lot of things out
because I'm not the strongest digital reader.
So if I have a really lengthy email,
pro tip: don't send me a lengthy email if you would like me
to reply faster, or if there's a contract or something
that takes me a long time to figure out,
I'll print it out, I'll read it a little bit more closely,
highlight, take notes.
It's just a lot better for me
from a comprehension standpoint.
One of my biggest pet peeves with printers in the past
and the reason that I stick with HP
is that setting up the printer from the beginning
needs to be easy.
I have actually gotten printers in the past
that I couldn't set up and I basically just wanted
to throw it in the trash.
I didn't even wanna take it back to the store
because I was so annoyed with the fact that I unboxed it,
plugged it in and couldn't figure out how it worked.
That's not the case with the OfficeJet Pro 8035.
I plugged it in, I connected it to WiFi,
and it was printing within minutes for me.
This is so important.
Us small businesses, we don't have an IT department
to do this for us.
So yeah, get going with your only job please.
You can also print, scan, share and copy files
directly from your phone with the HP Smart app,
which uses resources like Dropbox, Google Drive,
the Cloud, email, anything that really makes sense
for your business.
And I also love that the app allows me to let my assistant
connect to my printer, so she can actually send things
to my printer that I need to do,
which is just very efficient for me.
I don't even have to think.
I just take it, I sign and I get it off to them.
And by the way, that silly problem of running out of ink?
Don't worry about it.
The HP OfficeJet Pro 8035 all-in-one comes with eight months
of free ink delivered to your door,
and even recognizes when it's low on ink
to automatically ship it out to you.
And with Instant Ink, high resolution color prints
and black and white text documents all cost the same,
so printing in high quality color actually saves you more.
Shop now with the link in the description below
so you can check out the HP OfficeJet Pro 8035
all-in-one printer.
You will love it,
especially because it's going to totally match your copy
of "Vlog Like A Boss", which I think is a bonus,
I don't know about you.
My second essential home office item
is the Bose QuietComfort 35 II
Wireless Bluetooth Headphones.
My husband and I have been sharing our loft a lot more
with both of us working from home,
and that is actually kind of nice
'cause it's like having a co-worker,
but we don't have a door that we can shut,
and some of us need a little bit of quiet
every now and again.
Whether I'm recording podcasts or he's taking phone calls,
just being able to shut the other person out as needed
is really important for focus in the office.
Whenever he takes a call, I will put these headphones on
and they are so fantastic at blocking out all sounds.
So if I'm writing or I'm trying to return emails,
I can stay focused without to hear all the extra stuff
that's going on, or feeling like I have to leave
in order to get that quiet time.
I honestly only ever used to use these headphones
on the airplane to listen to audiobooks
and to protect my ears from the sounds of the airplane,
but now without any travel,
these headphones are just protecting me
from getting too distracted at work, which I am all about.
Probably the most impressive feature
of the headphones themselves is the battery life.
I feel like I never have to charge them
and they last forever, which is great.
But the hidden gem is how these headphones look on your head
and how they indicate I cannot hear what you're saying.
So if anyone is looking at you
and you're wearing these headphones,
it is the strongest indication
that you need to be left alone.
I mean, what can be better than that?
I think having the conversation
can be a little confrontational.
"Hey I'm busy, I can't talk."
But you put these headphones on,
people don't tend to question that.
You look busy with those things on.
You look focused at least.
I don't think that there's a better Do Not Disturb sign
that you could have in the home office
than these headphones sitting on your head.
I will leave an Amazon affiliate link in the description
for you to check these out for yourself.
Number three on my list is my Peloton bike.
I know this is a random one, but you gotta hear me out.
There is nothing that refocuses me
better than doing a workout.
Trust me, I hate to say that.
I don't like working out, but I can always tell
when I'm in a rut or when I'm feeling more depressed
or mellow or just not efficient,
that it's because I have not been moving my body
as much as I should be.
My biggest issue with this is I don't know what to do
for a workout, or what I should do to actually stress
my body in the positive ways that working out does.
So having this Peloton at my house has been amazing
because the instructors tell you what to do,
which I really do need to be told what to do,
and there are so many different options of classes
that you can take.
Having this bike in the house means no commuting,
no small talk in class, no extra time having to get ready
to leave or get ready when you come home.
It's just compounding how much a 30 to 45 minute class
is actually three to four times
that when you actually do it.
I just don't have that kind of time.
But I know right now, I could go downstairs,
change my clothes, hop on the bike,
take a 20 minute spin class
and then take another 10 minute arms class,
'cause the bike comes with weights and everything,
and do that and be done in 30 minutes,
take a quick shower and come back to work.
I mean, we're talking about less than an hour's time,
versus what it would actually take to go to a class
someplace else.
If I don't feel like using the bike,
I can take the yoga class, I can do something else.
The whole Peloton community has been so helpful for me
in working from home and being able to work out
at the times that I want to that are going to get me back
into a more efficient state of mind as quickly as possible.
Number four on my essentials list for my home office
is the bullet journal.
When it comes to non-digital note taking,
I absolutely need this thing with me all the time.
It is where I brain dump any ideas I have,
any tasks I need to do, and get them on paper right away.
I have this really bad habit, if I'm working on the computer
and I come up with an idea for something I need to do
or something I want to research,
I will open a new browser tab.
Like this video if you can relate, because I know you can.
I will open a new browser tab,
type it into Google real quick and then leave it there
and go back to the thing I was doing.
The problem with that is you end up
with all these browser tabs and you have such distraction
in front of you that you decide to start traveling into them
even though you're working on another task right now.
It's not efficient.
So having my bullet journal open to collect all those things
on paper, rather than opening a world of distraction,
is so important and why I tend to use it very regularly
on a day to day basis.
I actually find if I'm not carrying it around with me
throughout the house, I will miss it the moment it's gone.
I'll think, "I need to order that, I need to buy that,
"I need to do that."
And if my bullet journal isn't right there,
I worry about pulling out my phone to write it down
in some app somewhere, because I will forget
and I will start checking TikTok.
I just will.
The other great thing about bullet journaling
is just the migration technique, month over month.
So I will link to bullet journal videos that I've done
in the past that explain this in more detail,
but it's great for keeping track of your tasks
over a longer period of time,
not just through the day to day.
And number five on my list
is the Miracle Time Cube Kitchen Timers.
I've mentioned these guys so many times.
They sit on my desk.
They're with me all the time
because I cannot trust the timer on my phone.
I will get too distracted.
But these kitchen timers are fantastic
for keeping me on task.
If I say I'm only gonna take 20 minutes
to get my emails done, I will turn that cube on
and I will only spend 20 minutes on that task.
And using these little archaic technology timers
is a great way to stay focused, 'cause that little buzzer
goes off and it makes you wanna stop
everything you're doing.
I specifically love pulling out the timer
that's got only 60 seconds if Vin wants to come talk to me
and he's like, "Hey I wanna talk to you about something."
I'll just turn the timer on and be like,
"Go ahead, you got 60 seconds"
'Cause I'm busy, didn't you see my headphones?
Question of the day,
what is your essential work from home item?
I want to shop, so leave that in the comments below
so that I can see what you need to stay efficient at home.
Thanks again to the HP OfficeJet Pro 8035 all-in-one printer
for sponsoring this episode of the Freedom Five.
I hope you guys will check that out,
because I can't live without it.
It is quite a productivity hub
and so you'll definitely wanna check the link
in the description for more information on that.
That's all for today, thank you so much for tuning in.
I appreciate it.
As always, make sure you subscribe for good vibes,
kiss the ones you love and go after the life you want.
Cheers.
I'm late for a call now, gotta go.
Shoot.
(light music)
(beep)
Hello?
Hey Alexa.
Do not disturb for an hour.
- [Alexa] I won't disturb you.
- I don't think that's believable.
I don't even know why I'm going on this tangent.
(soda can opens)
I need to do that again, ugh.
And it's always in the hundred.
What's higher than 100?
I mean, not much.
Come on, come on!
What?
Sorry I looked away for that last one but I gotta go.