How I Stay Productive with a Paper and Virtual Calendar

Posted on by Analise

2024 is the year of working with my brain instead of against my brain.

Specifically, I’m talking about with organization and planning.

I am a pen and paper person, I find that if I write things down I am 95% more likely to remember it and do it (this statistic is made up by myself).

The problem is that I can walk around and people make plans and schedule meetings with me all the time and I don’t have my planner handy.

This is how I am using both my paper planner and my digital planner together this year.

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How to Choose A Word of the Year

Posted on by Analise

Hey guys! We made it through and I cannot believe that 2023 would do us like this and be over in the blink of an eyelash. 

I know that I am not the only one who felt like it was literally JUST February 2023? 

It’s that time of year, so I have been thinking a lot about next year and planning and praying. This year, I am doing a much smaller version of the vision board that I won’t feel like I have to throw away when we move (see updates here)! This small version of the vision board is in my START planner. I love it because when I am trying to make plans, I can just refer back to my vision board in my planner to inspire me.

I’ll have to pull the planner things into another post in the future.

“Yes, yes, Lise, but what is the word???”

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2024 Updates

Posted on by Analise

Hey y’all!

It has been so long since I have posted here, but I am really excited about making this a more active part of my life in 2024. 

So, I just wanted to post a couple of updates:

  1. I am halfway done with my interventional year! *Crowd goes wild*
  2. I have a job next year! More about this later 🙂 

That’s it for now – literally a couple of updates. 

I will have another post for my word of the year and my goal setting for 2024, but I thought it would be good to start by just starting and posting this on my blog today. 

Anyway, I hope you guys are doing great! 

I am thrilled about this next chapter and I will be sharing the things that I am learning along the way.  I am going to keep posting about the things I have always cared about – Family, Faith, Lifestyle, and Medicine but I am hoping to add a couple more topics in there intermittently. 

That’s all for now! Talk soon. 

Love, 

Lise

Why We Should Be Productive

Posted on by Analise

I’ve been seeing a lot of books lately that are about getting things done. They have catchy titles and excellent intentions and real results. I know, because I have implemented a lot of the changes suggested in the books and honestly, these are the only nonfiction books I am even interested in. As the planner that I am, I really like putting systems in place to help me adjust to the crazy schedule that I am dealing with at any point in time.

Though I am excited about this productivity scene, but I wonder… to what end?

We are told by the world to

  1. Get the promotion
  2. Get the body
  3. Do the travel
  4. Save the money
  5. Build the brand

All for what?

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Rest Day

Posted on by Analise

Of course, the cardiology fellow WOULD be talking about how she needs to get rest, right?

If you know me, though, you know that I have been trying to take a day for rest since I was in med school, when the temptation to work every day was overwhelming. I always felt behind and that I wouldn’t ever catch up if I didn’t take every single day and try and gulp some of the water down from the proverbial firehose that we call medical school.

One of these days in medical school (I think it was while I was studying for STEP 1 or 2), I realized that if I didn’t take this rest day, it felt like my brain would stop working.

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Our

Posted on by Analise

During wedding ceremonies, there are symbolic rituals that people typically do. One of my favorite ones from our own wedding (8 years ago now, can’t believe it!) was the salt ceremony.  If you have been to weddings, you have seen a million different variations of the same thing- the couple buys tons sand and has them in separate containers for the ceremony and then pours them into one container. This represents two lives, two homes, two people becoming combined. Even more- it is a covenantal representation, saying that the union is broken only if you can separate the grains of sand again after it has been poured in together (to signify the impossibility). Some people use different colored sand and then put it somewhere in their home to remind them of their covenant and for decoration.

Ours were identical containers of salt that we poured into a larger container, thus rendering the two collections of salt indistinguishable from one another.

I described this well-known marital ritual to now bring up a controversial topic. When we get married, there is no longer mine, and yours and everything becomes ours.

We become one flesh.

We have one home ( I mean I assume most of us have one home, but y’all may be Beyoncé and Jay for all I know).

Everything we have is combined.

That includes money, possessions, shoot, even leftover food.

Too often, I find myself saying things like my car, your keys, my food. The real term is – and say it with me- ours.

Rome often reminds me of this because the implications can be dangerous if you let the mentality behind the words mine and yours casually continue.

In fact, Rome would advocate for making it so that you CAN’T say this is mine and that is yours, especially for the big stuff. We have joint accounts, making sure that both people’s names are on the cars, and on our mortgage, etc.

This is marriage, that you are no longer two but have become intertwined as one.

Mark 10:8

and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh.

Also, shout out to Rome and I! We celebrated 8 years of marriage last month!

Love,

Lise (and Rome)

The 4 AM Club

Posted on by Analise

Good morning everyone!

It’s Lise here, live from my house for the early, early morning show.

I have loved mornings for a long time, I’d say almost 7 years now. It all started when I was studying for STEP 2. I would wake up at a regular time in the morning and get started with studying – no distractions. But then by the time that afternoon hit, my energy would wane and it would always would be near impossible to get back to my studying groove. *Cue the chopped and screwed version of Lets Groove Tonight*

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Why I Chose Cardiology

Posted on by Analise

Also, you can add a comma here for comedic relief- Why, Cardiology?

Anyway, its just the best. I didn’t say this in interview season, but I am often amazed at how much I love this field and how cool I think it is.

Cardiology is one of the fields of internal medicine that is just so broad. Though people in residency made it seem like only one type of person goes into cardiology, I am pushing back against that, because it’s just not true.

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Practical Tips for Intern Year

Posted on by Analise

July 1 is here! You’ve likely started your first job as a doctor and you are scared (petrified).

Some VERY normal questions that may be going through your mind…

How do I write notes again?

Where is the bathroom on this floor?

Will there be lunch at this lecture?

All of these were questions that were swirling through my mind as I entered my 3rd week of residency (recall that I had 2 weeks on night float to start out).

I have some practical things that I would share with myself if I could do it all over again.

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Open Handed Plans

Posted on by Analise

I am an obsessive planner by nature. Paper planners are my medium, but I will tolerate a good digital planner that has lots of colors.  There’s just something about pens, blank pieces of paper, and the promise of endless possibilities that brings me so much joy. Also there’s something about a blank poster board, glue, tape, magazines, scissors, and writing down my moonshot dreams that I adore.  I love that vision board parties have become a thing because I have an excuse to do arts and crafts like I did in grade school with the added bonus of planning out my year like a madwoman.

I planned like this for my 2020. I wanted to do all sorts of things like do another marathon, write a book (clearly my moonshot dream), read 50 books, read through the bible, and go on a cruise.

Needless to say, 2020 happened and everything changed.

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