I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what Old Soul productivity looks like.
The systems we're given are all designed by and for a different kind of soul. One motivated by achievement, status, and external markers of winning. One that runs on hustle. Yep — the Young Soul drives the world.
But what about the Old Soul’s way of getting things done? One that is in alignment with the Universe and their higher self? One that feels a pull to be a part of the larger order of things, to live an inspired life?
I tried to find that path — listening to Eckhart Tolle and Michael Singer, surrendering to What Is, allowing the hand of God to guide me to the next step.
The problem? I was floating. Not really moving anywhere. And because my energy and mood fluctuate, I'd find myself not feeling inspired, just wandering through the YouTube rabbit hole. Sometimes I'd get a ping to work on something — like building out new coaching frameworks — and dive in with big dreams of what I'd get done that day, only to fall flat because I didn't have the drive to get there. I'd end up frustrated and down, feeling lost. Spiritually aligned but adrift.
So I'd overcorrect. Back to the hyperscheduling. I'm a planner by nature — I love to plan. I'm an Aries sun / Virgo rising after all! Give me a project and I will plan the heck out of that thing. Every hour accounted for, every task sequenced, every contingency considered. Everything color coded, obviously. And for a while, the structure felt like progress.
Until I felt completely boxed in. Burned out. Disconnected from the whole point of everything — like I was technically doing all the things but not connected to Life itself. My ego was driving the train, and I worried it was driving in the wrong direction.
Neither extreme worked. And I was getting dizzy thrown back and forth between them.
There has to be a way forward, I kept thinking. Something rooted in the flow of the Universe that still gets me moving. Something for the productive Old Soul who still wants to create and build in the world — but do it in a higher, inspired way.
Here's the thing about Young soul productivity culture — and make no mistake, that's what most of it is. It's mind-focused and output-obsessed, designed to maximize what you produce as if humans were machines meant to run at constant capacity. Push through. Optimize. More.
But there is no constant output in nature. There are seasons. There is ebb and flow. There are tides. And there are currents.
I think of it like being in the ocean. There's something bigger than us — God, the Universe, the Creator, whatever word fits for you — orchestrating a symphony that is always playing. When you get into alignment with the currents of that symphony, things move. Creation flows. The right doors open at the right time.
But when you decide you know where you're going and start swimming hard toward it? You exhaust yourself. You fight the current. You end up in a rip tide — burning everything you have, going nowhere, wondering why it feels so hard when everyone else seems to be making it look easy.
Over-structuring is swimming against the current. Floating with no direction is just drifting.
Old souls need a third thing: enough structure to stay in motion, and enough spaciousness to stay in tune with where the current is actually taking you.
So I took that Virgo energy and built something that would work at an Old Soul level. Something that meets my body and my soul where they're at — tuned into the Universe, while being propelled by the current I find myself in.
Every morning as I wake up, I tune into my inner feeling to find what flavor this day has. What is the Universe calling me toward? Sometimes it comes right at me loud and clear. (Today it was the newsletter — haha!) Other days I have to hold up different ideas of things I could work on and feel into which one lights up, has more excitement or flow to it, or just feels lighter.
Then I check in with my body to find out what I'm actually capable of that day. Where is my energy level? Where is my mood? Two numbers: mood, 1–10. Energy, 1–10. Then I look at what needs to get done through that lens.
I built out an interactive excel tool that maps what kinds of tasks fall into each zone. On my personal version I even work with AI to create columns for projects and break them down into tasks by each energy level, so I always have options no matter where I'm at.
A 7 mood, 4 energy day? Writing, reflecting, light planning. Not filming. Not trying to build out a new masterpiece.
A 9 and 9? That's when I’m on fire. Those are my golden days — when I can create, build, and bring everything I've got. I used to expect myself to operate at this level every day. Now I know to make the most of them when they show up, and let myself off the hook when they don't, and find other ways that I can move forward with what I’ve got in the tank that day.
A 3 and 3? Research, organizing, admin — the small tending things that always need doing. Or honestly, rest. Actual rest, which is not the same as procrastination even when it looks identical from the outside.
No more expecting myself to grind through days I don't have the fuel for. No more floating. Now I am riding the flow — and it has genuinely powered up what I can do, while feeling like it's the current of the Universe moving me forward, not my ego telling me what I should be doing.
If you're an Old soul, you're not just running a different productivity system — you're navigating life from a fundamentally different place than most people around you. Different motivations. Different relationship patterns. Different ideas about what success even means. And most of the conventional wisdom on all of it was written for someone at a completely different soul stage.
That's why - on one of my golden days! - I built out a Soul Age Coaching Path. It’s a structured 1:1 program where we look at where you are in your soul's development, what alignment actually looks like from here, and how to build your life and work around that — and map a real path forward.
Explore the Soul Age Coaching Path: https://www.jillianharrington.com/coachingpaths
Let’s all find our way to the flow, so we can get the inspiration to transform the world, shall we?
-Jillian
