Better Ways to Find More Free Time for You
Are
there a hundred different things you wish you could do with your life someday
anything from exercising to meditation or yoga to writing that novel you always
wished you could write to reading more to relaxing and watching the sunrise?
But perhaps you never have the time, like most people.
The
truth is, we all have the same amount of time, and its finite and in great
demand. But some of us have made the time for doing the things we love doing,
and others have allowed the constant demands and pressures and responsibilities
of life to dictate their days.
Its
time to move from the second group back into the first. Reclaim your time.
Create the life you want and make the most of the free time you lay claim to.
Its not hard, though it does take a little bit of effort and diligence.
Not
all of these will be applicable to your life choose the ones you can apply and
give them a try:
Take a time out.
- Freeing
up your time starts with taking a step back to take a good look at your
life. You need to block off at least an hour. Several hours or half a day
is better. A whole day would be awesome. A weekend would be even more
ideal, though not necessary practical for many folks. With this block of
time, take a look at your life with some perspective. Is it what youve
always wanted? How would you get to where youve always wanted to be? What
do you enjoy doing, but dont have enough time to do? What things actually
fill up your day? Are there things you could drop or minimize to make more
time? Well look at some of these things in the following items, but it
starts with taking a time out to think and plan.
Find your essentials.
- What
is it that you love to do? Make a short list of 4-5 things. These are the
things you want to make room for.
Find your time-wasters.
- What
do you spend a lot of your time on that isnt on your essential list? Take
a close look at these things and really think about whether theyre
necessary, or if there are ways to reduce, minimize or eliminate these
things. Sometimes you do things because you assume theyre necessary, but
if you give it some thought you can find ways to drop them from your life.
Figure out what you do simply to waste time maybe surfing certain sites,
watching TV, talking a lot at the water cooler, etc. Youre going to want
to minimize these time-wasters to make room for the more important stuff,
the stuff that makes you happy and that you love to do.
Schedule the time.
- As
you sit down and think about your life and what you want to do, versus
what you actually do, you will be looking at ways to free up time. Its
crucial that you take a blank weekly schedule (you can just write it out
on a piece of paper, or use your calendar) and assign blocks for the
things you love the stuff on your essentials list. If you want to
exercise, for example, when will you do it? Put the blocks of time on your
schedule, and make these blocks the most important appointments of your
week. Schedule the rest of your life around these blocks.
Consolidate.
- There
are many things you do, scattered throughout your day or your week, that
you might be able to consolidate in order to save time. A good example is
errands instead of running one or two a day, do them all in one day to
save time and gas. Another example is email, or any kind of communication
batch process your email instead of checking and reading and responding
throughout the day. Same thing with meetings, paperwork, anything that you
do regularly.
Cut out meetings.
- This
isnt possible for everyone, but in my experience meetings take up a lot of
time to get across a little information, or to make easy decisions that
could be made via email or phone. As much as you can, minimize the number
of meetings you hold and attend. In some cases this might mean talking to
your boss and telling her that you have other priorities, and asking to be
excused. In other cases this might mean asking the people holding the
meeting if you can get the info in other ways. If so, youve saved yourself
an hour or so per meeting (sometimes more).
De clutter your schedule.
- If
you have a heavily packed schedule, full of meetings and errands and tasks
and projects and appointments, youre going to want to weed it out so that
its not so jam-packed. Find the stuff thats not so essential and cancel
them. Postpone other stuff. Leave big blank spaces in your schedule.
Re-think your routine.
- Often
we get stuck in a routine thats anything but what we really want our days
to be like. Is there a better way of doing things? Youre the creator of
your life make a new routine thats more pleasant, more optimal, more
filled with things you love.
Cut back on email.
- I
mentioned email in an earlier point above, regarding consolidating, but
its such a major part of most peoples lives that it deserves special
attention. How often do you check email? How much time do you spend
composing emails? If you spend a major part of your work day on email, as
many people do (and as I once did), you can free up a lot of time by
reducing the time you spend in email. Now, this wont work for everyone,
but it can work for many people: choose 2-3 key times during the day to
process your inbox to empty, and keep your responses to 5 sentences.
Learn to say no.
- If
you say yes to every request, you will never have any free time. Get super
protective about your time, and say no to everything but the essential
requests.
Keep your list to 3.
- When
you make out your daily to-do list, just list the three Most Important
Tasks you want to accomplish today. Dont make a laundry list of tasks, or
youll fill up all your free time. By keeping your task list small, but
populated only by important tasks, you ensure that you are getting the
important stuff done but not overloading yourself.
Do your Biggest Rock first.
- Of
the three Most Important Tasks you choose for the day, pick the biggest
one, or the one youre dreading most, and do that first. Otherwise youll
put that off as much as possible and fill your day with less important
things. Dont allow yourself to check email until that Big Rock is taken
care of. It starts your day with a sense of major accomplishment, and
leaves you with a lot of free time the rest of the day, because the most
important thing is already done.
Delegate.
- If
you have subordinates or coworkers who can do a task or project, try to delegate
it. Dont feel like you need to do everything yourself. If necessary, spend
a little time training the person to whom youre delegating the task, but
that little time spent training will pay off in a lot of time saved later.
Delegating allows you to focus on the core tasks and projects you should
be focusing on.
Cut out distractions.
- What
is there around your workspace that distracts you from the task at hand?
Sometimes its visual clutter, or papers lying around that call for your
attention and action, or email or IM notifiers on your computer that pop
up at the wrong time, or the phone, or coworkers. See if you can eliminate
as many of these as possible the more you can focus, the more effective
youll be and the less time youll waste. That equals time saved for the
good stuff.
Disconnect.
- The
biggest of distractions, for most people, is the Internet. My most
productive times are when Im disconnected from the grid. Now, Im not
saying you need to be disconnected all the time, but if you really want to
be able to effectively complete tasks, disconnect your Internet so you can
really focus. Set certain times of the day for connectivity, and only
connect during those periods.
Outsource.
- If
you cant delegate, see if you can outsource. With the Internet, we can
connect with people from all over the world. Ive outsourced many things,
from small tasks to checking email to legal work to design and editing
work and more. That allows me to focus on the things Im best at, the
things I love doing, and saves me a lot of time.
Make use of your mornings.
- I
find that mornings are the absolute best times to schedule the things I
really want to do. I run, read and write in the mornings three of the four
things on my Essentials List (spending time with family is the other thing
on the list). Mornings are great because your day hasnt been filled with a
bunch of unscheduled, demanding, last-minute tasks that will push back
those Essentials. For example, if you schedule something for late
afternoon, by the time late afternoon rolls around, you might have a dozen
other things newly added to your to-do list, and youll put off that
late-afternoon Essential. Instead, schedule it for the morning, and itll
rarely (if ever) get pushed back.
The Golden Right-after-work Time.
- Other
than mornings, I find the time just after work to be an incredible time
for doing Essential things. Exercise, for example, is great in the
5-oclock hour, as is spending time with family, or doing anything else
relaxing.
Your evenings.
- The
time before you go to bed is also golden, as it exists every single day,
and its usually completely yours to schedule. What do you want to do with
this time? Read? Spend time with your kids? Work on a hobby youre
passionate about? Take advantage of this time.
Lunch breaks.
- If
the three golden times mentioned above dont work for you, lunch breaks are
another good opportunity to schedule things. Some people like to exercise,
or to take quiet times, during their lunch breaks. Others use this time to
work on an important personal goal or project.
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