Time Management – Something We Can all Appreciate

Do you find that you the days just fly by and you feel like you haven’t accomplished much? Personally I feel like this more days than I care to admit. Trying to manage home, work, children and their activities is like being the circus juggler. When I finally get a moment of quiet, which is a rare occasion I make an attempt at organizing my life. The old adage of making lists has helped me become organized and accomplish more than expected. Here are a few tips and or tricks that have worked for me:
1. At the beginning of the week, take five minutes (preferably in the morning when everyone else is sleeping) and make yourself a list of tasks you need to accomplish by the end of the week. Keep the list with you at all times, don’t just leave it on top of the kitchen counter or on your desk.
2. Daily lists puts too much stress, you worry more on how you’re going to finish everything you have to do and evidently not get anything done at all.
3. After you’ve written your list, look it over and make every attempt to prioritize it. Usually I start by counting how many phone calls I need to make and then take an hour or two, sit at my desk and make all the calls in one shot. This is usually quite successful, although sometimes you may have to do it on two separate days, depending on the follow up calls needed.
4. Then, after the calls, go over your list again and review all the things that you are sure won’t take but a few minutes to complete. Do those next. After those are done, look at your list and see how much you have accomplished thus far and start feeling good.
5. Finally, do the more time consuming tasks by order of priority.
6. Cross things out as you complete the task and also add things to the list as the days go by. You’ll notice that as the week passes if you started with 15 tasks to accomplish, by the end of the week you’ll have, maybe 15 or more added to it. This is normal, and if this doesn’t happen, you really did not have much to do.
7. By the end of the week, take that wrinkled, ripped, messy paper you call a list and review it. You’ll be surprised how much you’ve actually accomplished and pat yourself on the back. Just don’t worry if there are tasks left undone, there’s always next week.
8. Any left-over tasks get transferred to the next week’s tasks. And try to do those first on the following week, or else you’ll start stressing and say that lists don’t work, bunch the paper up in a wad and throw it away. Then you go back to being your old self, stressing over everything you have to do and get nothing done.
I know like any good plan there are those unexpected interruptions, or else it wouldn’t be called life.