The best advice for those who want to keep up with everything

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

This thought about how to manage your time can change your day. Simple, how ingenious everything is!

Our options are actually limited

How to keep up with everything? No way!

Yes, you are not mistaken, you will not be able to catch everything. Today the world convinces us that there are no limits. Advertising advises to take everything from life, get the most out of the moment and believe that the impossible is possible. And in each individual idea there is a certain meaning, but all together it turns into a blatant lie!

We are limited by time, physiological needs, genetics, economic and political conditions, and so on. To ignore all this is stupid and even dangerous, because the flip side of eternal stress and life at the maximum is mental disorders, no more, no less.

Therefore, in contrast to the statements about the omnipotence of man, today we will talk about two indisputable restrictions.

Time

Recently, one client complained that she does not have time to do anything at work, she has to stay at least a couple of hours, and she really wants to leave on time, because her husband and child are waiting at home. Accordingly, the client asks to teach her “correct time management”.

We discuss what are the responsibilities, what constitutes a normal working day. I find out what her responsibilities include: conducting training, evaluating personnel, developing a new project for introducing webinars into the network (about 70 stores), organizing corporate life. Daily schedule:

• 9: 00–9: 30 - meeting with management;
• 11: 00-17: 00 - daily training with staff (plus preparation before and after 30 minutes).

That's it, stop! This is enough to understand: the problem is not in time management, but in the fact that the meeting and training takes 90% of the working time! This is a very clear example of a mistake we often make.

There are 24 hours in a day, 60 minutes in every hour, 60 seconds in every minute. Everything. The day is over. We cannot stretch the time!

Physiological needs

The first level of human needs according to Maslow's pyramid is physiological (sleep, water, food, air). What does this mean within our theme? The energy that we receive in order to subsequently spend it.

With each of our movements, a certain energy is expended. We are limited by its quantity. If there is not enough energy, when we have not had enough sleep and are overwhelmed, then our body will prefer not to perform the next task, but simply turn down (read "save energy"), for example, aimlessly traveling on social networks.

The main difficulty is that it is difficult to measure the energy level, especially since the body of each person functions in its own way. Someone needs five hours of sleep a day to recover, while others feel good only with a full eight hours of rest. People with fast metabolism need orders of magnitude more calories per day to feel energized.

So there are no universal recipes, only common recommendations:

• move more;
• go to bed at 22:00;
• massage;
• engage in breathing practices;
• to walk outside.

And each of these points needs to be checked on yourself separately, trying to understand what really gives you energy and a feeling of satisfaction, and what does not.

How to learn to consider constraints

Time

Now, having scared you a little by the fact that our time and energy are limited, I propose to conduct an experiment. During the week, you need to keep a diary describing your daily activities and indicating what gives and what takes energy from you. For example, in this form:

This will help you understand what resource of time and energy is available for the activities that you have planned.

Next, do the following exercise. Take a piece of paper and write down all the things you would like to redo. In front of each item, indicate the time it takes to complete it. But not according to the principle "If I really want to, I will do it in … minutes / hours", but according to the principle "At an average speed in a calm state, I will do it in … minutes / hours."

Calculate how long it should take you to do all these things.

Answer yourself to the question: do you have this time? Take a close look at your schedule last week and remember that when assigning cases, you should have 30% free time for unforeseen situations.

If you have this time, then skip to the point on physiological needs and energy.

If you do not have this time, it turns out that you want the impossible. And if you want the impossible and reproach yourself for not doing this impossible, then you are extremely unfair to yourself. And you have several options:

1. Continue torturing yourself for not doing the impossible.
2. Accept that you are not omnipotent and do the following:

• prioritize matters and fulfill first "it is necessary - a matter of life and death", then "highly desirable, otherwise serious consequences are possible" and finally "I would like, but otherwise the consequences will be insignificant";
• reallocate cases. Are you sure that all these tasks can only be done by you? Maybe discuss with your boss a list of your main tasks and the possibility of hiring an assistant? Or can one of your loved ones take on some of the household chores?

Physiological needs and energy

One of the signs of harmoniously flowing energy is a feeling of cheerfulness in the morning. This means that you have enough strength to get through the new day. If you wake up feeling good and in a good mood and you have time in your schedule to do your things, then I don't understand why you are reading this article at all!

Otherwise, pay attention to what gives you energy and what takes you during the day. If you are spinning like a squirrel in a wheel all day, doing unloved work, pulling the whole household on yourself, you do not have a minute of free time and at the same time you scold yourself for not having time to do something else, then I hasten to notice: you not an immortal pony. So you are driving yourself into the grave - you urgently need to revise your priorities in life.

Take another look at your notes from the previous week and think:

• What gives you energy? What other activities (extra hour of sleep, massage, walks in the fresh air) can you add to your schedule to get more energy?
• What is taking up energy and what can you give up? It's time to remember the prioritization and reallocation of responsibilities.
• How can you organize yourself and your loved ones so that there are more activities that give energy and less that take away?

After answering these questions, do the following:

• Make a plan of action and remember that changing everything at once is difficult, so make one or a couple of changes per week.
• Get the support of loved ones and treat them with respect: Explain why these changes are important to you, and be prepared for the fact that they may resist.
• Reward yourself even for small successes (a pleasant purchase exclusively for yourself, words of praise) and do not scold for failures. I didn't manage to do something this week - it's okay, you will do it next.

So, friends, in an effort to redo all the cases, be sure to remember the limited time and your opportunities and do not believe the popular trends. You will not be able to catch everything. But this does not mean at all that you cannot catch the main thing!

The longer I live, the more clearly I understand that the main thing in life is to know firmly what you want, and not to be confused by those who think they know better.