From the course: Time Management Tips

Time management fundamentals at home

From the course: Time Management Tips

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Time management fundamentals at home

- Occasionally, students of my courses will reach out to me and say something like, Dave, I really enjoyed Time Management Fundamentals, it's helped me be more productive at work, but I'm having issues with organization and time management at home. What am I supposed to do there? The answer is surprisingly simple, go through Time Management Fundamentals, again, but do it at home. All the principles that are there still apply to your living space. Let's explore why this is true by taking a look at a few of the major principles of Time Management Fundamentals adapted for use at home. Effective time management is a function of taking control of three areas. Space, meaning your work space and your physical objects. Your mind, meaning keeping your mind free and clear. And your time, meaning your calendar. Let's explore how these come into play at home. First, when it comes to space, the biggest issue most people have at home is that they have way too many gathering points. These are places where things that are unresolved gather until you figure out what to do with them. Many people in their home have gathering points strewn all over the place, under the bed, in the corners of the closet, or the kitchen counter. It can become endless. What we want to do is the same thing that we did in your office, schedule time to take all those gathering points, and consolidate them into one gigantic inbox. This one inbox may be represented initially by many cardboard boxes put together in one place. Anything that's out of place in your home, don't put it away, put it first in the inbox. Then, just like you did in Time Management Fundamentals, schedule extra processing time to gradually bring all those boxes to zero. After you complete this from that point forward, you only have one inbox at home, very likely a large one. Find something aesthetically pleasing to you, but also large enough to gather anything that may get out of place during the course of a week. Incidentally, you can also do the same thing with other family members, even children. My son has learned that he has an inbox and everything that's out of place in his room first needs to go into that inbox. It makes the chore of cleaning the room far easier because he only needs to focus on one step at a time. It helps him avoid constantly going back and forth throughout the day, putting things away. It's too hard for the average 12 year old to do. Next, when it comes to keeping your mind free and clear, the same principles apply. Always have close at hand some sort of mobile gathering point, so that when ideas pop into your head while you're at home, you can immediately put them into a gathering point. Whether the idea is about home, or about work, gather it to the same place, we still need to get it out of your brain, regardless of context. A lot of people use a mobile notebook on their phone. Since you likely always have the phone with you, it's the easiest way to leave a message to yourself. Just make sure that it's going into a clearly designated gathering point and that you're not creating lots of different notes all over the place. By clearing these things out of your head immediately, you can be more focused on just enjoying the evening, or spending time with loved ones outside of work hours. Then finally, time. This is perhaps where the biggest adaptation needs to happen. In Time Management Fundamentals, I talk about focusing your work hours on your most valuable activities, these are the things that are worth the most per hour. But when it comes to your home time, your value per hour matters less than what is most meaningful in your life. Think about what sorts of things you really want to spend your time doing. Is it spending time with a spouse, or with your children? Or, is it devoting time to cause that you care about? Whatever it is that you determine has the greatest worth in your life, make sure that you're scheduling time consistently in your hours after work to give it the attention you feel it deserves. Create a time budget for what matters most. If you need help on on juggling the two sides of your calendar, work and personal, you might also want to take a look at my course called Managing Your Calender for Peak Productivity. In the end though, the solution can be summed up in one phrase. Go through Time Management Fundamentals again, but this time while you're at home. Follow the steps and the principles that I teach there and you'll find that they're just as applicable.

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