One habit that I returned to my scheduling routine is adding in time estimation of each task I need to do.
I was having difficulty getting in all of my work and household chores within the hours that I allotted myself to work.
Although I planned out my day in advance the evening beforehand, I was still running short on time in trying to accomplish every bit of it. I found myself often pushing tasks into the next day.
I was starting to get frustrated.
In my frustration and through a convenient conversation I had with my husband, I remembered a neat trick that I used to do years ago, but had forgotten all about.
My memory came back to me mid conversation with my husband who was discussing his satisfaction of having estimated correctly beforehand the work hours on a few landscaping projects.
If he estimates incorrectly, then he would have no choice but to work over the time he was being paid for. This resulted in the client getting free work hours from him because of his incorrect projection of how long a job would take him.
For example, if he projected a job would take 3 hours and it really took him 4 hours, then he would lose an hour of paid time.
I thought through his example he unintentionally laid before me and realized that I was NOT even estimating how long something would take me when I planned out my day.
I took to my to do list with the time estimation in mind and projected how long each individual task it would take for me to get through. I even included time of exercising and getting ready for the day.
I then tallied up the time and marked how many hours it would take me to get everything on my list accomplished.
This helped me with refraining from putting too many big tasks down for one day, which I am prone to do.
It helped me visually see my day better, and gave me a more realistic frame of mind of how long it actually takes me to do tasks that for some reason I thought I only needed five minutes for. (Not true, most tasks take me longer because of my issue with perfectionism and my random inclusion of another task that was like the first task. In other words, I easily distract myself with things I should not be doing! Who can relate?)
This mapping out my day through estimating how long each task will take me also helped me not become overwhelmed and anxious about getting things done. It gave me a sense of control over my day and I was able to trust my own to do list.
Now, some tasks, such as new ones not done before, are harder to make time estimations on. That is definitely okay, because we can give ourselves elbow room as we plan our day around that new task. And if we finish early, then we can take a well needed break.
My husband always reminds me to plan flexibility in my day a well. That will have to be for another blog article. 🙂
Try this out for yourself! See if this helps you plan your time more wisely and not become too wrapped up in your lengthy to do lists.