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You might have been reading a ton about time management, but it is quite possible that while many time management tips are helpful such as finding the right planner and establishing a Morning and Evening Routine (both of which are absolutely essential!), there might be a few more things that seem to be missing from the bigger picture.
Many of These Time Management Secrets were inspired by my mentor Darren Hardy, author of the best seller The Compound Effect and former Chief Editor of SUCCESS Magazine. It is my pleasure to share with you these invaluable tips that I hope help you moms out there achieve the work-life balance you desire.
Just don’t forget to take action!
Secrets to Work-Life Balance
1. Set 3 BIG Goals for the Year (with balance in mind)
You can set goals in various areas, and there are many, such as:
- professional
- social
- spiritual
- financial
- recreational
- family
- intellectual
- physical
Be mindful when you set goals so that you don’t end up setting all professional or financial goals. Some can be blended, like family+ recreational+ physical and spiritual+ social to help balance the many areas of your life.
You want to focus on only 3 BIG Goals at a time, to avoid overloaded yourself. READ How to REALLY Set Goals to Truly Make This Year a Success to get started.
2. Consider What You DO Have Time For
We often catch ourselves constantly thinking and talking about how we don’t have enough time. Think about the flip side though… What DO you have time for?
3. Use the Buffett Method
Warren Buffett got to where he is today by mastering how he managed time and how he did it will transform your life. Use it to prioritize your year, quarter, month, or week.
How apply the Warren Buffett Method:
- Take a sheet of paper and write down all your priorities and/or things to do
- Circle the top 3 priorities and write them down on your scheduler or planner
- Throw the rest away in the trash
The first 2 are easy, the last not so much. The purpose of throwing away your list is to avoid getting distracted from the 3 most important priorities.
We just simply cannot do it all! You can reevaluate when you set 3 new priorities.
4. Plan and Schedule Your Days in Writing
Don’t just do one… do both! Planning will decide what you’ll do on a given week or day and scheduling determines when you do it.
If you utilize the 4-Quadrant Planning method it will divide your weekly to-do list into your 3 Big Goals and (everything else) to help you stay on track weekly. Schedule your tasks from there into your calendar.
5. Reduce Your Opportunities to Be Distracted
We live in a Digital Age where any and all information can be accessed within a few minutes search… and it can be incredibly distracting. Not only that, it seems like we are privy to information overload though in reality it is actually caused by our lack of priorities.
We DON’T need to know it all. Decide what you will put into your brain.
It’s important to understand that we do not want to resist the temptation of our vibrating phones… it’s about avoiding it. To learn more about avoidance tactics READ 11 Proven Hacks That Will Dramatically Reduce Screen Time.
Your mind will thank you. Less stress… Yay!
6. Set Boundaries
For a lot of women, it can be hard to say “No” to incoming requests. We subconsciously seek others approval by not refusing even if we already have so much on our plates. Saying “no” is quite confrontational. It can be hard to do!
In order to reduce our commitments, we need to learn to let go of what others think about us and instead focus on our priorities and families. If it isn’t a “Hell Yeah I’ll do it!” then its a BIG fat “No.”Look at it this way, when you are saying “Yes” to one thing, you are saying “No” to another, which could be time with your family or working on your priorities.
7. Turn “On” and “Off”
One of the most important and probably most neglected aspects of creating work-life balance (especially for us moms!) is to be fully in the moment. With communication the way it is today, professional and personal lives can easily blur if appropriate actions are not taken.
This prevents you from being fully present when you are at home with you kids… if you are awaiting a phone call from work and you turn down your children when they want to play with you.
When you ARE at work that family vacation coming up inspires you to research things to do there on your phone when you should be focusing on the tasks at hand.
Learn to focus on work when you are AT WORK and turn it OFF when you get home.
But what if you work at home or have clients that need you?
Set Working hours, and inform clients the times when you are on call. It’s OKAY to set DO NOT CALL hours.
Conclusion
In order to manage our time wisely and efficiently, we must look also look at the self-management aspects of time management in order to truly be effective with the time we are given.
We all have the same amount of time in a day. What you do with it will determine how effective you are in achieving your goals and maintain the work-life balance all of us moms always wish for.
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