Organize Your Time: Use Time Pockets

Organize Your Time: Use Time Pockets

Time management may not seem like a “fun” topic, but if you want to live intentionally and achieve your most important goals, you will need to look at how you’re spending your time each day. This week I’m sharing a few of my top tips for organizing your time, so that you can live life on purpose!

A great way to accomplish more in your day is to use “time pockets”–those few minutes here and there during which you’re waiting for something else. You probably already do some of these activities like checking email while eating lunch or reading in the doctor’s office, but you can expand this concept to so many other times in your day:
 

• While your bagel is toasting, chop some veggies for dinner later.

• While you’re waiting for dinner to cook, clean the kitchen.

• When watching television, organize a file during commercials or fold laundry.

• Listen to a podcast while exercising.

• Read a book or write thank you notes while waiting for an oil change.

• Review your budget or return emails while waiting in the car line to pick up your child from school.

• Make your weekly menu and grocery list by spending 5 minutes a day while you’re cooking breakfast or dinner.

If we’re honest, these are the times we’re reaching for our phones. But if you change the way you think, you can use this time to  accomplish small tasks that can make you more productive and improve your life by moving you toward your goals, and even create more room for leisure activities.

Let’s look at one way using time pockets can help you. Let’s say that you plan two hours every Saturday morning to clean your house and do laundry. If you spent 5-10 minutes throughout each week day (or in the evening after work) vacuuming, dusting, washing a load of laundry or cleaning a bathroom, you would free up your Saturday morning for more pleasurable activities like enjoying a leisurely breakfast or taking the kids out to do something fun.

The problem for most of us is that we put off doing less enjoyable tasks until they pile up and take more time than necessary. If we’ll just plunge ahead and do a little here and a little there, those unpleasant tasks will be done in no time and with much less psychological “pain”.

Taking advantage of little pockets of downtime can help increase your productivity, but make sure to enjoy some relaxed “unproductive” time each day as well. I divide my day into “chunks” so that there are times when I am focusing on one task at a time, times when I am multitasking, and others during which I am doing nothing but relaxing. Find the balance that works best for you.

And by the way, if you’re a mom, make sure that you’re spending time paying attention to your kids too, not just working to get the to do list done. 🙂

 
If you’d like some very practical time management tips, one of my favorite books is Don Aslett’s How to Have a 48-Hour Day: Get Twice as Much Done as You Do Now!Yes, it’s older, but it’s a really easy read (a great project for time pockets!) with simple tips to incorporate into your day.

How do you use the small pockets of time in your day? Leave a comment.

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