Are You Feeling That 24 Hours a Day is Not Sufficient For You? Are You Stressed About How to Get Additional Time for Your ‘Self Development’ or ‘Do Nothing’? Manage Your Time Mindfully!

 Recently, my friend Jeyalakshmi registered for her Ph.D degree and has to start her research work now. Already she is running short of time(!): working as a teaching faculty in an engineering college, taking care of her family and her three-year-old naughty son.

Keerthi always complains that she cannot find time for her daily workout. She is also a working person and leaves home around seven in the morning and returns at seven in the evening! She wants to go walking, do some yoga stretches, and also do meditation. Truly, she is not able to find time for all these and to simply ‘do nothing’!

Another friend of mine, Subhashini, has registered for a PG certification course now. She is managing her house taking care of her two daughters(they are doing their schooling!) and her parents-in-law. She is also working in an Engineering college travelling nearly one hour up and down. 

How, how am I going to manage my time is a very big question before them.

Maybe, you are also one among the many who are facing this ‘How to manage time’ difficulty.

We all know good time management enables us to work smarter and not harder. If we are mindful and good at managing the time we can get more things done in less time, even when time is tight and pressures are high. Also, we can achieve more of our targets and not get stressed as failing to manage our time damages our effectiveness and causes stress.

My sister’s grandson said ‘Avva, I did not have time to play with my friend today’. He is just 4 and going to kindergarten school. Similarly, we are hearing from the elderly people at home saying they did not get time to do something they wanted to do. For youngsters and middle-aged I need not tell you how badly they want some additional time in the available 24 hours! 

For everyone, starting from a school-going kid to the aged person at home it seems that there is never enough time in the day. But, since we all get the same 24 hours, why is it that some people achieve so much more with their time than others? The answer lies in good time management. The highest achievers manage their time exceptionally well. By utilising the available time effectively we can improve our ability to function more efficiently even when time is tight and pressures are high. Good time management requires an important shift in focus from activities to results: Being busy isn’t the same as being effective.

Making a to-do list along with the task schedule and following it will reduce anxiety. Many of us are good at the first part, planning and preparing a schedule. But, more than planning, following the schedule is vital, right?

Sometimes, I get jealous of those people who enjoy having more time to spend on hobbies or other personal pursuits. Is it that they do not do their work? If we observe, they are those who definitely can manage time effectively. You know, good time management gives you extra time to spend in your daily life. 

Enough, we know the benefits of good time management, but how to do that, that is only our problem, is this what is going on in your mind now?

First and foremost, set goals, the targets correctly! Do not aspire for not attainable and irrelevant targets. If you aim to lose 10kg in a week, can you achieve it? Only stress! Let your targets be achievable and measurable. Specific targets that are relevant and time-bound will be better.

Most importantly, prioritize your work wisely: Prioritize tasks based on importance and urgency. For example, look at your daily tasks and determine which are:

• Important and Urgent: do these tasks right away.

• Important but not Urgent: decide when to do these tasks.

• Urgent but not Important: delegate these tasks if possible.

• Not Urgent and Not Important: set these aside to do later.

This is what I suggested to Jeyalakshmi, to appoint one maid for household work, ask her husband to engage her son during the evening for one or two hours, and get help from her parents(they are living close by) in taking care of her son during bed time. Something like this we have to delegate work whatever is possible.

Also, you can set a time limit to complete a task, setting time constraints for completing tasks helps you be more focused and efficient. Making the small extra effort to decide on how much time you need to allot for each task can also help you recognize potential problems before they arise.

Yet another important thing is to remove non-essential activities. This is a very simple and effective way to get more time for you. Check your routine for a day, for a week. List down all that you do, do not leave anything that you are doing. Then have a look at it and find what are the tasks or activities you are doing which you feel now as non essential. For example, spending hours and hours together on serials, or social media or chatting with others.

Determine what is significant and what deserves your time. You can see removing non–essential tasks/activities frees up more of your time to be spent on genuinely important things.

You can Plan for a year, monthly plan, weekly plan, everyday plan, and even the schedule for the day! You can refer to the Mindmap given for preparing your ‘to-do’ list. You can see the video on Mind Maps for more clarity! (https://youtu.be/XR74V3Knoz4?si=mQWmDGkrQnCbwVqY)

Make sure you start every day with a clear idea of what you need to do – what needs to get done THAT DAY. Consider making it a habit to, at the end of each workday, go ahead and write out your “to-do” list for the next day. That way you can wake up stress-free and happy the next morning.

I have prepared a planner for a year, month-wise, weekly, and daily schedule:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vPwERpQphULmKeXSBfOlITmSZNwrDVpqI36bpM0PJdo/edit?usp=sharing 

You may either download and use it as an Excel sheet or make a copy and use it in google sheets for planning your to-do things! Hope you like to use it, kindly share your feedback!