Map out your ideal week

If you feel like you’re always playing catch-up, try mapping out your ideal week on a calendar app. With a time-blocking approach, map out the things that are important to you. Take the goals that have been floating around in your head, and put blocks of time to work on them in your calendar. Put your meals and morning rituals and workouts and hobbies and client projects and work hours and commutes and relaxation time. 

This exercise is revealing. It shows you what you really value. It helps you see what you truthfully have time for. Instead of feeling like a failure for not accomplishing some vague whisper of a goal, mapping out your ideal week shows you that you never had time for it in the first place. It shows you what you have to sacrifice to get that time. It shows you that you can only do so much. It shows you when you ought to be getting up and it reveals how little time you can afford to waste with distraction. 

Many people push back against this exercise, because who can achieve their ideal week? Things come up, we need to save the day, someone gives us a call. But even if we’re only 50% successful at it, that might be exponentially better than the reactive approach we’re taking now. 

Try it out. It’s a great exercise. It’s a great mental reset.