You have to start somewhere to get somewhere

Do you ever feel like you have a lot to get done but don’t know where to start? As an individual who works full-time, runs a business that is starting to enter the speed of full-time need, and has to heavily focus on their own health while maintaining everything else they are involved in, yes it can be, and is very overwhelming at times!

What do I do in order to succeed in all areas of my life? Here is a peek!

Time Management

The biggest way I find success is to examine and really do my best to manage my time to the best of my ability. We have 168 hours in a single week. I try to get 7–8 hours of sleep a night, that’s 56 hours a week, which leaves us with 112 hours for the remaining of the week that I use to sort out everything else.

Sleeping

Sleep is important, for me I have to average 7–8 hours of sleep. For others you need less, you know your body better than anyone else. Getting the sleep you need is one of the most important things you need to manage in order to take care of yourself so that you have the energy and focus for other things. I am usually in bed between 6–7PM, and up between 2–3AM most days. Why these weird hours? Because my full time job starts at 3:45AM most days so I have to plan accordingly.

Full Time Job

Right now I work a full-time job where I work an average of 40–41 hours a week. That brings our 112 hours we have after sleep down to 71. These 40+ hours I work are usually split between 4 days, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, Friday.

Important Note: Most days at work I have a lot of downtime. In the mornings from about 4:30–7:00AM I don’t have a lot to do. I spend this time working on business tasks, usually for my own brands such writing these articles, or planning / producing content for my different content platforms, or business Rogue Elephant, LLC. That means that 4 days of the week I am doing 2.5 Hours of work each of those days for my own businesses because of the down time. That’s usually around 10 hours of work each week for my own businesses alone, while working the full time job.

Entrepreneur Life

I am an Entrepreneur, the only reason I work a full-time job is I am just not ready to make that transition to my own business platforms full-time yet. That being said I still have to invest a lot of time into my Entrepreneur Life. I already invest 10 hours into this weekly with the time I invest while I’m at my full-time job during the downtime. I also invest a lot of time after work for roughly 2–3 hours each afternoon of the days after work. That gives me another 10–12 hours that I invest on those Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, Friday days.

On top of that I always have at least 1 day that I dedicate to my business alone. Usually this is Wednesdays or Saturdays. Both are days I have off from my full-time job, and days that I can invest full 10–12 hour days into my businesses, and brands.

Daily Personal Time

Another important thing is to take care of yourself everyday. In fact this should be a top priority for you daily! A normal day as far as personal time involves taking care of myself health wise such as taking medication, checking blood sugar, physical exercise, taking mental breaks, reading, etc.

For me I do a lot of these things first thing when I get up in the mornings such as medication, blood sugar and just cleaning up to prepare for the day before I head to work. Throughout the day with downtime at work I may go for short walks, and take moments to meditate if the environment is peaceful and allows for it. I also do a lot of reading during downtime at work of a variety of books, articles and magazines.

After work I will usually come home and have some dinner, and usually will end watching an episode of something on Netflix or Hulu like right now I am going through the “Black Mirror” series on Netflix. (I only have a few episodes left). After that episode and dinner I will transition to finishing up or working on client projects. Depending on the week, or even day I may not have a lot I need to do so then I can use that time to either do future planning, more writing, or take time for myself to relax.

With going to bed around 6–7PM, it is usually by around 5:30PM I do my final prep for the next day routine, something like prepping the coffee maker, finishing dishes and cleaning the kitchen, taking evening meds, bed cleaning, etc. This doesn’t take long when it is a regular routine for you. Once I am done depending on how I’m doing (If I’m really tired and ready to pass out, or still have some energy) I will try to end my night with reading. While I read a lot of books on Kindle when I am at work, I recommend not doing that before bed! Read a physical book, magazine, comic, etc. Using electronic devices before bed just keeps your mind going making it harder to fall asleep.

Other Tasks

How I manage my time can flex quite often, especially when working in media and everything can change in a moment’s notice. Other things I tend to do are meditating, even more reading, food prep so I cook less during the week, and making sure I spend time with family and friends too!

Day of Rest

A very big priority for me is having a day of rest. This is a single day where I do not have to do anything. I can literally just sit back and relax. Knowing me I usually end still doing things but they are usually nothing major, with a high level of importance but rather small things that are easy to accomplish. Having a day to rest each week is good for you not only physically, but emotionally as well, it allows you to release some of that overwhelming tension and stress. Again what day I do this can vary depending on how life is flowing through, but it is incredibly important.

Prioritizing

A final thing to look at is how you prioritize what you need to get done. You should always take care of what you need to get done for yourself physically whether it is doctors visits, medication, working out, eating healthier, etc. Then plan everything after that. If you can’t take care of you, you can’t take care of anyone else.

For setting priorities, you will always know what is the most important thing for you to accomplish, you want to start with those. If you have a lot of them then focus on accomplishing those that will take the least amount of time first. The faster you move, the more accomplished you will feel, and the more motivated you will be to get the bigger tasks completed.

Conclusion

In the long run everyone has a different system that works best for them. Never feel bad about stealing ideas from others when it comes to how you organize your life. Why on earth would we share them if they were not up for grabs in the first place? Do what is best for you!