How to Find More Time in Your Busy Day
Whether you are a stay-at-home parent or professional parent (or a combination of both), you are undoubtedly busy. We all are, aren’t we? Balancing a home, family, social life, marriage/partnership or co-parenting, business commitments, community obligations, personal care, and any additional involvements (like volunteering at school, hobbies and other errands) is both energizing and productive…and can also be draining and overwhelming.
Here we highlight a few ways to streamline your busy day and stay on top of the laundry list of tasks.
1. Prioritize
Take the time to physically write down your priorities on a high, medium, and low scale. This is a good way to sort through what is in front of you. It is a reference point as you consider your commitment to something new along a tool when organizing your day or week ahead. What can be dropped further down the task list? What needs to be done in a more timely manner? Knowing where it all really falls in the broader scheme of things will help you make better decisions with both your time and energy.
Focus on your high and medium tasks and incorporate your low priority tasks only when you have time. You may even question the low priority tasks altogether. When considering adding something new to your list, ask yourself where it falls in priority. Perhaps an evening out with the neighbors is not as important as having a date night with your partner this week. Happy hour with colleagues might fall below going to that yoga class after your work day. Thumbing through social media likely falls lower on the list than reading that book you have been intending to begin for months.
Keeping your priorities in line day to day will help you feel productive and positive about all the hard work you put forth. There is only so much time in each day - handle it with intentionality and care.
2. Invest the time
You have to find time upfront to get yourself organized. Download apps that make life easier. Organize your calendar. Manage your passwords in a secure app so you aren’t spending time resetting them. Clean up your contact list. Organize your inbox. Update your address list. Find a physical home for things in your household or car. Organize your desk, desktop, purse, and wallet. Whatever it is - write it down as a priority and get it done. Having things in order will make maintaining your day-to-day much more efficient. The time and energy upfront will be well worth it as time goes on. Disorganization = time wasted.
3. Use the tools at your disposal
There are so many tools to save time and add convenience to your everyday. In terms of streamlining your busy day, here are our top 5 daily uses:
Coda.io: Coda can be used to organize meal planning, family budgets, kid’s school and sports schedules, speciality projects and more. We use it to organize holiday cards, plan trips and birthday parties, and keep up on our to-do lists.
Calendar.ly: Set your availability and send out a link for others to schedule time without having to go back-and-forth. Depending on your lifestyle and work life, this can be a game changer.
Doodle: Scheduling a PTA meeting? Group playdate? Family reunion? Use doodle to evaluate everyone’s time without wasting your own.
G-Suite: Google has really figured it out - their gmail and calendar apps work perfectly together. You can stay organized and on top of things on the go with these apps. I find they work much better than the native calendar and mail apps on iPhones.
Boomerang: This is my favorite email management system and helps me stay in front of communication needs and never forget follow-ups. It helps keep my inbox clean, which offers a lot of sanity in its own right.
4. Have Less
This sounds like nonsense, yes. Have less to manage so you have less to manage? Of course. But yes, have less.
Commit to less things that don’t fall in your top priority category.
Consider having less physical items (clothing, toys, jewelry, candles, etc.) - having less means there’s less to take care of and think about. Donate clothing you never wear, toys the children have outgrown, and books and other items no longer serving a purpose. Similarly, delete apps that steal your time and energy. Marie Kondo it. #mariekondo
5. Assembly Line Management
Jumping between tasks wastes a lot of time and context switching. This can make you feel forgetful and feel less productive. Do your best to stay focused on the task at hand. If you have a long list of to-dos that requires you to be in front of your computer (such as ordering birthday presents, emailing your mom back, setting up a paperless post invite, printing out a return labels) simply sit down and do it all at once. When doing laundry - once clothes are dried, fold them and put them away in one sweep. Wash the dishes all at once rather than as you go. Managing your tasks as an assembly line saves time and doesn’t require a new onset of motivation later on.
6. Delegate
If you have children old enough to help around the house, involve them. Their chores can be centered around taking care of themselves and others - setting the table for meals, doing the dishes, putting away groceries, folding laundry, taking out the trash, etc.
If you have the luxury of any in-home childcare provider or an occasional housekeeper, delegate tasks that fall under their realm. Those responsible for taking care of the children could have additional expectations that might include the children’s laundry, cleaning and putting away toys, washing baby bottles, cutting up produce and preparing snacks.
I gladly pay a babysitter additional 15-30 minutes of time when I return home from work so that I can spend quality time with my children before the hustle for the upcoming meal or bedtime routines. While the sitter cleans up from the day and gets us organized for the night or next morning, I get a few moments of together time and fun with my kids that isn’t additional “work” for me as soon as I get home. That additional financial cost is well worth the time I get with my kids and sanity I keep after a long day at the office. It might not be the most budget friendly principal, but it is a best practice that has great benefits during this season of life.
Key take-aways:
Prioritize
Invest the time
Use the tools at your disposal
Have Less
Assembly Line Management
Delegate