So as the dust settles and I’m getting used to my life in Olympia, I’m starting to look at having a work schedule.
I didn’t have one before. I couldn’t. 
I moved states. That’s pretty much enough said on how unpredictable your daily life can suddenly become.
I ran, for the last two months, basically on a “what do I need to do today” mentality, stuffing in tasks that came my way and events that I somehow had to squeeze in between realizing that I wasn’t at “home” anymore and being okay with this. And everything that I couldn’t hit today, automatically got shoved over to tomorrow.
I never saw any sort of long term goal or plan past the upcoming 24 hours. If I was lucky, I saw the forecast for a few days.
Now there’s a time and place for this sort of reactive mode of living; this emergency autopilot that kicks in and just helps you survive until the next day. And sometimes, running a business can completely feel like this.
You can fall into “damage control mode” where you try to fit in all urgent tasks that should have been addressed yesterday on today’s to-do list, and you stop either when the fire is put out or you are just too damn tired and you need to sleep.
And this can lead to feeling very, very harangued. Stressed. Sometimes a bit crazy.
And I realized, after two months, that while this is a very viable reaction in an emergency, you can’t do it all the time.
Can you imagine if you ran your business on this high octane state of mind 24/7, flying by the seat of your pants?
- You would never feel like you had control of your business, because if you spend all your time putting out fires, then your time is actually not your own.
- You would never rest, or if you did, it’d be more because you passed out from exhaustion.
- All the bigger personal projects you had in mind would never get done, because it’s very easy to cut your personal wants out of the equation when you’re in a time crunch.
- You would never be able to get ahead of your own workload, because you’d only be reacting to what needed to immediately be done.
This is not the way to run a business. Nor is it a way to run a life. But sometimes, we cannot help falling into this state. It catches the best of us off guard, and for some, this might even be the norm.
So how do you stop something like this and get to a point where it feels like you have control of your business?
Ironically, by having a schedule.
I used to think that schedules weren’t for me. That because I’m a freelance business, I can do whatever the hell I want. That’s the perks of being self-employed, after all. But even the most flexible business owners have a structure underneath their work week that keeps them on track on their long term goals and most importantly, keeps them sane.
Schedules keep you out of reactive mode that can make you feel you have no control. Schedules help you block off time for meetings and puts a limit on how many things you can do in a given week so you don’t swamp yourself. Schedules give you a structure in which you can say ‘no’ to something and not feel bad about it. Because if it doesn’t fit in your schedule for the week, it’s not really your fault, right? 
But most importantly, at least in my book, schedules tell you when you have time off and you better damn well take it. When you know that you’re off the clock at 7pm, you are way more productive on your actual work hours. It helps you focus. It gives you an end in sight. And knowing you have time that you can spend however way you want helps charge your energies for the next day.
You worked hard and so therefore you earn a break in having the rest of the day off. You need moments of gratification and reward, and as a business owner who’s solely in charge of yourself, you need to consciously schedule in that time.
Schedules are much like contracts. Contracts are to protect yourself. It’s that iron shield that if you need to, you can hide behind in a dispute. Schedules are the same. They’re actually there to protect you and keep you on track, make sure you have enough time to relax and enough time to work on the projects that rejuvenate your business.
Contrary to popular belief, a schedule doesn’t box you in. At least I’ve found it to free me up from a lot of worry and guilt I had. Because now I have the power to say “I can’t do that this week, how about next week?”
That being said. Here’s my weekly schedule:
- Monday/Tuesday – client work (writing, tech, emails, and follow ups)
- Wednesday – day off (though I can work on this day if I want to)
- Thursday/Friday – networking (usually filled with meetings and home errands)
- Saturday/Sunday – Fun stuff (fiction writing/info product creation/drawing)
What does your schedule look like?
No related posts.