SDH 422: My #1 Time Management Tool: Calendar Your Life with Amanda Boleyn

Other ways to listen:

Hey friends, welcome back to another episode of the podcast. In this episode, I'm sharing a tool that I’ve been practicing diligently for the past 9 months. It is what has attributed to me accomplishing my goals, not giving in to overwhelm, and knowing when my workday is done.

Time management. What does it actually mean to manage your time? Managing your time is you decide ahead of time how you’re going to spend your time and exactly what you’re going to do with it.

The problem with time management for most people is that they’re reactive to their schedule and work from a never-ending to-do list.

When you work off a never-ending to-do list, it is, therefore, never-ending. Right from the start, you set yourself up for failure in the sense that you’ll always be “behind”.

And when you feel behind, you put yourself in a closed loop of being behind.

Napoleon Hill, the author of “Think and Grow Rich” shares that our thoughts create our feelings, which creates an emotion, inspires an action, which produces a result. If your thought is “I’ve got so much to do” (because it is triggered by your never-ending to-do list), you’re going to feel overwhelmed. Most often this results in either not taking or initiating action but also not following through. Ultimately, this becomes your story and what you identify with.

Today, I want to offer you a tool I use that actually allows me to throw my to-do list away and feels so freeing. It is a tool called “Calendering,” meaning everything that needs to get done, goes on the calendar. No longer are you trying to track down your multiple sticky notes, rather you have ONE central location that you work from. This method definitely works better with a digital calendar rather than a traditional paper calendar because you may find yourself needing to switch things around, and doing this digitally is much easier than on a paper calendar.

The idea is that anything and everything that needs to get done has a place on your calendar. The benefit of this is that you no longer have a to-do list and you become more proactive with your time; you know exactly how you’re spending your time and what you’re producing during that time, plus, you save energy by having a system in place.

I’m going to share with you:

How to get started using this tool

How to set up your digital calendar (with options to create different calendars)
Common mistakes to avoid

How to Get Started Using This Tool

To get started using this tool, you first need to carve out time to plan. If you’re not already doing this, you’ll want to start. The Six-P Formula states that “Proper Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.” It may take you 10-12 minutes to plan your day but by doing so it could save you up to two hours in wasted time and diffused effort throughout the day.

“Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now.” - Alan Lakein

Start by planning the week. As you begin to practice this skill, you can then work towards planning two weeks at a time. And sometimes in order to know what needs to get done for the week ahead, it is helpful to know what you need to get done for the month.

Step 1: Here you create two lists; 1) what outcomes do you want to achieve by the end of the month, and 2) what outcomes do you want to achieve by the end of the week.
Here is an example of your monthly list for November:

Complete my opt-in
Finish the course on email marketing
Record and schedule 2 podcast episodes for next month
Record 4 podcast interviews

Here is what your weekly list might look like:

Go to the store
Workout
Date night
Any other activities that take place

Step 2: Next, you want to assign dates to each of the items on your lists.

Monthly list for November:

Complete my opt-in (end of November)
Finish the course on email marketing (first week of November)
Record and schedule 2 podcast episodes for next month (2nd week of November)
Record 4 podcast interviews (3rd week of November)

The weekly list might look like:

Go to the store (Monday night)
Workout (every day at 8 am)
Date night (Thursday at 6:30 pm)
Any other activities that take place

Step 3: For each list (when possible) take each outcome that you want to achieve and make a massive action list for each.

Let’s take “finish the course on email marketing” as an example. This may include:

Watch module 1
Complete module 1 worksheet
Implement learnings from module 1
Watch module 2
Complete module 2 worksheet
Implement learnings from module 2
Etc…

For the “Go to the store” it may look like:

Brainstorm meal ideas
Create a final list of what I need to get

Step 4: Schedule these activities in your calendar. For some of these, I recommend scheduling them in 25-minute increments and for others, it will make more sense to simply schedule the activity.

For example, the “finish the course on email marketing” activities, those I recommend scheduling in 25 minutes increments. It might look like 3-3:30 PM on Monday you’re going to watch the first module, then from 3:30-4 PM “complete module 1 worksheet.”

Let’s say that for date night you simply block out 2 hours.

You also want to consider the time it takes you to get to and from a place. Driving to date night, you’ll want to include that travel time.

If you’re someone who is not used to using a digital calendar, try it out. You can always go back to your paper planner if you want to.

How to Set up Your Digital Calendar

When using a digital calendar you can use iCal, Microsoft or the one that I prefer and use is Google Cal. The great thing about Google Cal is that you can create different calendars for different types of activities.

If you’re someone who is building your business while working full-time, consider the following calendars and color coordination:

Personal (Yellow)
Full-time job (Orange)
My business (Green)

When you go to schedule activities on your digital calendar, using different calendars and colors can help you visually see exactly where you’re spending your time.

As a business owner, I use the following calendars:

She Did It Her Way
Executive
Content Creation
Launch/Promotion
Personal

You can always change and modify your calendars to figure out what flow works best for you.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Not scheduling time to plan: You want to make sure that you pick a time every week where you sit down and plan your schedule. For some, Sundays work best and for others, Friday afternoons work best.

Scheduling activities when there need to be outcomes: For example, instead of scheduling time as “work on blog post” you would instead schedule “produce 1st draft of blog post.” This ensures that you know exactly what you need to produce and get done, not just do. Doing doesn’t always get you where you want to go. It is like a rocking chair but gets you nowhere.
Improper use of time: One of the worst uses of time is to use it to do something very well, that needs not to be done at all. Always consider what it is that you’re doing and whether or not it needs to be done in the first place.

There you have it! I hope you enjoyed today’s episode. I’d love to hear from you on whether you use something like calendaring already or when you start to implement this technique in your life.

Join us over on Instagram at She Did It Her Way. Until next time, keep doing it your way.

In this episode, you will:

Learn how to effectively block time on your calendar for business and personal use
Find out how I break down tasks to maximize my working hours
Hear how to make the switch from using a paper calendar to a digital one
Discover the importance of planning out the usage of your time

Insights:

“The idea is that anything and everything that needs to get done has a place on your calendar.”
“Our thoughts create our feelings, which creates an emotion, inspires an action, which produces a result.“ - Napoleon Hill
“The Six-P Formula states that ‘Proper Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.’”
“You want to make sure that you pick a time every week where you sit down and plan your schedule.”
“One of the worst uses of time is to use it to do something very well, that need not to be done at all.”