Think about it: your calendar shows where you’ve been, where and when you worked, projects you did, with who, vacations, events, travel, dry cleaning pickup, daycare dropoffs.
Your calendar is like a bank statement of your time.
The weeks, months, years past are a log of what’s happened in your life.
This present week is a snapshot of what you’re focused on right now, what you plan to prioritize this week, commitments you have, maybe the To-Do’s and life admin needing attention, hopefully some self-maintenance and learning/personal development, protected quality time with loved ones, and attention to your energy needs.
What do the next 2 weeks, quarter, year look like?
How much of your future is being left to chance?
Don’t make the mistake of ‘living paycheck to paycheck’ with your time
Some people run their schedules (with the best intentions) much like ‘living paycheck to paycheck’ from a time perspective, hoping the demands of work and life won’t exceed the supply (of time, energy).
Crossing their fingers that next week’s onslaught of work won’t tip the scales, sending them into overwhelm and stress.
They start their week looking at what emails have come in (which Dan Martell beautifully describes as nothing more than ‘a public to-do list for strangers on the internet’ to make demands on your time. It’s true though right? Every email is someone requesting your action, attention, and/or time.) – so they look at their inbox and the emails dictate a ‘to-do’ list to fill any blocks of time still available between whatever meetings are already in their schedule.
Autopilot… it’s a survival tactic
They may forget to eat lunch, work late ‘to get through a few more emails’. They might inadvertently squander their energy and time by decompressing after work with a glass of wine or scrolling social media late into the night, tanking their sleep quality but still waking up and powering through a 6am spin class then zooming, coffee in hand, into the next workday, living in a sort of high-octane autopilot accomplishing tons without much time to reflect.
I say they, they, they, but as you likely guessed that was me, me, me. For a long time.
Your calendar is also a forecast
Then I saw a talk by Warren Rustand, who early in his career had a chance to work for the president of the USA and manage their schedule – probably one of the people with the most demands on their time in the world. He initiated a shift from reactively triaging the barrage of incoming requests as they came, to instead proactively setting the upcoming priorities with the president first, letting that determine what requests were of most importance and relevance to respond accordingly.
Knowing what to say yes to makes it easier to say no
I happened to have just started as an executive assistant for a very fast-moving, charismatic entrepreneur when I discovered this and applied it instantly to his schedule.
Think about that shift, from ‘how much of this can I do within the constraints of my schedule/time etc.’ i.e. maximize volume – to having clear priorities and direction set, dictating how to fit the most important, dial-moving things in first.
Being busy means trying to get the most things done, being productive means getting the most impactful things done.
Shift from ‘The Most Things‘ to ‘The Most Important Things’
If you don’t tell your time where to go, you’ll find yourself wondering where it went.
(Ever had one of those days you felt like you were running and gunning all day handling whatever came at you and at the end of the day you just wonder what even happened?)
The more clarity you have on what is most important, the easier it is to allocate your most precious and scarce resources of time and attention. Much easier to say no thank you or not right now when you know what needs your focus.
Got goals? Tell your calendar.
Your calendar is the roadmap to your goals
Does your future calendar tell a story of your dreams coming true, your goals getting achieved, your family getting the best version of you, of thriving health, replenishing rest and sleep, great connection with friends, learning and expansion, growing yourself and your business…
Or are you leaving much of that to chance?
If your calendar is waiting for other people’s demands and priorities to flood it, or worse, already filled with things that don’t inspire or fulfil you…
You wouldn’t be alone if that is the case. But what if instead…
You didn’t leave it to chance, you shifted out of default mode and designed your days and weeks to work for you, to keep you performing at your best?
Being REALLY productive involves ensuring that you predictably and reliably arrive to your commitments with enough energy to perform your best. If you’ve ever heard the expression ‘garbage in, garbage out’ – it applies to our schedules too. Arriving to an immaculately planned workday or event with a cloudy mind and empty energy tank isn’t quite a recipe for success. That’s why we must plan for energy too.
Your calendar needs to know your plans
Need daily exercise to clear your mind? Tell your calendar.
Need accountability to follow through? Tell your friend’s calendar.
Intend to go on more dates with your spouse? Tell your calendar.
Imagine your calendar as your personal assistant, a roadmap planned and perfectly suited to you and this chapter of your life, guarding your time and focus for what matters, ensuring you are rested, fed, fulfilled, challenged, stretching your potential, energized, supported, not letting important balls drop, effortlessly keeping sight of and momentum going on your goals and priorities both at work and home.
Make the big decisions upstream (in advance).
When you shift like this to proactive mode, you will unlock much more capacity and energy, and it only keeps getting better from there.
Time management is energy, focus, and priority management. It’s the art of decision-making in advance and adapting on the fly, creating systems to move decisions upstream, batching or offloading low-value decisions or tasks to make room for higher-return-on-time activities. It’s communication – teaching people how to treat you and your time, saying no more often, saying yes more discerningly -, and finding ways to save, protect, expand or contract time for yourself.
Book in the good stuff too!
You’ll continue learning by trial and error what conditions help you be at your best, so you can replicate that formula week after week. It starts with booking in your inputs (rest, fuel, learning, exercise, etc.) to maximize your output – and prioritizing the things that matter most, first.
I used to think this proactive, pre-blocking and protecting time in advance was only for CEO’s, successful people who had earned and grinded their way to be ‘allowed’ to determine how they spend their time.
I wish I could say the instant I saw that talk by Warren I overhauled my own schedule too, but I only drew the connection to my exec. It took a couple more years and a big brush with burnout to wake me up to the fact that I could, and must, apply the same mindset to my own schedule. Then I was awakened and hooked and started writing permission slips, to my team, friends, clients.
Guarding your time is not just for CEO’s
It turns out it’s the ticket for all of us, no matter your life, position or situation. Treat your time (=attention=energy=focus) like the most high value commodity it is, by allotting it in advance where you need it to go:
towards creating the story of your great career and life, with YOU as the author.
You can work with a time coach to level up
