Are you too stressed up? There are lots of things that need to be done and you yourself want to do but everything seems so impossible. The time is running at the speed of light and the opportunities are fading away. At such a time, the only thing that you wish for is to learn time management.
What is Time Management? It’s an activity that helps you to plan and control the time you spend on doing several important and not so important tasks in your day to day life. Many people in India think that time management is required by very busy people who acquire top positions in top business companies and firms. For normal people, time management is just a concept.
That’s where we all go wrong. Time management is required by one and all. Even if you are a student, you need to learn how to manage your time. First because if you don’t learn it now, you would have to learn it at a later stage which would be 1000 times more difficult than now. Second because there are lot of things that need to be done and you have too less time to do them.
Time Management has been a big issue in my life as well. I have to give time to my studies which include not less than 6 subjects with extra thick books written by nerds who think understanding each word they say is the only work I have in my life. I have to give time to my passion – my blog which requires me not only to write but also work on promotion, marketing, sales and business development. I have to give time to my part time job and to prepare myself for the full time job I will be looking for in the coming months. And then I have my friends, families and my laziness.
All of these need my time and to manage all of it, I needed to learn the skills of time management. Many of you have already asked me about how I manage to do so much of work – reading, blogging, studying, going out with friends etc. So, this is how I do it and how you can manage your time.
Get mentally prepared
The only tool that works for efficient time management is your brain. If you prepare your brain to manage your time well, all other tips are useless (They would come naturally). Once I asked a friend of mine how he manages to do so much of work. What I wanted was his schedule or a tool that he used to schedule his day but what I got was a one line answer.
“I love what I do.”
This is in fact the secret formula for time management. If you start loving what you do or start making yourself think that you love what you’re doing, you would be able to do that task in less time.
You need to motivate yourself for working on the task in your hand while keeping the big picture in your mind “Why you’re doing it”.
Take rest
Are you thinking how resting would help you complete your tasks? This seems to be a ridiculous idea. Isn’t it?
That’s where you’re going wrong. If you give yourself enough time to rest and be lazy, you would be able to work for more time and complete your tasks at a quicker rate.
The saying, “All work but no play makes Jack a dull boy” is there for some reason. Make sure you give yourself rest that is much needed for your overall mental and physical health.
Also, make sure you give yourself adequate breaks while working. Make sure these breaks are short (5-10 minutes) and see the increase in your overall productivity at work.
Do the Important Things First
When you wake up in the morning, sit for five minutes and analyze which is the most important thing you need to do in the entire day. Make a list of all tasks you need to do in the day and prioritize them.
Learn to say ‘no’. Throw away the unimportant tasks or the tasks that give you no returns. Keep the important ones in the to-do list and do them first. Once you complete the to-do list, take up the unimportant tasks and do them if you want to.
Stop Killing time
Do you realize how much time you waste on using Facebook, twitter, checking mails etc? I am not asking you to stop using all such sites. Do them but when you have wrapped up all the important tasks in your to-do list.
Never utilize your 5 minutes breaks while working or studying for checking out facebook or e-mails. The 5 minute breaks are meant to give your rest and using an electronic device- mobile, laptop, IPad doesn’t let you do that.
So, make sure you really get rest in your breaks (a short nap or a stroll around the house) and you don’t kill your time until the important tasks are done.
ALSO READ: 5 TIPS TO OVERCOME PROCRASTINATION
Turn work into a hobby
Remember the first point I mentioned in this article? I asked you to start loving what you do. And I am repeating the same point to emphasize on the importance of ‘loving your work’.
If you’re unable to make yourself love and get used to of your work, you can never learn time management. You will always be running out of time and missing the deadlines.
Make your work a hobby and do it every day. And time would follow you.
You never have less time to do what you want to do. Time is always enough. Only your intent matters.
“Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.” ― H. Jackson Brown Jr.
I hope these tips would help you manage your time in a better way. In case, you have some more secret tips, do share with me and with the readers of this blog.
Yes, time management does keep a respective importance so as to meet the dead line and target in order to maximize the productivity respectively in order to manage the things in the right perspective. One of the best approach in terms of time management that makes a better sense is the prioritization. When ever the prioritization of things go better with the time management approach, the end result does have a greater importance. That is the only reason I look out for tool that could manage the things in a better way with all necessary requirements and there is my choice of tools, the cloud based hours tracking tool from Replicon which is featured with the user friendly and calendar based interface for a better end result.
Prioritization is definitely needed. Infact, I am reading First Things First and the book emphasizes on the same concept. What kind of tool are you talking about?