Someone once told me that if you want to be financially capable at an early age, you have to give up your passion. I actually believed in that for some time. I strived hard to be financially stable. I gave up on my passion for writing because it does not provide food on our table. Some of you might tell me that with patience, I can earn money, but I did not have the luxury of waiting. My mother had a stroke before I graduated and our medical bills are piling up. Our family does not have a source of income, and as the eldest, it was my duty to provide for them.
A few years passed, I realized I can actually do both by maximizing my time. Many of my peers have asked me how I manage my time to finish a lot of task in a day. I dabble in some online works while managing two business ventures (check out my first post for some background of me), so my day is usually busy.
If you were like me before – striving financially but still wants to pursue your passion – here are some tips that have been very useful to me.
1. Wake-up early or at least have a consistent wake up schedule.
This is the most important part. Waking up early allows you to have more focus on your task. It might be hard at first but waking up early gives you more energy, which you can use on your daily tasks. I usually wake up between 6:00 to 6:30am every day. This gives me about a couple of hours to get ready for my day – pray, shower, eat and some exercise. My working day starts at 8:30.
If you are not a morning person or your schedule doesn’t allow you to wake up early, try having a consistent wake-up schedule. This also means you need to have a consistent sleeping time. A good 8 hours of sleep helps give you more focus.
2. Make a list of all the tasks you need to do with their corresponding importance and due date.
A list will help you stay on track in keeping a busy schedule. Group your schedule base on importance, due date and size of task. Due date will let you know how much time you have until a tasks needs to be done. Size of task will inform you of how long it would take you to finish a task. The importance will help you prioritize. You can now arrange your tasks base on the following criteria.
Do first those tasks that you can finish nearest to its due date. If you need to choose between two tasks, the task with most importance should be done first. In my situation, my business comes first since this would provide for my family.
3. Insert small tasks between big tasks.
Small tasks are usually task you can finish within minutes or those that do not need much thought. These tasks can also pile up if you ignore them and can take a chunk of your time. You can do this task between bigger tasks allowing you to check off more task for the day. For example, if I have to make a financial report for my company, I have to download many related documents. Instead of just waiting for my download to finish or browsing the web while waiting, I use this time to finish signing checks or basic documents that needs my approval. If I have to be in a conference call with my business partners, I sometimes do the dishes or clean my place (except for video calls of course) while listening to some discussions.
4. Check off completed task on your list.
This is not very important but I find this satisfying to do. I love to make those red lines in my notebook every time I complete a task (I use red pen in checking off completed task, and yes I use paper notebook). It gives me a sense of accomplishment regardless of the size of the task.
5. Make time for your hobby and loved ones, or anything that will make you happy today.
When I say make time, don’t just say, “I will call my mom later” or “I will start writing this afternoon”, instead set a fix time to do that. Setting a time gives you a conscious reminder that you need to do it by that time. It will also motivate you to be more focused on your current task. If you are a workaholic like me, chances are your “later” becomes tomorrow. As we all know, there is an infinite number of later and tomorrows. Before we know it, it has been months or years but you have not yet started that blog you love or haven’t talked to your family for quite some time. Do at least one thing that will make you happy every day.
I hope these tips will make you in organizing your time. For more post, follow me
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