It’s October, and although it’s perhaps my favorite month of the year, it also tends to be one of the busiest. If you’re a writer, NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is less than thirty days away, and you’re probably busy prepping! If you’re in school, midterms are coming up and the semester is in full swing. If neither of these applies to you, I’m willing to bet you’ve still got a lot going on. This means it’s a great time to look at how to plan your time so that you make the most of it.
This post is kicking off a multi-part series about being your most productive self so that no matter what’s filling up your calendar, you can stay in control and get that to-do list completed.
Without further ado…let’s talk about how to plan a productive week!
Making the best use of your time starts by planning well, and at the very least, this means planning out each week (I also do yearly and monthly planning, but I’ll save those for another post…) Each Sunday, I sit down and plan out the upcoming week. This doesn’t have to mean every second is scheduled, but it’s important to determine your focus for the week. You can’t do everything, so decide what your priorities are.
Choose your goals
I make a list of goals for the week, generally keeping it to no more than five or six. Start with things that absolutely have to get done—anything with a deadline or that other people are relying on you for. This might be a work project, or it might be packing for the trip you’re taking. Then, add in other things that need to be done: sending that email or going to the gym or working on your creative project. Even if it’s something you do every week, add it to your goals, since it’s going to take a chunk of your time that you can’t commit to other goals. For example, at the top of my list each week is “Publish blog post.” This list isn’t necessarily a reminder of things to do—it’s about setting priorities and visualizing exactly how much you’re expecting to get done.
This last part is important. If you look at your list and have twelve goals set, you may need to evaluate them. You might have tons of free time and can get everything done—great! But more likely, you won’t be able to accomplish everything. See if there are any goals you can move until next week, or if there’s any way to make more space in your calendar for this week.
Set the tone
Pick a word of the week. Choose a word that will set the tone for how you want to approach this week. On really busy weeks, sometimes I’ll choose a word like produce or create. On weeks that I need to slow down, I’ll pick a word like balance or rest. It should reflect that goals list, and serve as a general guide of how to approach your week (though it doesn’t mean that you can’t ever rest during a week with the word produce!)
Stop and reflect
It’s important not to constantly plow ahead. You need to take time to relax and reflect on what you’ve experienced. Each Sunday when I create my goals, I also look back at the previous week and pick out a few highs and lows. This is a simple way to go over my experiences of the week, and also gain insight into what I should try to do more of and what I should avoid if I can. Obviously, there will likely be lots of lows that are just part of life—car trouble or busyness at work. But if you realize that, say, you always feel low after spending time with a certain person, or always list a certain activity as a high, then try to adjust your schedule accordingly.
Consider calendar blocking
Okay, I said planning your week doesn’t mean scheduling every second, and it doesn’t have to, but a helpful tool I’ve started using is calendar blocking. I’ll outline the basics of calendar blocking, but for more in-depth info check out this post by Madeline Bartson and this video.
I use Google Calendar since it’s easy to edit and rearrange things. Start by adding commitments like work and school. Then necessities like meals, laundry, errands, and even driving time. As you plan out your required time commitments, you’ll begin to see the spaces you have open. Start adding in time for each of your goals. This will allow you to get a handle on how you’ll spend your time this week and how you’ll fit in working on your goals.
I’ll be honest: I’m too lazy to calendar block every single day. Most of my day is taken up by work anyways, and so I don’t always see the need for planning out the few hours I have in the evening. BUT when I have days off—especially free weekdays, which for some reason are always harder for me to be productive on—I will calendar block those specific days. Otherwise, I tend to spend way too much time watching YouTube or sleeping in or otherwise wasting my time. So even if calendar blocking is a little too Type A for you, consider doing it on specific days when you know you’ll be tempted to waste time.
Be realistic about what you can accomplish. This is where calendar blocking comes in handy. It’s easy to create a to-do list a mile long and then feel discouraged when you don’t finish everything. But when you assign a realistic chunk of time to everything, you suddenly realize what is actually feasible to get done in one day, especially when you add in other requirements on your time. Even if you don’t use calendar blocking, still be kind to yourself. Recognize that there are a limited number of hours each day, and that you also need to take time to rest so that you can be fully productive later on.
I do all this planning in my bullet journal, but even if you don’t use a journal, it’s important to actually write everything out, not just think about it and roughly plan it in your mind. Seeing your goals, priorities, and reflections visually on the page will give you a much better idea of your week ahead and the one that just finished. If you’re not sure where to start, I’ve created templates with all these categories on one page to give you a head start on planning a productive week and day. Click here to get them!
Is October a busy month for you? How do you make the most of your time? Let me know in the comments!
If you liked this post, pin it to share and save it for later!
Featured photo by Marten Bjork
2 thoughts on “How to plan a productive week”