Over and over, I’ve heard it said, “If it’s not scheduled, it’s not real.”  

I’ve fought the idea of putting my life on a schedule.  I’ve said:

How can you schedule when a child’s going to get sick and they have to stay home from school?
How can you schedule an accident on the highway and intense traffic?

How can you schedule going grocery shopping, forgetting an item, and having to go back?

Aren’t most schedules for show anyway?

Yes, I’ve given every objection to planning my day and living my life by my Google calendar and my android digital personal assistant but here’s what I’ve found:

Until you schedule it, it’s not a priority.

Wanting to work out everyday is a nice wish but until you have a set time that it occurs in your week (hence, why people love going to classes where times are scheduled and locked in), it won’t happen.

I’m a commitment phobe when it comes to my calendar.  It takes me 20 minutes too long to plan out my day because I look at my list of to-dos and look at my calendar and my constant gripe is:

There’s not enough time in my day to do EVERYTHING I want to do!

After about five minutes of pity partying, my Higher Self kicks in and lovingly reminds me:

At the end of the day, there will NEVER be enough time…

It’s not about having enough time.  It’s about doing ALL  you can with ALL you have, accepting that life is a work in progress, and being okay with the fact that it’ll never ALL be done.

We’ll never ALL be done.

“Waiting” to arrive is a total and complete waste of energy. 

The journey is THE thing.  The destination changes A LOT.

If you want to get more accomplished in your day, week, month and year, here are three tips that help me:

1. Schedule your most important tasks DAILY.  Okay, take one day off during the weekend so you don’t feel like a total auto-bot (Side note: Transformers!  More than meets the eye:).
2. Change your schedule as soon as “life happens.”  Yup, when a child gets sick or I have to run an errand I wasn’t expecting to run, I go back to my Google calendar and change my time frames.  It keeps me honest and it keeps my calendar consistent with my life.
3. Spend 5 minutes each night evaluating how you spent your time.  Before I sit down with my husband and watch another episode of Life Unexpected on Net Flix, I sit down and ask myself a few questions: What worked about today?  What didn’t work about today?  What do I need to change in how approach tomorrow?   This idea came to me from Peter Bregman’s book, 18 Minutes.

Well, there you have it.  I’m not in love with the idea of scheduling my life but it works.

Sometimes, you do what you HAVE to do now so you can do what you WANT to do later.

It’s called, “Never give up what you want most for what you want now.” 

#usetodaywisely