Optimize your life

After graduation, quite a bit changed in my life. I started my professional career, became more intrested in hard work, started to invest in myself as a person. Very fast I started to find out -quoting a colleague now- that there are (only) 24h in a day. What will we do with it? That just up to us. The more interesting (and important) question is: how do we use it? Do we squander time or do we use it as efficient as possible? If you are anything like me more then a year ago, you don’t hold still at the latter. We just do what we want, if there is time.

In this post I’ll share some of the lessons I’ve learned to efficiently use the time that was given to us. I’ll try to prioritize and put the more important ones on top.

Set goals

It’s a biggie, one should stop and really answer the question: What do I want to accomplish? I use a great tool for this: FreeMind. It’s a mind mapper that really works for me (Helping by reporting bugs btw).

If you set goals, one can work efficiently in the right direction. If you just follow your gut feeling, you’ll change more directions then socks. Keeping clear goals allows you to set milestones into your life. Reaching milestones are from my experience, the ultimate thrill. Goals can be very long term, but try and pinpoint milestones, no more then a handful, that are within reach.

Of course milestones and goals will change. But since you made a rational decision about setting a goal, it’s harder to toss it away later. There is an investment in a goal already, that you just don’t want to lose.

Let’s look at an example: imaging you want to learn how to learn to cook (is one of my goals btw). Since you don’t know how to cook, the first milestone is easy. Get an easy cookbook. Get good cooking gear (What’s that? Finding out is also a milestone) . Decide what kind of cooking interests you, etc etc.

Plan out your days

Eisenhower once said: Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.

Don’t waste time doing nothing, instead plan out what you will do. Don’t over plan, but at least firmly lay down what should be done in the day. Once plans are made, it’s easier to finish everything. Less distractions (what to do next?) means more effective time used.

Prioritize

Learning how to prioritize, prevents important tasks not being done. Doing the most important right away (when appropriate) is a very efficient way to get things done. Don’t waste time doing very lower priority items, while important stuff needs to be addressed.

Another related item: make time available. This is not easy, sometimes to get something done, something has to be discarded. Wanting to do everything, or worse wanting to do a little bit of everything, is the perfect formula of actually doing nothing at all. I made time to finish this also, it was ‘done’ for weeks now but hadn’t reviewed it.

Organize tasks

Tasks should be organized. Keep a to-do list, keep track of items in progress. Keep a good schedule. Tasks should have a finish. Clean room isn’t a real task. When is a room clean? Better would be: pick up clothes, clear dust and make the bed. For IT related tasks, keep following in mind: SMART.

Learn to sleep less.

I used to sleep 8h straight, every day. After a couple of months of training, this can be reduced easily (at least of me) into a 5h nap. A couple of hours extra daytime is the difference between doing nothing but work all day, and having some time to do something you like.

A couple of tips to start sleeping less:

• Go to bed and get up on a tight schedule during the week. It really helps to train your body to start sleep right after you go to bed. Getting up also gets easier when it’s on the same time every day. Don’t snooze half an hour, cause it’s just teasing and it’s very inefficient.
• Don’t start skimping an hour of sleep. Start small, like 10min. Get into a rythme getting to bed at a regular hour. After you are used to the shorter sleep time, stay up another 10-15min. Again wait until you are adjusted before reducing the sleep any further.
• Don’t work during those extra hours of daytime! Instead spent time on yourself. Do something you didn’t have time before. Read a book, watch a movie or have sex. Do something you feel is a bonus on your day. Trust me, it’s really import to keep the sleep from setting in. Once you are doing this for a some time, you can work from time to time, since you don’t feel tired before you normal sleep time.
• Don’t under sleep. I tried going below 5h15min/day but I felt bad during the day. I wouldn’t die at that rate, but I didn’t enjoy myself. Don’t under sleep!
• Caffeine is your best friend!

As always, feedback is appreciated!

Regards,
Andries