When you wake up in the morning you probably have a huge to-do list waiting for you.
You might start with the essentials, getting your kids ready for school and yourself ready for the day.
You may have various items like grocery shopping, housework, meetings with your boss and dinner.
But where on your to-do list is the time scheduled for your goals?
You have dreams, I know you do. We all have them.
Whether it is to get in better shape, write a book or start a business we all have goals we would like to achieve.
The difference between those who achieve them and those who only dream them, usually comes down to time.
One person found the time to work on their goals and the other stayed busy with their to-do’s instead of their goals.
Your goals matter, they are important to you and they will probably have a positive impact on others around you.
You need to make your goals a priority.
Stop using the excuse that you don’t have time to work on them.
You have the gift of 24 hours every single day, never more, never less.
These 24 hours are extremely precious, yet we treat them so cavalier.
We jam pack them with so much busy work that we crowd out the time for what matters most in life.
Time is not some obscure, untouchable and uncontrollable force out there that evades us each day as we try and accomplish our long “to do” list.
No, time is a real thing, it is the same every day, we can count on it, we can manage it, we can own it, we can make it work for us and not against us.
You can gain control over your time! Time does not control you.
Investing your money wisely can give you great gains. Time is the same, if you invest your time wisely it will yield great rewards for your future.
So how do I take control of my 24 hours each day and make time for my goals?
1. There Isn’t Enough Time to Do Everything, You Have to Prioritize
The Law of Forced Efficiency states, “There is never enough time to do everything, but there is always enough time to do the most important thing.”
This means we can’t do it all, therefore we need to make some choices.
We need to stop beating ourselves up everyday for not having the time to do it all.
We will never have the time to do it all. So let it go and focus on the things that matter most.
Instead of throwing a bunch of items on your to-do list, stop for a minute and consider your day.
What are your most important priorities today?
What are the items that if you don’t accomplish today, your future will be affected in a negative way?
These are the items that should get your best energy and your first priority.
Your priorities can change daily. Some days rest is much higher on my priority list than cleaning my house because I know my body is needing the rest.
Other days my blog or quality time with my husband are at the top of the list.
What are your priorities?
2. Schedule Your Priorities First
Unless we start managing our time and allocating it according to our priorities our time is going to keep slipping through our fingers and being spent on the lesser things that will not help us accomplish our goals.
Just as we need to budget our money, we need to budget our time or we will end up looking back at the end of the month and wonder where it all went.
This means planning out each hour of our day the night before.
Don’t wait till you are in the middle of the day to plan your day. Be prepared by taking a few minutes the night before to plan out your next day.
By scheduling your priorities first and assuring you have the time to complete them you are building your future and assigning purpose to your day.
You are taking back control of your time.
Sometimes an item on our list can feel really important, but when we think of it in light of our priorities we discover that it is not nearly as important as we thought.
Ask yourself, if I don’t accomplish this task today will it even matter next week?
I have a dream to help women achieve their goals by challenging them to get up and do the hard work and also by helping them know what steps to take.
One of the ways I accomplish my goal is through this blog right here.
This blog takes me several hours each week to complete. Since I don’t have several extra hours in my week just lying around I had to make some choices with my schedule.
Therefore, as I am typing this I can see dog hair on my floor, I have some dirty dishes in the sink and I am still in my sweaty gym clothes from my workout this morning.
Before I started this dream I would spend quite a bit of time each day keeping my house nice and clean.
I am not going to lie, I really miss the cleaner house, but if I forfeit writing my blog so that I can have clean floors today, my clean floors won’t even matter next week.
They will just be dirty again and I will be cleaning them all over again.
But the girl who called me last week to share her success story of losing 15 pounds so far because she read one of my posts and it inspired her to get up and make a change matters.
That matters much more than my floors.
I am not telling you this to toot my own horn, I am telling you this to help give you perspective.
When it comes to how you spend your time each day, only give permission to the things that matter most.
All the less important things will work themselves out.
Hopefully someday you will be successful enough that you can hire someone else to help you with those things.
But for now, just let them go and focus on spending your time on the things that matter most.
3. Schedule The Rest of Your Day
Next add in the other less important items in the remaining time.
As a side note for all your mamas out there: Take a minute to look at your to-do list and see if there is anything you can take off your list by delegating to your kids.
Sometimes we take on too much when others should be helping… Ok I am off my soapbox now. Moving on…
4. Stick to the Schedule, No Excuses
You can have a life of excuses or a life of purpose, but you can’t have both.
So it is up to you to decide.
Excuses are some of the biggest growth stunters in the world.
They hold you back from your potential.
They weaken you in every way: mentally, emotionally, spiritually and physically.
Excuses have been holding people back for generations.
Excuses basically allow us to excuse away our potential.
Excuses are also tricky and they have a way of creeping into our days.
You need to keep your priorities first and your excuses out.
Stay consistent in putting your priorities first and eventually you will begin to see the life changing impact of your choices and the things that were once dreams will become a reality.
