From Chaos to Clarity: Structuring Your Time Around Your Values
To be the best version of you, your calendar has to reflect your values.
It’s easy let literally the opposite order of operations determine your life:
1. Work dominates the schedule
2. Relationships fill in the gaps
3. You get what’s left over
But the first circle to ensure you have time for is: you.
Circle 1: YOU
You have to make time for yourself to:
• Rest enough
• Get bored enough
• Do what nurtures your soul
So how do you do this?
I teamed up with Nir Eyal to analyze the science:
(The image is from Nir’s book Indistractable)
1. Focus on the inputs
2. Take pressure off the outputs
3. Timebox your days and weeks to make time
By making time for yourself, you can bring your best self to…
Circle 2: YOUR RELATIONSHIPS
The second circle is your relationships.
It’s all too easy to let work and your obligations, such as childcare, take over your life. In practice, we all need strong relationships with our partners and friends.
The science is clear:
• You live longer
• You are happier
• And you make more money
So we need to make time for it. Regular times are the solution, EG:
• A weekly afternoon with your kids
• Dates every few weeks with your spouse
• Meeting other families for lunch every few weeks
These types of regularized activities create the basis for us to bring our best selves to our…
Circle 3: WORK
We modern workers constantly feel pressure:
• To respond to messages outside of work hours
• To maintain an Inbox zero for other’s agendas
• To be hyper responsive on chat and text
But these work-related distractions ultimately compromise the quality of time we have for ourselves and our relationships. And an email when you are scheduled for family time is exactly that, a distraction.
So the key?
Right-size the amount of work and produce high quality without compromising on your other times.
You want to schedule out your work and provide transparency about it to your boss and stakeholders. That’s how you make time for all three circles that matter, in the right order.
For more tactics on how to apply this to a tech worker’s career, check out the deep dive.
P.S. What do you do to make time for all three circles in your life?
