Your Admin Now

For years, I’ve loved scheduling my life. This actually began because of my work in business administration almost 10 years ago and it’s truly been a life changer. It even got me into making Monday my favorite day of the week. Why? Because I looked forward to an organized week.

Most of us should have a digital calendar on our phones, laptop or computers. Some of us have one on different devices, different platforms. Take me, for example, I have my personal calendars on my MacBook, and I have my business calendar in Google, but I started off with a physical planner before going digital. When I used a physical planner, I always made sure to immediately write in an event ahead of time if I had that option or I’d take some time out of Friday or Sunday to add in things that came up. I wasn’t writing on it daily, but it was constantly updated even when things came up at the last minute. I would tell myself “Writing it out helps me remember.” And it did! It also got me comfortable with using a calendar.

So, my first recommendation is to start with a physical planner as a guide into transitioning to digital. Here are some more things to consider and a few tips to get you started:

1. Make sure that when you purchase a physical planner, you’re really imagining how you’re going to use it. I personally love a full size, monthly & weekly, planner with enough writing space in each day and a notes section in each weekly page. I prefer a minimalistic look, hardcover, with a spiral type of edge. I don’t like too much color or too many features because I essentially use color codes and the notes sections for specifics, like goals, inspiration and priorities. I recommend you buy something you’re going to love using.
2. Purchase highlighters or color pens to color code to easily distinguish what you have going on, priorities and what can be placed on hold. I recommend you make a planner key with symbols and colors for categories. (Ex: Black ink – general, blue ink – work, red ink – school, teal – children, purple – personal life, etc. / * – priority, ! – deadline, $ – bills, à – rescheduled, r – cancelled, ü – complete.)
3. Use the monthly pages for special days like birthdays and monthly recurrences like bills and income. Use the weekly pages to schedule daily activities and planned occurrences. When scheduling daily activities, try to schedule with start time and end times to determine how long it’ll take for you to complete certain things.
4. Schedule activities based on realistic expectations. For example, don’t schedule a workout 7 days a week but you usually only do 3 or 4. I’d say plan for the 4 days, and if you don’t make it once, it’s better than saying you didn’t make it 4 out of 7 days. This helps you stay motivated but also to aim for a higher goal with time.
5. Give yourself grace period! This one is important. If you’re scheduling a consistent daily life, take into consideration how much time you have between activities. You don’t have to schedule commute times, but maybe consider writing an end of 30 minutes later.
6. Don’t take your calendar too seriously. I’m huge on telling people how important it is to stay organized and on top of your day, but to also completely understand when we need a break. It’s okay to dismiss a few things off your calendar if you’re feeling overwhelmed.

Don’t overwhelm yourself with setting yourself up for unrealistic expectations. It’s okay to start off with scheduling too much, but make sure that you’re updating how often you do daily activities if you’re not able to meet them. This was one of my biggest personal problem transitioning from full time employee to self-employed. If this happens to you, there’s no need to beat yourself up for it. Shit happens. What you do is, as soon as you notice yourself in this state, you rearrange your schedule to only focus on doing as much as you can bare. This will not only help you meet your lower expectation, but it may also help you exceed them once you find your flow again.

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