Is it really possible to balance it all?

People often ask me how I “do it all”. Well um, usually I don’t!  I always have more things to add to my to do list than I take off, there is always laundry to be done, and it seems that I am always behind… in everything.

You see, I work full-time and have for the past 15 years. I have daily fantasies about being a stay at home mom, but unfortunately I don’t have that luxury. Well, not until I win the Mega Millions anyway. But umm, I guess I would actually have to remember to play to win. Moving on… If I stay home, there would be no home! I also run my own photography business.  The worst part is the editing and processing after a shoot, that takes up a fair amount of time. But I absolutely love doing it. I also do web design. This used to be an occasional thing, but lately everyone wants a site. I have a waiting list. I did not want a waiting list! I blog for several sites. I try to get in a little money making on my site when I can. And lastly, I have 2 sets of twins. That probably says enough right there, huh? Well,  there is of course a bunch of other stuff that I do, but I don’t think I could write it down if I tried. I sometimes have that chronic “can’t say no” condition and conversations that start with “I need a….” from a friend usually result in me saying “Oh, I can do that for you!”  That’s a problem that I need to overcome.

On balancing it, I have realized that is not entirely possible. There are just not enough hours in the day. But I have learned that distractions play a huge role in not getting stuff done. Twitter, Facebook, and aimless web browsing are the worst culprits. Sure these “tools” can be useful when used for networking and promoting, but it’s the “well let me just see what so and so is up to” while on there that gets dangerous! So, I am trying to teach myself to limit my play time to very little per day. My next lesson is to actually stick to my to do list. I find that even while trying to accomplish a task on the list, 2 or 3 other things that I need to do come to mind, but instead of just adding it to the list I tend to start to try to do or research that at that very moment. And then neither of them gets completed. So what is the moral of this story?

• Make a list. Spend a few minutes each morning, or whenever you designate “work time” thinking about everything that should be on the list. Note items that you want to get done today versus items that are ongoing or to do later.
• Turn off distractions. Depending on what are problem distractions for you, this might mean the TV, Twitter, or just waiting until the kids are in bed.
• Stick to your list. Pick a task and focus on that one until it’s done. Don’t jump around on the list, this will only delay each thing getting done. Of course if one task is impossible to complete at the moment for reasons out of your control, put it off and move on to an easier one.
• Relax. Take a few minutes at the end of the evening to just watch some mindless TV, relax in a hot tub, or have a cup of tea. Try to clear your mind of all the chaos of the day, so that you can get a good nights rest.

Tagged as: balancing, time management