Start and End Your Day Right
You jump out of bed, hoping to get on the road before everyone else. Whatever your means of transport, you join executives, officers, advisers, clerks, and assistants in the daily rush to reach the workplace on time.
By the time you return home, you describe your day as “toxic.”
Tomorrow, the routine begins again.
Working beyond regular hours becomes a habit, leaving little time for other things worth doing. You say, “There’s not enough time,” “I don’t have the time,” or “Time passes too quickly.”
But have you considered why your work takes so much time?
You arrive on time and remain at the workplace throughout the required working hours. Yet your tasks are unfinished, or some are not done properly and must be corrected.
Perhaps you do not fully understand what needs to be done. You may lack a particular skill or use an inefficient method. You spend more time figuring things out, repeating steps, and correcting mistakes. Then there is social media—that self-imposed daily requirement that takes your attention away from the work.
To finish, you extend your working hours.
You go home with a tired mind and a tired body. Personal responsibilities still await you, so bedtime moves later. Yet you must wake up early and report to work on time.
The next day, you begin work without enough rest. Concentration becomes harder. You work more slowly, overlook details, and take longer to complete tasks. Once again, you work overtime.
More overtime. Less rest. Another tiring day.
What seems like a shortage of time has become a vicious cycle.
Everyone has twenty-four hours in a day. Time cannot wait for you, adjust to your difficulties, or give back the hours you have used.
You may resolve to become stricter about “time management.” But a tighter schedule alone will not supply a missing skill, clarify a task you do not understand, or stop you from scrolling through social media.
Why not focus on managing yourself?
Self-management involves the ability to do your work properly, the discipline to give it your attention, and the physical and mental readiness to sustain your effort.
No amount of seminars on the Pareto Principle, the four quadrants of time management, or other techniques can substitute for a fully charged, well-rested body and mind. Rushing to work and arriving on time do not guarantee efficiency. Punctuality gets you to the workplace; it does not, by itself, enable you to perform your work well.
Starting your day right begins with ending the previous one well.
As a starting framework, divide your day into three parts: eight hours for sleep, eight hours for work, and eight hours for your other needs and responsibilities. Adjust this to your circumstances, but give each part a definite place. Sleep should not receive only whatever time remains after everything else.
Give yourself those eight hours of rest so that you can make productive use of your eight hours at work. Otherwise, you risk spending the day struggling with fatigue and the evening completing what you could not finish.
Next, examine how you perform your tasks. What do you repeatedly have to redo? Which instructions are unclear? What skill would help you work more accurately and efficiently?
Ask for clarification. Seek guidance from someone who knows the process. Learn and practice using the tools your work requires. Correct a method that repeatedly produces errors. The time you invest in learning can save you from spending the same extra hours struggling every day.
Then examine where your attention goes.
Supervisors and customers have requests they consider urgent. Colleagues need assistance. Friends and family send messages. Some demands require an immediate response; others can wait. Learn to make that distinction.
Be honest, too, about your social media habits. A quick look can become prolonged scrolling, watching videos, checking updates, or exchanging personal messages. These activities consume working time and repeatedly break your concentration. You may then work overtime to make up for hours you were physically present but occupied with something else.
Keep personal social media use for breaks or after work. Give your tasks the attention they need so that avoidable distractions do not consume the hours meant for your personal life and rest.
The aim is to complete your regular work properly within regular working hours. Your remaining time also has a purpose: commuting, meals, family, household responsibilities, personal interests, and preparing for sleep.
There will be occasions when overtime is necessary. But when it becomes your everyday routine, examine what keeps it going. Is it a lack of understanding, insufficient skill, an inefficient method, a distracting habit, or fatigue carried over from the previous day?
Address the cause instead of repeatedly extending the hours.
Doing your work well helps you finish on time. Finishing on time gives you more opportunity to rest. Rest helps you return better prepared to do your work well.
That is the daily cycle worth building.
Start and end your day right.
