Back at the start of the year (how was it that long ago already?!) we shared our first One Thing at a Time idea: Pick A Priority.
I’m famous among my friends for frenzied multitasking. This is despite trying over the years to chill out and single-task .Or at least do three things at once instead of twenty-eight.
So how did it go?
Well, it was a very simple plan – make a list and PICK ONE. I’ve been keeping on top of things much better with my bullet journal, so the list part was easy.
But ohmygosh I am SO BAD at picking just one thing to focus on. At the moment there’s so much going on that everything and its dog feels like a priority!
After a couple of weeks of failing miserably at this, I decided to take a slightly different approach. Instead of one priority for the week, month, or as long as it took to get done, I’d pick a priority for different chunks of time.
What a ‘priorities’ day might look like
I chose to track this on a Monday when I work half a day at my day job and half a day on my own things. It looked like this:
7am – 8am priority: make sure I have fed the cats & litter tray cleaned, etc
8am – 9am priority: get to work on time
9am – 11am priority: the new research website I’m working on at the day job
11am – 11.30am priority: emails (responses, filing, listing jobs that come from them)
11.30am – 1pm priority: day job database work I’ve been putting off for ages. It was actually ok once I made the decision to do it, and prioritise it for this chunk of time. I rewarded myself with decent music while I worked.
1pm – 2pm priority: nourish myself with a healthy lunch, not junk food
2pm – 4pm priority: mermaid swimming (and a priority in itself – get footage for the mermaid spa splash page)
4pm – 7pm priority: Get Run Away Days mermaid spa splash page live
7pm – 8pm priority: dinner (again with the nourishing & healthy)
8pm – 10pm priority: downtime, and relax before bed. No screens!
So while it wasn’t quite about picking one overall thing for me, I found that having one focus in each chunk of time worked incredibly well for me, and I got all of the things I needed to do done far more effectively than when I just firefight.
It was also more effective than when I did try to focus on one thing continuously – which backs up what I already know about my personality and brain – I can focus, but I need variety in my day in order to thrive.
All in all, I’m counting this one as a success! Did you try it? How did you get on?