How to Rearrange Your Hours to Make the Most of the Day
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Earlier this week, I celebrated my one year anniversary at the company that I work for. There’s something about these types of milestones that make me so nostalgic. On these milestones, I always take a few minutes to reflect on what’s happened in my life during that time — how far I’ve come, what I’ve accomplished, what’s changed, etc. And it’s always fascinating to see how much of a difference just one year can make. With this milestone in particular, I noticed one distinctive change that has tremendously impacted both my personal life and professional life. And that change was getting a strong grasp on time management.
Time management has always been both a strength and a weakness of mine. Similar with many other people (especially those who are also living in New York City), I juggle many extracurricular activities outside of my day job. As if my current line of work isn’t overwhelming enough, I still do my best to set time aside for my passions that make me me.
However, as we all know, there are only twenty-four hours in a day, seven days in a week, and three hundred sixty-five days in a year. And that time can go by very quickly if we don’t take advantage of it.
Prior to this year, I thought that I had my routine pretty ironed out. On a typical day when I didn’t have any scheduled plans, I’d wake up, go to work, go to the gym, go home, shower, then eat dinner. After a while though, I started getting frustrated with how little time I had at the end of the day to do anything else.
For example, there were some nights when I had to stay at work later than usual. In turn, it made me go to the gym later than usual, which in turn made me get home later than usual, by which time, it would be around nine or even ten o’clock when I finally started preparing dinner. At which point, I’d be so hungry and in a terrible mood. Ultimately, I’d be fed up with how the entire day played out.
It made me regret going to the gym, regret staying late at work, and regret not planning things out better beforehand. But, I was so ingrained in my routine, so accustomed to my schedule that I didn’t see another way. I didn’t see the other options because I was too comfortable with how I had been doing things for the past few years.
