Managing Your Time When Time Matters Less
A flexible schedule can go from being a blessing to a curse, especially when staying at home. Here are some ideas to help you measure and manage your time.
Many of us aren’t in jobs with a structured 9am to 5pm schedule. If you’re naturally better at keeping a more flexible day, you might depend on deadlines or other people’s rigid schedules to get things done. For example, sitting down to work from 10 – 12:30, because you have some tasks to work on, but then you’re meeting someone during their lunch break at 1.
Right now, during “Stay at Home,” times, you might be finding it difficult to manage your day if you’re typically more unstructured in your timekeeping. Whether you are self-employed, a creative, or maybe even unemployed, trying to schedule your day in a very rigid way may not work for you. While keeping a strict schedule may be good for some, it’s not especially helpful for everyone. Attempting to keep a rigid schedule may make you feel like you’re waiting for time to pass, while also adding to the stress of feeling like you’re not doing a good job filling time.
Trying to capture the natural schedule of an unstructured day may be a better approach to managing your time, and it might help minimize feeling like you’re just waiting for the hours to pass. In workshops, I try to help people utilize their natural structure to be productive. Right now, it’s less about productivity for most people and more about protecting mental health.
First, sit down and loosely think of some constants in your day and the time that they generally happen. I like to aim for 4 that are happening in the morning, afternoon, and evening. There doesn’t have to be a hard start time. For example: Wake at around 9, eat lunch at 2, virtual workout class at 6pm, get ready for bed around 11pm.
This will give you markers for your schedule, and while they don’t need to happen at any specific time, they can help measure your day in a way that is easier to digest. Now instead of trying to fill 9am to 11 pm, you’re planning more manageable spans of time: 9am to 2pm, 3pm to 6pm, and 7pm to 11pm.
To fill this time, base your goals on your natural tendencies; if you’re still working, pick the time during these windows when you’re naturally more productive to sit and work. When you’re most bored, pick the time during these windows to do an activity that seems pleasurable to you. Some good examples could be reading, napping, video games, cooking, playing with your pet, or taking a long bath or shower.
If you don’t have specific markers in your day, try this instead: write the time you wake and the time you go to bed. Then for your morning, afternoon, and evening, decide what time each starts and ends. Your day is now broken down based on your own internal clock and desires for yourself.
None of these periods are set in stone, and you can spend them however you want, doing want ever feels good. The goal is to have a loose structure that helps you feel better about time in general.
For many of us, this is enough. However, for some, this may still feel a bit like waiting to get to the next time marker. Here are some alternate methods for measuring time that can create a relaxing effect, allowing us to engage in activities without worrying whether we’ve “used enough time in our day” :
1. USE PLAYLISTS
Most of us move through our day based on where we need to be and when. On our way to and from these places, we are usually listening to music. A fun way to measure time is to use playlists. If you’re breaking up your day as suggested above, perhaps a “Morning Playlist” that gets you from 9am to 2pm could be a mix of music that supports the activities your plan to engage in until your 2pm. Make a different playlist for each span of time. When the playlist stops, you know it’s time for the next activity. Now you don’t have to look at the clock and make sure you’ve read or worked “for long enough.” This also has the added benefit of being less intrusive than an alarm signaling the end of the time span. If you’re using an app like Spotify, make sure that you turn off the auto feature so your playlist ends when you intend it to. If making a playlist seems hard, use the pre-made stations and set a sleep timer on the app for the amount of time you’re trying to measure.
2. HAVE SPECIFIC ACTIVITIES FOR SPECIFIC TIMES OF DAY
Whether you’re using the above method or not, you can still benefit from having morning, afternoon, and evening activities.
This will look different for everyone, and the activities don’t have to be traditional for each time of day, just specific to you. In the above method of breaking up your day, it might be work from 9am to 2pm, leisure activities from 3pm to 6pm, and then TV, movies, and social activities after 6pm. That would mean not watching TV at 11am but finding a work-related task. If you’re breaking your day into self-decided time blocks, that would mean doing your own pre-determined morning, afternoon, or evening activities during those dedicated times.
3. CHANGE LIGHTING OR SMELL THROUGHOUT THE DAY
You can do this in the above method of structuring your day or independently. If you’re lucky enough to have lights with dimmers, this can look like setting the lighting at a different brightness through the day based on time, or, every time you sit to do an activity, select a different light setting, changing it when the task is complete. Without dimmers, this may be more tricky, but try covering lamps with lightweight fabric (not directly on the bulb!), using natural light instead of artificial lights during the day, or using floor lamps with no overhead lighting, etc. At the same time, or without changing the lighting, you can burn a candle or use a diffuser to pair your activities with different smells. This will give your senses the impression of shifting your environment, and making it feel less like activities are bleeding into each other. Most diffusers have time selections, so you can set your diffuser for the amount of time you’re trying to measure. When the diffuser turns off, its time for the next shift!
4. TRY NOT TO WORRY ABOUT TIME
Although this seems counter to the advice above, it’s actually a central theme. Right now, many of us are feeling challenged to be productive, but really, we just want to rest and recover. We are feeling stressed by the world and its uncertainty but still have responsibilities and things we would like to get done. Pick a few things each day, and just do what you can for however long you can. That is more than enough. Try not to look at the clock; try just to engage in that activity, and really benefit from doing it. Maybe use a playlist or a diffuser, but also, maybe just use your own interest level. Stop when you’re done, and start the next activity when you’re ready.
by Nicole Borger, M.A., LMHC
Nicole is a licensed mental health counselor specializing in the treatment of anxiety and depression, and in professional development. A former adjunct professor of group dynamics and human service management at CUNY New York with BA and master’s degrees in psychology and counseling, she provides individual and group psychotherapy to a diverse population using cognitive behavioral case formulation and related techniques.