Strategies for Success: Drawing your day
Have you ever counted how many separate trips you do in a day? I have to admit on one particularly hectic day I did over 15 trips in the car and clocked up over 150 miles just running errands, school runs and after school activities! At the end of that day I felt frazzled and exhausted. I seriously needed to analyze what I was doing and what changes could I make.
Over dinner I explained my predicament and started to run through my day for my husband. It did not take long until he stopped me and told me to breathe. He could not follow my frenetic story of all my car trips that day.
“61% of women make one stop on the way home after work and almost 30% make two or more stops. This compares to only 46% men who make a stop on their way home after work.”
I am a very visual learner and to show my husband how much driving I had done I started illustrating my day on paper. This allowed me to share all my locations and the car rides between them. Then I had an idea. I could use the crazy diagram that I had created as the basis to create a calmer day that made more sense.
Once I could see my day on paper as a diagram of locations and journeys I could then identify where I could make it easier. What could I pare down? Where could I be more efficient with my time? And so my “Drawing your Day” technique was born. I use this regularly when our schedules are full and it feels like I need to be in so many places at the same time! Making things simple is the name of the game for me.
How to Draw your Day
Start by writing your locations on a piece of paper based vaguely on their geographic locations.
Then draw arrows on to show your intended journeys connecting the locations.
Step back and look at the bigger picture. What can you simplify? Are there any things that can be done around the same time because they are geographically close?
Re draw your day and think it through. Like what you created? Great! Go forth and conquer. If it’s still not there draw version 3.0, 4.0 etc.
Draw the locations on the paper, then add arrows to represent your journeys.
After reviewing drawing you will see where there’s too much and what needs to be simplified. In this example I reduced 10 trips down to 6!
Top Tips!
See what you can combine on one outing. This is not multi tasking, it is about being efficient.
Do you have to always run home after dropping children off at their clubs. Can you do the shopping you needed to, place your grocery order or even finish up your emails before finally heading home for the evening?
When you know that the week will be really busy do a drawing for each day. It will really help you simplify and have a clear plan in place.