Every day is full of new opportunities and exciting chances to make your dreams come true. This may some spiritual or ‘far out’, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. If you live to be 80 years old, you’ve got 28,960 days on this planet, excluding leap years.
If you’re reading this and you’re 30 years old, you’ve already had just under 11,000. So, are you making each of yours count? The best way to make the most of each and every day is to use the time you do have optimally, making the most out of every second, every minute and every day.
Here’s how.
Start the Night Before
When it comes to having a proactive and efficient day, you don’t start when you wake up; you start the night before. Making sure you go to bed at a decent time and get enough sleep is the best way to start your day well rested and with maximum amounts of energy.
Fuel Your Body
So many people missed breakfast in the morning for a number of reasons, mainly because they are running late or not really hungry and want to save eating for lunchtime. However, while you’ve slept, your body has digested all the food, and you’ll be running on empty.
If you don’t have lunch until 1pm and you’ve been up since 7am, that’s five hours you’ve been working on minimal energy, and it’s highly unproductive. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day for a reason.
Motivate Yourself
There are so many ways you can motivate yourself, so you can make the most out of every single day. The most common is using motivational quotes. However, you don’t need to use your phone or memes for this.
“Simply write down your favourite quotes on post-it notes and stick them around your house. This is a great way to keep yourself driven and focused, so you can make the most out of each hour” shares Rob Downer, a time management coach for UK Top Writers.
Use Lists
One of the most effective ways to manage your day is to create a to-do list for everything you need to do for that day. It only takes 5-10 minutes in the morning to write it out, and you can include everything that you need to do in priority order.
It’s much easier trying to follow a list than it is to try and remember everything that you’ve got to do.
Change Your Mindset
When it comes to maximising the performance and productivity of your day, it all starts with how you’re thinking. If you’re telling yourself from the moment you wake up that you’re going to do everything you set out to do, the chances are that you probably will.
Keep Reminding Yourself of Your Goals
It’s so easy to get caught up in your day, and if you’ve got a lot on, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and stressed out but this will only force you to become unproductive, and you’ll be tempted to start multi-tasking. Instead, keep reminding yourself of everything you set out to achieve that day.
Remember the Inspirational People
There are sure to be people in your life, whether friends or colleagues that are as highly motivated as you are and set out to get things done. If you feel like your focus is slipping or your productivity is starting to dip, remember these people, have a conversation with them and inspire yourself again.
Avoid Stressful People That Hold You Back
Hand in hand with the coinscnsideration above, there are going to be people out there in your life, whether you know them or not, that is going to be overwhelmed with stress and despair. These are the people that are going to hold you back, and if they don’t want help, they like living that way, live them to it, so the attitude doesn’t rub off on you.
End Your Day Positively
Coming back full circle, once you’ve completed your day and you’re happy that you gave it everything you had to give, before you go to bed, remember to remind yourself of all the great things you did as you fall asleep. Fall asleep positively and respect and appreciate the day you just had.
Take Things Second by Second
The past is the past, and the future doesn’t exist yet, all that matters is the present moment. No matter what you’re doing in your life, remind to keep your head focused in the present moment so you can give it everything you have.
Using Online Time Management Tools
Many of us have a love/hate relationship with technology, but there is a tonne of resources, apps and tools that you can use to help you manage your time when you need an extra bit of assistance.
Asana is a team-time-management program that can help you to track your own daily performance and habits as well as the rest of your team or department.
Trello is a workspace and fully functional to-do list that you can use individually or with team members.
An online business writing tool that can help you to complete professional writing tasks, so you can focus on more important tasks.
An online writing tool you can use professionally or informally so you can save time in your day to focus on other jobs.
This is a complete time-management application that logs your time on the desktop and mobile devices so you can optimise how you spend your days.
This is a free online tool that can help you write emails, so you save time throughout your day to do other things.
An article by a leading publication that lists and reviews a tonne of services that can help you save time every single day.
Author Bio: Rachel Summers is an experienced writer living and working in the UK. She works as a journalist specialising in education, including Best British Essays, as she has a passion for helping students get the most out of their years in school. Her writing focuses on tips for making school easier for people who are studying, and tools that can help them get the assistance they need.