How one calendar hack changed my life
For years I have struggled with the fact that I’m “not a morning person” and used that as an excuse for laziness. The fact that I have worked in retail for almost a decade has only compounded this truly bad behavior. If you’re not familiar with this life of retail and work a typical 9 to 5 job or get to make your own schedule, let me paint the picture for you. On any given week I could start work at 6am on a Monday and finish work at 1130pm on a Saturday. Having a “set schedule” in retail is a huge no-no and greatly frowned upon. Thus depending on the day and when I were working, I would wake up anywhere from 6am to 10am; I lacked a lot of self-control and discipline. While I would love to one day have a schedule that is consistently the same, the variety helps keep things interesting for me, so I have gotten used to it.
I have always heard of people who have been able to pop out of bed in the morning smelling the roses and feeling the sunshine on their faces and just be happy to be alive; needless to say this has never been me.
Recently I was sitting in front of my calendar app on my computer and was starting to plan my week. I was scrolling up and down only my screen when I got a little frustrated looking at one day. I went to my apps preferences, I went to how many hours I can show at one time, changed it from 16 hours to 20, and that’s when I saw it for the first time, an opportunity for a pattern. I was able to see the earliest hour I would ever be awake and the latest hour I would ever go to bed, for me that is 6am in the morning and 11pm at night. What this meant for me was the regardless of when I worked or whatever I had going on I could achieve a level of consistency I have never had before; this was my EUREKA moment the moment that would change everything for me.
Leading up to this moment in time I have always tried to exercise proper time management and plan things accordingly. What I was finding was I would wake up, go to work, come home spend an hour or so with my kids before putting them to bed, have a moment of couch time with my wife, maybe watch a tv show or latest youtube video and then fall into bed exhausted from the day. I had no margin and I had no time to ever develop myself and grow. I had set a goal for the new year to read more and have not been getting to that goal at all. I had become frustrated with the way things were going and wanted more.
Insert this new found calendar hack and now I have literally gained an entire time slot in my day that I never had before.
My daily routine now is this, the alarm goes off, I immediately wake up, pour a glass of my favorite cold brew, and immediately start reading. Eventually my daughter wakes up and then my wife and the morning can start together as a family.
I have got a lot of things wrong in life and I am still growing in a ton of areas, but for me this one simple trick has literally given me time back that I never had in my life.
I hope by me sharing this one small hack that it will help you in some small way as well. Good luck and contact me if you ever need any help.
