Want to know an easy way to get other people to stop overloading your schedule?

Every day that you get out of bed you are faced with a growing number of events all begging for your time.  Each day there seems to be just one more thing to take care of.  Your life is cluttered with things that society, your family and friends think are “important” so you added them to your “to do” list.  Have you ever asked yourself why you do this to yourself?  Would you like to find a better way?

As humans, when we accumulate all of these things that we need to do “later” our minds become a mush of these events.  One day we wake up and wonder where the time went.  I call this process filling your “accumu-later”.  Each of us has an accumu-later that has at least a few tasks in it.  The more you have stuffed into your accumu-later the less effective you feel.


One of the tools that I use every week, and every day is the task and goal sheet.  Friday or Saturday of each week, I write down six goals that I want to accomplish.  Sometimes the goals aren't met so they move to the top of the next week.  For instance, we have an older company van, that needed to get cleaned up and sold.  It is now clean, shiny and ready to sell but I didn't sell it last week so it is number one this week.

Each day I also create a list of six tasks that are the primary targets for the day.  These six tasks should work in support of the primary goals, however one or two of them may just be required “chores” or “errands” such as make deposits.  All six of the daily targets might be related to just one goal on the weekly sheet.  My weekly sheet is actually a 12”x12” dry erase glass board on the wall in my office.  Everyone knows what I want done each week.  By posting the goals publicly I have done two things:
1.I have announced to my small corner of the world my intentions for the week, which makes me more likely to achieve them.
2.I have given other people that see them an opportunity to help out.

Letting other people help out is a huge bonus.  You never know who it is.  The other side effect of this posting is people know I already have a plan and people stop asking for right now, and start asking to be put on next weeks plan.

At the end of each day, I review the daily targets and weekly goals and line through everything that was completed.  I then create the targets for the following day, and at the end of the week I create the goals for the next week.  This is a very simple method to get out of the office with your accumu-later cleared of the clutter so your time is really your time.  This same system can work at home too.