How Planning Can Help You Stress Less
It’s that time of the year again when I get pen on paper and set some yearly personal goals and get back into weekly planning.
This exercise is something I do yearly as well as our usual weekly planning. I find it keeps me on track but even more importantly it keeps me sane. I am one of those people that functions best with schedules and check lists. In fact both my children are the same as well, they love a bit of routine because they know what to expect. It takes only 30 minutes on a Sunday night after we put the kids to bed and it prevents us from wasting hours during the week on tasks that don’t really matter. Its also time that I get to spend with hubby taking about our week ahead.
One of the most important things about planning is to do so realistically. We don’t overload our schedules and plan things that are important allowing for the ‘unexpected’ that often creep up.
Planning and schedules are not for everyone but it can really help those who have that tendency to feel overwhelmed especially when you allow for some flexibility. For me it prevents mental fatigue, enhances my productivity and helps my overall well-being.
Here are some of the things in my weekly plan that help me get through each week with a lighter load.
Meal Planning
Trust me. Once you start doing this you wonder how you ever functioned without it. It helps cut costs with groceries because you only shop for what you need, preventing so much waste. It also prevents you from eating crap or starving because you ran out of time or food! Once you meal plan you can then organise when to cook everything and meal prep. We have home cooked meals every night but don’t cook every night 😉 You find your rhythm and what works for you.
Home Life
I do a little bit every day of the week rather than spend a whole day cleaning, washing, etc.. I DONT IRON. Ironing is a complete waste of life in my opinion. There are other ways to make sure shirts and uniforms aren’t creased, such as hanging straight on a hanger and allowing to air dry.
My Top Tip For Cleaning: Tidy as you go = less time cleaning.
Kids Life
Although we don’t do loads of extra curricular activities planning the one we do into the week along with any other appointments helps both me and hubby know what’s going on and helps us better share the load.
Work Life
My little mātā wellbeing biz has allowed me to be the mum I want to be because I get to do what I love while working around the needs of my family. I’ve also been running a couple of Airbnb’s for the last 6 years and although it’s pretty sustainable now, managing guests, check-ins and servicing the apartments and the admin of it all is something that needs to be scheduled to allow for everything to run smoothly.
Study Life
Yep. Im still studying. Although only part-time I still need to plan for upcoming assessments, exams, assignments, lectures and study time around the rest of life. This is one of my biggest challenges because there are so many priorities so it’s very easy to fall behind in this area if not well planned.
Social Life
Maintaining a social life is hard. And it’s not just my own, but my kids social life as well. Organising play dates, birthday parties, coffee dates, brunches, dinners and drinks are kind of just slotted in where they fit. But these are important as well, for everyone so we at least plan for one social outing a week. Because FUN 😆
Downtime
Yes I schedule downtime because it needs to happen and if it doesn’t we all fall apart. Whether it be a yoga class, a walk, sitting in the park reading a book, or getting out in nature and to the beach with kids, I don’t sacrifice this for anything. Downtime is necessary for everyone’s mental wellbeing. It also gives our family quality time which is very easily lost amongst the wonderful chaos of life.
I’d love to hear from you guys about how you get through your week. Do you plan? What challenges do you have and how do you manage the load?
xx
