5 Life-Changing Time Management Tips

Post Summary

Struggling to manage your time (or energy)? You’re not alone. Whether you’re a student juggling school and making money or just someone tired of running on “organized chaos,” this post has your back.

In this guide, we break down five life-changing tips that’ll help you stop procrastinating, stay ahead of your tasks, and make room for the things that actually matter to you—without burning out.

Introduction

We all know we have limited time here on Earth, and the time we do have tends to feel very scarce.

I’m here to tell you, as a chronic life planner, that time management will be the key to feeling like you have control of all your time and making the best out of your everyday experiences.

But if I may add—time is also just a social construct. A testament to this is how daylight savings time can shift our entire lives in an instant—so maybe time shouldn’t be taken too seriously either.

Something I’ve learned the hard way, a balance between planning every aspect of your day and leaving room to just live in the moment is necessary for living a fulfilling life: as expressed in my lastest post “Summer Break has Lost Its Spark (This is How To Get it Back)” witch you should check out after reading this post.

“Right now, you might be a ‘get-it-done-at-the-last-minute’ procrastinator, but after this entry, you’ll be on your way to becoming a more productive person.

Really, we shouldn’t call it time management—since we can’t actually manage time; it’s always ticking. What we’re actually managing is our energy.”

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5 Life-Changing Time Management Tips

1. Use a Planner / Calendar App

Okay, I know you might be rolling your eyes at this one, as it’s kind of obvious—but very necessary.

Having a laid-out idea of your day or week will make it 10x easier to manage where and what you are putting all of your energy into.

I personally utilize Notion for planning content for The Anomaly’s Journal and other social media platforms with their free content planner template.

I’ve also used Structured numerous times in the past when I was in need of some real-life organization and, well—structure. (It’s especially useful now over the summer if you want to build a daily routine.)

Both platforms are usable on any type of device (so cross platform compatible) witch is really useful when you may want to check up on something on your phone while your out and may not have your laptop readily available and vise versa.

(Neither of these apps are sponsored; I just really like them and think they can help you in your daily life.)

There are possibly thousands of applications out there that function in the same way—even paper and digital versions.

So just search around and find the platform that is the easiest for you to use and helps you in organizing your life.

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2. Have a Reminders App

Along the same lines as the first tip, a dedicated reminders app or system is absolutely a must. Without being notified of tasks that need to be done, they may never get finished.

You might have thought of something you wanted to get done in the middle of one task and think, “Oh, I’ll have to remember that for later,” and then later comes and you’re sitting there trying to remember what it was that you forgot.

Well, there will be no more forgotten tasks once you get a dedicated app or system to write down all the small tasks that you may need to get done but don’t require a spot on your calendar.

Some people use sticky notes, or the Notes app on their phone, even the literal Reminders app if you have an iPhone—which I personally use.

No matter the method, having an outlet to write down all your fleeting ideas and minuscule tasks will give you an opportunity to set aside time to get them done and remember what it is—without having to hold space in your mind for more things than you can handle.

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3. Time Tasks Accordingly

This goes back to having a calendar where you can time-block your activities.

Time-blocking allows you to efficiently see how much time a task may take and allows you to re-arrange your day around it.

For example, you may be at school or work for 8 hours a day—what other activities can fit in your other 5–6 waking hours?

Having a way to see exactly how much time you have really shows you how many things you can actually fit into one day—and that it’s more than enough time if you just plan accordingly.

Not Sponsored: But a good example of a system that does this is Structured or even the calendar app that is on your phone already.

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4. Plan Ahead

A big part of time/energy management is planning ahead.

Think of planning for deadlines a week before they’re actually due, so they’re done ahead of time. If you’re a big-time procrastinator, this tip will be especially helpful to you.

You won’t have to rush to complete a task at the last minute, because you gave yourself a whole extra week to finish it!

This can even be helpful for being on time to places. If you have to be at a meeting for work at 10 AM, plan to be there by 9:30 AM instead—so there’s NO WAY you’ll be late.

There’s no harm in planning ahead, but their might be repercussions for planning too late!

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5. Prioritize

The biggest piece of this whole post is that you learn to prioritize your energy and time.

If there are a billion things your friends & family want you to do for them or for you to be a part of—and 90% of it you don’t want to do—don’t do it!

Instead, spend that time working on things that actually interest you and possibly even give you more energy to do the things you may not want to do but absolutely have to—like house chores.

If you’re unsure about how important something is, there’s a good chance it’s not important enough to prioritize.

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Conclusion: You Cant do Everything

What makes time management so important is that we can’t do a billion things all at the same time. Even if you think you can, it’s just not the most efficient strategy to accomplishing your goals.

Instead, you might end up feeling overwhelmed and putting things off because they seem unattainable in the moment—due to the sheer number of things you have to do and the “lack of time” you think you have in a day (speaking from experience here).

After this post, I hope having these tips under your belt helps you become a successful, organized energy management king, queen, or ruler of your life when it really counts.

Let me know if you find any of these tips helpful and if they’ve helped you become more efficient in how you spend your energy and time!

Check out this post mentioned earlier or another listed down below!

Summer Break has Lost Its Spark (This is How To Get it Back)

Check Out Our Other Posts!