Right now, it feels as though I’m living life like I’m stuck in a revolving door. Not at all from a family and personal relationships perspective – everything is absolutely fine in that regard. This relates more to the general routine and humdrum of life.

Here’s an example of a typical week for me:

• Monday morning – I get up and start the traditional working week.
  • I have grand ideas of things I want to do and what I’ll achieve during that week though I hit early evening and am usually too tired to do much of it (or at least that’s the excuse I use to procrastinate…)
• The week continues in that vein until I hit Friday. It’s a non-working day for me these days. Supposedly a day when I try to concentrate on writing. Though I usually have other urgent tasks to complete (at least that’s how it has largely played out to date) and if I do manage to write, it’s usually not enough. Another factor is that once again, I’m often too tired to do anything of real significance.
• Saturday rolls around. I’m usually busy with things that aren’t that important in the grand scheme of things. I do a few uninspiring tasks/jobs throughout the day (cleaning etc) but nothing which gets me closer to achieving my true goals. I get to late-afternoon / early-evening and realise I’ve spent much of the day working on things that aren’t important to me. I’m usually too tired to do anything during the evening so I slump in front of the TV.
• Sunday is essentially a repeat of Saturday, except that the spectre of Monday morning looms large over the latter part of the day, certainly the evening. Work and the week ahead are nearly always on my mind way too much to allow me to truly enjoy the day.

Does this sound familiar? There must be a way out of this. A way to resolve things. I need to feel more fulfilled. I need to feel I’m living the life I really want to lead. Therefore, I realised recently that I needed to take a look at what wasn’t working and what I could do to resolve this. I’ve been thinking long and hard and have identified some areas I think / hope will help:

Shedding fat

I’ve written about this in numerous previous posts so I won’t go into significant detail here, except to say I’m pinning a lot of hope on weight loss helping me with so many issues. I’ve really knuckled down lately and expect to see big changes this year. I’ve started to create an exercise routine (though it does need some refinement) and I’ve decided to revisit some of the more challenging yet effective methods of exercise, primarily running. I’m 3 weeks into the Couch to 5k programme (perhaps more on that in a future post) and whilst it isn’t easy, it’s already proving to be really rewarding and I’m already starting to see small changes.

Better time management. Create a focused plan twice a week

I’m not terrible at time management though there is certainly scope for improvement. I’ve recently started compiling short-term plans, on Sunday and Thursday evenings each week, focusing on the following 3-4 days. The Sunday list doesn’t have many entries as there’s usually little time to do anything after work and spending time with my family. However, I try to include the more mundane weekly tasks which have to be done (hoovering, polishing, any house jobs etc) to ensure they’re out of the way before the weekend. The Thursday list is considerably longer and usually includes those tasks that are really important to me.

Just 10 minutes – finding the time to do what I want to

I constantly get frustrated as not having the time to do what I truly want to, though I’m slowly coming to terms with the fact that I don’t need a block of 2 or 3 hours to do something. Quite often, 10 minutes is enough. More often than not, that initial 10 minutes will end up being 20 or 30 minutes, or an hour, once I’ve started and got into a flow. If not, it reignites my enthusiasm and the task at hand becomes much more of a daily habit. This is true for so many things in life. Quite often, just 5 or 10 minutes is all we need to set the ball rolling. The phrase ‘Just get started’ is very powerful and so true.

Setting challenging targets

These days, when I do have a few hours to use, I like to set ridiculous, nigh-on impossible targets. If I have that time to devote to writing, I aim to write a full book within that time, or 6 months’ worth of blog posts. I know it’s impossible to do but it really does sharpen my focus. With those types of goal in mind, I find it much easier to knuckle down and crack on with it. In doing that, I may not write that full book or those 26 blog posts, though I’ll certainly achieve much more than if I sit down, with the so-called luxury of time, and spend far too long planning what I intend doing rather than actually getting started. It’s much better to just miss a vey challenging target than to achieve a ridiculously easy one. Aiming big really does work for me. One of my favourite phrases is ‘Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land amongst the stars.’

These are just a few ideas I’m trying out now in a bid to change things a little and stop that frustrating sense of being stuck in the revolving door of life week after week after week. If you have ever felt the same way, I hope there’s something here you can try in a bid to end the monotony.

As always, thanks for reading and take care.

Best wishes.

Mick