If there is one phrase I hear all the time, it is, “I don’t have time”. I constantly hear people telling me that they don’t have time to listen to trainings, hire a team, and even set up their ecosystem.
That one phrase is the main reason why you must time block. This is not going to be a post on how to time block your entire day or week. But it is going to share why you must time block and how to get started. Plus, I need to drive this point home, because your business depends on it.
Before we get into time blocking, I want you to think of the last time you had a toothache. You got the first little twinge and thought it was annoying. The next day, your tooth was a little sorer. The following day, you are in the mindset that you only have a couple of more days of pain and it will go away. The pain will continue to get worse though and you will have no choice but to go to the dentist.
So, you call the dentist and make an appointment. You put that appointment on your calendar and go to the dentist at your scheduled time. The dentist does what they have to do and your pain is gone.
You have to think the same way about your business. You have all of these pain points and all of this stuff that’s going on in your business.
- I Don’t Have the Time
- I Have Too Much Work
- No One’s Paying Me
- I’m Talking to All of the Wrong People
Many people think about the big picture when they are talking about time blocking. But there’s a lot of little pieces in your business. I recommend you take the one thing that is the biggest pain point right now, the one that will have the biggest impact, and block time on your calendar to get that done. Just that one thing.
Don’t worry about time blocking everything else on your list right now. Just choose the one that will have the most impact.
Give yourself one hour a week and put it on your calendar. In that one hour, you are going to tackle what you need to do to check that pain point off of your list. Determine the steps you must take to change, or implement, this pain point. If you decide it will take six steps for this pain point, you know to block six weeks’ worth of time blocks.
Write that time block on your calendar for six weeks. Then write down which step you are going to take each week. Once you finish your biggest pain point, you can move onto your next one.
The reason I stress this so much is because if you don’t make time, and you don’t treat it like an appointment for yourself, you and your business will suffer. You will be all stressed out and nothing is ever going to change.
You need to actually make the time, take the action, do all of the stuff, and come out of it slowly. But if you look at your pain points as if they are this big mountain of stuff, nothing ever changes. And I guarantee that a year from now, or two years from now, you are going to be in the same boat. You are going to be tackling the same pain points that are on your list right now (if not more!).
You can’t pull the time out of thin air.
You need to make the time.
You need to be disciplined.
You need to be deliberate.
This is a very deliberate action to make sure you get things done.
Time blocking does not need to be a mountain. It can be one thing for one hour a week. I personally have an hour and a half each day that is devoted to my business development. I add things I need to do, because I know myself. If I don’t block this time off, I will go do something else.
I know I need to be focused, so I make sure I have everything on my calendar. Yes, my entire calendar is time blocked, and my entire team can see it, but you don’t need to start there.
I use the calendar on Google, but you can use any electronic or paper calendar that will work for you. Simply block the time and then set alarms for ten minutes before each time block to remind yourself it is almost time to switch modes.
If you have not started time blocking yet, start with one hour a week. And if you can’t block off an entire hour in one day, start with two thirty-minute sessions each week. Make sure you treat those time blocks like an appointment too, so you stop putting your business on the back burner.
And don’t stress if you miss a time blocking session or skip it once. Just keep moving forward and make yourself, and your business, a priority in the future. I guarantee you will see a huge reduction with how many pain points you have once you start time blocking regularly.