Establishing your priorities

Back to daily planning. By now you've defined what's most important to you.

And hopefully spent some time each day deciding on your action plan.

Perhaps you've noticed that "putting your life in order" isn't as easy as you thought. Here are a couple of suggestions.

First, V=ROI.
Value equals return on your investment. You invest time in completing your tasks, right? Well, was it worth it? There has to be some sort of payback. Granted, most of your long-term goals don't pay you back right away, but the progress you are making should make YOU feel good.

Squandering three hours playing Halo when you should have been doing homework isn't likely to give you any sense of value. (Unless, of course, you beat all the other players and rack up your personal best score.)

Halo might have helped you achieve some other goals, like spending time with family. Perhaps you need to edit your goal to read, "Spending quality time with family."

I can promise you that when you spend your time working on the things that are really important you will feel better about yourself.

Just to help with prioritizing:
A-rated tasks are the vital ones that must be done.
B-rated ones are important and should be done.
C-rated are optional and could be done.

Don't get too far ahead of yourself. Look at the day, estimate how much discretionary time you'll have, and start listing your tasks. Add a couple more than you think you'll have time for, just in case an appointment falls through.

It feels great to check off all your tasks for the day.

One more thing. Urgent doesn't always mean high priority. My best advice there is to keep up on your homework (students) and try to anticipate what your boss is going to want (employees).

It's a matter of controlling your events vs. constantly playing catch-up. Trust me; control is the better alternative. Learn to put pressure on yourself rather than spending your days putting out fires.