Manage Your Energy Better!
Being self-employed means we have to manage our time very efficiently to get the most out of it.
We are always taught to manage tasks within the amount of time we have to do them, when in fact to be our most efficient and effective we should be managing our tasks around our energy level instead.
In other words, the amount of energy you have should determine what tasks you do.
What do I mean by this?
Have you noticed that there are certain times of the day when you feel full of ideas, brimming with energy, raring to go?
Then other times where you feel like your sluggish and your thoughts are slower.
These are known as our high and low energy levels.
So, for your high energy levels do your high focus work such as difficult decision making, creating, planning, writing a list, etc.
For the low energy level, times do your routine work such as invoices, responding to emails, working through mundane tasks.
Observe when these times are and start planning your work around these energy levels.
Start by keeping a track of your energy levels, and remember it doesn’t matter whether your high energy levels are in the morning or, late at night. It seems to be “fashionable” to get up early to get things done, but really it’s a matter of choice. For me personally, my high energy levels are always late at night so I tend to focus on the creative side of my business then and save the routine tasks for when I’m less energetic in the mornings.
Don’t forget we have times where we need to relax and actually switch off, this is how we put all that energy back into our bodies, so its important that we honour these times so we can revive and recover.
When you start working in this way you will see an increase in actual work output.
Studies have shown that doing 30 minutes of creative work in a high energy level will be as effective as trying to do the same work in 2 hours when you have lower energy levels.
So if you are awake late at night or early in the morning and your head is full of ideas, then put that burst of energy to good use, even if it only lasts 20 minutes.
Give it a try you may just be surprised.
