Step 1: Design Your Ideal Week

Have you ever completed an "ideal week" exercise? 

A majority of my clients have found it very useful to actually map out their ideal weekly & daily schedule.  When I say "ideal," I am not referring to your fantasy week where you would have no day job, no family or relationship responsibilities, and no need to engage in physical activity. Ideal means:

Given all that you are required to do, how do you want to design your days so that you are spending time on what is most meaningful to you (e.g. your creative work, your most important relationships, etc.)?

Mapping out your ideal week (and tracking to see how well you can stick to it) will give you a snapshot of the difference between what you say is important to do and what you actually do.  

This exercise will really open your eyes to: a) the choices you make around how you actually spend your time, and b) how much time things actually take you to do (we often underestimate how long things will take us, especially creative work).  This process will give you new insights into how to better manage your time and distractions.

So how do you do get started?

• First, read this article or this one to get a deeper understanding of how to create an Ideal Week and why they can be so helpful.
• Next, sit down and open up your Google Calendar or an Excel spreadsheet (here is a template you can use) - and map out your "ideal" week. This doesn't have to be perfect - just get started and create your first draft.  
• Then, see how well you can stick to your Ideal Week by tracking how you spend your time for one or two weeks.
• Along the way, you will gain new insights into how you are spending your time, what challenges and distractors are most likely to derail you, and how you might modify your Ideal Week to be more attainable yet still ensure consistent progress on your meaningful goals (e.g. you may wish to shift your morning deep work session to after your afternoon workouts or vice versa; you may wish to wake up 30 minutes earlier; add in a date night; batch your email reply time at the end of the day, etc.)
• Modify your Ideal Week based on your new insights and observations
• Test it out again and keep making adjustments until you have something that you can consistently stick to 75-90% of the time

A few tips to keep in mind during this process:

• This is a process, not a one-time activity. The aim is to enhance your mindfulness regarding how you spend your time, energy, and attention. This is a learning process that requires active engagement, not just another activity that you complete and then forget. The benefits come over time as you get more disciplined and deliberate with doing what you say you want to do, and learning how to best use your time and energy (and eliminate distractors).
• You likely will not achieve 100% of your Ideal Week - ever. But that is OK. This is more of a tool to help guide our decision-making (and make it easier) around our time management. It is a gold standard in which we strive to execute each day - but with the understanding that regardless of how well we design our Ideal Week, there are still many things outside of our control that will influence how we feel and what we must respond to. We shouldn't expect complete control over our time in a world that is increasingly chaotic and out of our control.
• Strive for the right balance of Flexibility and Structure. As a creative person, too much rigidity likely will make you feel too confined, and you may just end up rebelling against your own plan. We need a certain amount of flexibility to be responsive, spontaneous, and open to opportunities. What does the optimal balance look like for you?
• Adding in time to reflect and plan each day can be very powerful. Try protecting just 20 or 30 minutes at the end of your workday to reflect on how your day went & why, and to identify your next day's top 1-3 priorities.

Step 2: Bring More Flow into Your Life

Flow is the state of optimal experience.  It is that feeling of being "in the zone" or "on fire."  Flow is "a state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience is so enjoyable that people will continue to do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it" (Csikszentmihalyi, 2008).

When we are in Flow, we are able to tap into our highest levels of creativity, focus, and performance.

One of the best ways to make the most of our limited time is to design our habits, rituals, environment, and tasks so that we can experience more Flow.  One hour of creative work while in Flow can be more productive than 3 hours of creative work while not in Flow.

Curious to learn more about how to bring more Flow into your life?

One of the main things I do with my clients is to help them create more Flow in their lives and work.  After studying under Mike Csikszentmihalyi (author of Flow) during my PhD program, as well as hacking my own flow in a wide variety of performance and work situations, I am well-versed in helping people design ways to experience more flow.

To optimize one's creative work and life for Flow, it often requires a close look at a person's specific situation - but here are some general questions that you can ask yourself in order to bring more Flow into your life :

• Do I have a clear goal of what I want to achieve?
• Will I able to fully concentrate & focus for a sustained period of time?
• Is the activity or task challenging?
• Does the activity or task fully activate my skills?
• Is there a good balance between my perceived skills and perceived challenge of the task?
• Do I feel a sense of control over the situation?
• Am I able to experience direct, immediate feedback - to know if I am performing well or making actual progress?
• Is the activity intrinsically rewarding?
• Are you able to minimize feelings of self-consciousness or judgment from others?

To get a deeper understanding of why the above questions are critical to address when designing your life for more flow, and to explore specifically what opportunities exist in your own life to create more Flow, you can set up a FREE 20-minute Creative Challenge Problem-Solving Call with me at any time.