Maybe you’ve heard this before from some “productivity guru”:
Everyone has the same 24 hours in a day, 7 days in a week, 52 weeks in a year.
Actually, no.
This is a common myth that ignores an important truth:
Most of your time is already committed before you even start planning.
You need to sleep. Eat. Take care of basic personal needs. Care for family. Rest.
If you’re trying to “manage” your time based on this starting premise, you’re almost guaranteed to over-schedule yourself and end up burned out.
Nobody can work 24/7/52. It’s not humanely possible.
How Time Blocking Can Help
One of the best ways to stay on track with your desired outcomes is to implement a time-blocking strategy. Time blocking helps you visualize how you are allocating your time and gives you a clear focus for each blocks of time.
One of the biggest mistakes people make with time blocking is over estimating the time they have available for their work projects and other things they want to do.
Time blocking only works when you start with a realistic assessment of the time you have available to allocate. We can assess our time availability at many levels: daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, semi-annually, and annually.
For today, let’s look at what time you have available at each of the 3 major levels: daily, weekly, and annually.
Daily Availability
A day may have 24 hours, but not all of those hours are available to you for work, relationships, and hobbies.
For example, depending on how much sleep you need, your 24 hours will be reduced by 6-8 hours.
Consider some other aspects of your daily routine that are allocated to basic life functions or non-negotiable commitments:
- How much time do you need to sleep?
- How much time do you need to workout?
- How long does it take you to shower and get dressed each day?
- How much time do you need to eat meals each day?
- How long is your commute?
- How much transition time do you need between tasks?
- What are your obligations outside of your core work? For example, how much time do you spend doing carpool, cooking meals, or tending to the needs of your family?
Calculate the time you need for personal care, sleep, family obligations, transition time, meals, and other “life commitments” and subtract from 24.
That will tell you how many hours you really have available to you in a given day.
Weekly Availability
Realistically, you’re not working 7 days a week.
Rest is an essential component for sustainable productivity — not to mention for your mental and physical health as well.
Everyone needs at least one rest day — a day to be unstructured, to goof off, to play, to just hang out and not be productive. Ideally you’d have 2 days like this.
More recent studies show that having 3 days off — a 4-day workweek — can actually improve productivity and lead to more sustainable progress over time. It also results in improved well-being.
Before you time block your week, block out at least one day for rest.
The key here is consistency: try to pick one or two days as your regular rest days, rather than changing it week-by-week. This will help you establish a reliable rhythm for work and rest.
It is also helpful to look at the monthly calendar and note any holidays that might require a change in your routine, or on which you don’t want to work.
Annual Availability
A year generally has 52 weeks, but you’re not going to work all 52 weeks. Everyone needs some time off to not focus on work.
Looking at your year realistically means acknowledging both planned time off and natural slow periods in your schedule.
Even though it may be unrealistic to plan your daily schedule a year out, it’s helpful to look at the year to determine how many weeks you have available and plot out bigger project timelines and deadlines.
You’re going to have seasons of the year where personal events take up more time and limit your availability for work projects, and you’ll have seasons when work projects take up more time. If you travel to conferences or events, those weeks will force a different schedule.
If your schedule is tied to kids and school breaks, those breaks might determine your vacation times. If you aren’t tied to those break schedules, it can be easy to overlook vacations. Plotting out your off-weeks can help you plan those necessary breaks into your schedule up front so that you force yourself to take the time off.
Even if you don’t go anywhere or plan deliberate vacation time, there are some weeks where you’re going to get less done. For example, the week between Christmas and New Years tends to be a slower time; it’s unrealistic to expect you’ll maintain the same schedule as you do during a busier time of year.
Just like it helps to know your energy rhythms for your daily cycle, knowing your energy levels at different times of year can help you avoid planning to do important tasks for a time when you’re going to want to lay low and rest.
You Have Less Time Than You Think
Being realistic about your available time isn’t about limiting yourself – it’s about creating a schedule that actually works. When you subtract your committed time first, you can create time blocks that reflect reality rather than wishful thinking.
This leads to sustainable progress instead of constant overwhelm.
A year may be a long time, but you have less time than you think.
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