Why Time Blocking Changed the Way I Run My Business
I don’t like for my days to just happen to me because I don’t end up getting where I want to go.
If I don’t have a vision that translates into a plan then I spend the day reacting. An email here. A question there. A task that felt urgent but probably was not. By the end of the day I had been busy the entire time and somehow still felt behind.
Sound familiar?
Time blocking can help bridge the gap between the important things you need to do and actually taking the steps to accomplish them. It acts like a protective block in your calendar to do what you need to do.
What Time Blocking Actually Is
You look at your calendar before the week starts and you assign specific chunks of time to specific types of work.
For me it sometimes looks like this….
Shoot days get their own days.
Recovery has a window.
Content creation gets a dedicated window.
Creative work gets protected space where nothing else is allowed to interrupt.
Personal time and family time gets blocked off.
When everything has a home, nothing gets lost.
The Difference It Makes
Instead of waking up and wondering what is going to pull your attention first, you already know what the day is for. You sit down with a plan and you work the plan.
It doesn’t have to be followed perfectly because sometimes things come up. But it’s so helpful to have a guide to follow that you set up and works with your goals.
What I Actually Protect
Here is what has non-negotiable space on my calendar:
Shoot days are fully protected. When I am shooting I am shooting.
Content creation has its own block because if I leave it to whenever I have a spare minute it never happens. It needs dedicated time or it gets pushed indefinitely.
Creative work gets space where I am not in execution mode. Thinking, planning, dreaming about where the business is going. That kind of work needs room to breathe.
Personal time and family are on the calendar just like everything else.
How to Start
Pick one thing you never seem to have time for. One thing that always gets pushed because something more urgent showed up.
Put it on your calendar right now. Give it a real block of time. Treat it like an appointment you cannot cancel.
Do that for one week and notice what changes.
You are not going to build a perfect time blocked schedule overnight. But you can start protecting one thing today and that will make a difference this week.
Your Time Is Yours
Nobody is going to protect your calendar for you. If you do not decide what your time is for, someone else will decide for you.
Some things are already decided: work hours (and what goes in them), appointments, things you have to do.
Time blocking the other pieces helps you reach your goals.. It is how you stop being reactive and start being intentional. It is how you build a business that has room in it for the work that actually matters, including the work of being a full person outside of the office.
