Monday Musings: Time Blocking

In last week’s musing I declared that I’m a walking contradiction. And that is the thesis of today’s post: I love structure, but then I rebel against the structure I set in place.

I love the idea of time blocking, but I often struggle with sticking to it. Why do I resist it so much? I think it’s because I feel like I don’t have much time for myself, and I don’t want to be told what to do by my calendar (at least when it doesn’t involve being accountable to someone else). But don’t we all feel that way? Or is it just me?

Another BIG issue that disrupts my time blocking attempts is my number obsession and desire to have nice equal blocks, evenly spread out in periods of time that I prefer— say 30 or 90 minutes, or three hours. But maybe the things I want (or need) to get done don’t fit in those even little (or big) boxes.

And the third truth is that more often than not I like planning more than doing the actual thing. I’m great at plotting out a plan, distributing my available time, even creating a table with what I’m going to do and when! But then I don’t implement it!

Time blocking at work

The time and place where I have the most success with time blocking is at my full time job. Honestly, I don’t have much control over my workload. It’s not like I do deep work, have a lot of meetings (thank goodness!) or work on many projects (though I do have some). I’m a customer service rep at a printing company and customers just send stuff in at random and I have to handle it. Period. The end. Sometimes I have nothing to do, and other times I’m swamped.

I wrote about time blocking at work in more detail HERE. But basically I time block in 30 minute increments, take a 15 minute break, then have a longer block for catching up on anything I didn’t get to in the earlier blocks. Then I have lunch and repeat the loop. In general, this works well. It’s not perfect, but it forces me to stay on track, particularly when I’m overwhelmed with my workload.

Time blocking my routines

I have constructed my AM and PM routines multiple times over the years and I hardly ever stick to them long term.

While I consider myself a morning person, I’m not necessarily a happy morning person— I need some time to wake up, which often derails my routine. I want to sit and stare at the TV while I drink coffee and warm up my back with the heating pad. Next thing I know, I’ve blown through two or three of my time blocks and it’s time to get ready for work.

And evenings? Well, I go to my mom’s after work almost every day and when I get home at night, I’m exhausted. I can just about get myself ready for bed some nights.

Nevertheless, I do try. I time block in 15 minute increments. My mornings have six blocks, and my evenings have three. On paper it looks great. In real life, I’m conflicted. I don’t have time to do everything I want— maybe I need to be okay with not being perfect, and allowing a little flexibility with how I approach time blocking (for instance, not needing to do the same thing every day, but maybe alternating between two things I want to get done most of the time).

Time blocking weekends

Weekends are like my AM and PM routines but on a larger scale. The time blocks are bigger. Sometimes when I plot out my ideal weekend, the time blocks are in 90 minute increments and there’s more of them, or recently I’ve tried doing them in three hour chunks. I want to fit a lot in, and alternate productive need to do tasks with times of rest and times of fun, but I hardly ever stick to the blocks. And I think that’s okay, right? Weekends shouldn’t be so structured. If I get everything done, or even if I don’t, that’s fine.