Create Structure in an Unstructured Life

If you are like me and work/study from home, you probably struggle with self-motivation and discipline. Without an outside force pushing us to finish certain tasks or reach certain goals, it can be easy to fall behind, feel overwhelmed, or get off track. In this state of chaos, the idea of building and maintaining a regular daily routine seems like an impossible dream. I want to tell you that it IS possible and even simple. They key to creating a low stress, manageable lifestyle is to develope boundaries and structure in your everyday. Here are some tips to help you to get started:

Set Goals - How many times have you heard someone tell you how important it is to set personal goals? And, how many times have you ignored their words as self-help mumbo jumbo? As corny as goal setting may seem, you cannot get from A to B without deciding you want to get to B in the first place. Goals don't need to be world changing like running for President or losing 300 pounds. Goals can be as simple as eating breakfast by 8:00 a.m. each morning. The most important thing is to think clearly about where you want to go and want it to look like when you get there. Goal setting not only gives you a direction, but also provides you with a sense of progress and achievement as you start to move closer to your end point. Like anything else, it also takes practice, so start small at first. As you become more comfortable with your ability to achieve your goals give yourself bigger challenges. Over time, setting and achieving goals will become second nature.

Make a Plan - Lots of us find it easy to dream of a better future, but when it comes down to reaching that future we feel overwhelmed and give up. As Larry Elder said: "A goal without a plan is just a wish." After setting a goal, think backwards about the steps you need to achieve to get there. I like to think of these steps as mini-goals. For example, let's say I want to lose 300 pounds. This goal is definitely achievable, but at the same time, cannot be done overnight. I start by making a list of mini-goals (things I need to do to reach my ultimate goal): eat healthy foods, get more exercise, sleep regularly, reduce my stress, etc. If I were to try to tackle all of these mini-goals at once, I would easily become overwhelmed and quit. Therefore, my next step is to choose a mini-goal that I feel is achievable and break it down into even smaller goals. Let's say I want to work on eating healthier foods. In order to accomplish this, I need to learn more about healthy eating, remove unhealthy foods from my home, find out what is motivating me to eat unhealthy foods, develop new habits to replace food in my life and so on. Once again, I could easily become overwhelmed, so I break this mini-mini-goal down further and decide to choose one to start with - learn more about healthy eating. At this point, I can start to see actions I can take to achieve this mini-mini-goal: take a healthy food cooking class, order a nutrition book online, or talk to a friend who is interested in healthy eating. Suddenly, the insurmountable goal of losing 300 pounds became as easy as calling up a friend and talking to him/her about healthy eating. As you work through and complete your mini-goals, you are moving closer to achieving your ultimate goal. Achieving anything takes time and consistent effort, but each step down the path becomes easier and more rewarding.

Get a calendar and use it - Maybe you already have mastered the art of goal setting and planning, but are struggling with the implementation process. One of the keys to ensuring you follow through on a task is accountability. If you don't have a parent or a boss telling you what and when to do things, you need to create an artificial accountability system. A very simple way to do this is document your goals, mini-goals, tasks, and overall progress in a calendar. Once you have a task in mind, open up your calendar and think about when you can make time to complete it. Choose a specific date and time to work on it. This way, even if you forget about it, when you open up the calendar it will be there staring you in the face as a reminder of a commitment you made to yourself. If you find yourself pushing deadlines back, back, and back again, share your goal and deadline with another person. Having another person aware of your goals, makes it is harder to forget about them or make excuses about why you haven't made an effort. Another strategy is to schedule a task with people. It could be as simple as going to an exercise class with a friend instead of doing weights on your own. Making others aware of your goals is a great way to get support; however, in order to avoid sucking the life out of your friends make sure this support works as a stepping stone to self-accountability.

Check-mark -As you complete tasks on your list, give yourself a check-mark. Tracking your progress will help you to ensure certain tasks don't fall through the cracks, as well as, monitor and reward yourself for successes. As you see yourself getting things done and moving forward, it will give you more enthusiasm to continue working hard on all your tasks, even the ones you don't find fun.

Starting the morning off right - Now that you see the big picture, how do you start to manage the day to day? Setting goals, mini-goals, tasks, and deadlines for the week and each day are definitely necessary; but, how do you make sure you get them done? As Woody Allen said: "80% of success is just showing up each day." In my experience, the most important aspect of ensuring you have a productive day is starting early. Trust me; I understand the non-morning bird types. When I wake up in the morning, I loathe the idea of getting out of bed. I want to snuggle under my covers and keep dreaming just a little longer. And even after I am up and about, I'm not ready to spring into action. I amble around adjusting to the sunshine. So, how the heck do you motivate yourself to start at 9:00 a.m? Set up a breakfast meeting.