The Sunday Session: Mentally Prepare For Your Work Week
Recently, in the middle of an internal team call the topic of time management came up. Talking about doing things, instead of doing them — Yay! lol
If time management takes the wind out of your sails, you're not alone. It's definitely not a sexy topic, but nonetheless an important one.
Being a person that has very little tolerance for disorder, I've tried many things to: (1) be more productive, (2) get organized, and (3) feel more prepared for the week ahead.
I've tried courses on time management, every planner available on the market today and software that claims dominium over all the time and organizational woes that an entrepreneur may have.
Some of that has helped, and the vast majority did nothing at all... For reasons we can get into another time.
After my endless pursuit of the perfectly planned week, I've long since accepted that that just isn't thing.
Ideas pop-up, kids get sick, meetings get delayed, or added, and accepting the unknown has alleviated a lot of unnecessary stress.
One practice has emerged in my journey, in particular, that has served me through it all. I call it the Sunday Session. It's really quite simple.
Every Sunday I crack open my notebook du jour. *Sorry not giving up the notebook hoarding. Haven't evolved past that yet.*
Then I answer 3 questions:
I really let myself just free flow on those questions. Sometimes there's long answers, sometimes short. All depends.
These are the prompts if my writing is not legible for you:
What energy do I want to reflect to those around me this week?
How am I doing? And how can I be doing better?
What am I grateful for?
After that, I plan my upcoming week. A daily planner never seemed to work for me, but this weekly process fits and feels very doable.
The process I use sets up like this:
The BIG section is for areas, tasks and projects that need the most focus.
The LITTLE section is smaller tasks, but requires focus all the same.
The NEXT section is what's coming up in the weeks ahead. Think of it like things you need to be aware of, but don't need to start work on yet.
Hot Tip: All the things I'm working on align to my BIG goal. Only goal achieving activities are on this list.
From doing this simple exercise I'm setup for my week.
I've mentally wrapped my mind around what's on my plate and I'm ready to dive into Monday prepped and ready. Instead of feeling behind before I even begin.
I often consult the previous week in case I forgot about something too.
I love this system, because it's not too structured that it feels like an ill-fitting blazer, but structured enough that I can wrap my mind around what's on my plate.
Give it try!
If you don't like it, all you've lost is 3-5 notebook pages. 😉
Enjoy!
