How to Organize Your Time When You Have Too Much to Do
Feeling overwhelmed with all your to-dos? Not even sure what you’re supposed to be doing? As a life-long list-maker, I can tell you that even the most organized moms have days, areas, and seasons of life that feel disordered and chaotic. The good news is that it is possible to take steps to overcome that overwhelmed feeling.
Here are three steps to take to get things done when you’re overwhelmed with all you have to do. And yes, it starts with a list!
The first step is to categorize your tasks in a way that makes sense to you. Next, you’ll create routines and designate time frames around your tasks whenever possible. Finally, you’ll add them to your calendar. Let’s talk through what that looks like in real life.
Plan for Your Real Life
When you’re feeling overwhelmed, it’s important to plan for the life you have right now, not the life you wish you had.
There are three basic steps that will reduce that overwhelmed feeling.
- Group tasks together into blocks of time.
- Create routines around tasks as much as possible.
- Use a calendar to schedule your tasks.
Throughout this process, remind yourself that it will be worth it in the long run to eliminate tasks and obligations for now in order to regain control of your time. You can always add things back to your schedule once you have a good system in place for managing your time.
When life is hectic and you really have too much to do, it’s ok to eat pizza every Friday, say no to kids’ play dates, or stop volunteering twice a week. It’s even ok to do all of those things and more.
So grab a notebook or open a Google doc, and let’s get started.
1. Use Lists to Capture Your Tasks
Choose whether you want to use pen and paper or a digital file to create your lists. I prefer physical paper rather than scrolling back and forth between categories, but digital files are easy to change and rearrange.
Categorize Your Tasks
There may be some variation, but in general, everything you have to do may be categorized under home, work, and personal. As a homeschooling mom, I need a separate category for homeschool.
Write each of your categories on a separate piece of paper at the top of the page.
Designate Time Frames for Your Tasks
On each category page you’ve created, add a section for daily, weekly, and monthly. You may also want to include a section for projects, or non-recurring tasks.
Add Tasks to Your Lists
Now that you have a framework, write down all the tasks you can think of under the appropriate category and time frame.
You’re the grownup, so you get to decide these time frames for yourself. Do you want to vacuum your floor daily, or is weekly ok? If you like to pay bills and go over finances every two weeks, feel free to add a time frame for every 2 weeks or any other way you prefer to segment your time.
While you’re adding tasks to your list, make note of when you need or want to tackle each task.
Here’s an example:
2. Create Routines Around Your Tasks
After you’ve created a list of everything you need to do on a regular basis, take a moment to assess how realistic it is to complete everything on your list in a given day or week. If it’s obvious that you have too much to do and not enough time to do it, you will need to prioritize for your current situation and season of life.
Seriously, cut back. You cannot keep a perfectly tidy home, make from-scratch nightly dinners, do hands-on homeschool projects, keep up with your business needs, go on weekly date nights, serve on a weekly committee, and have your kids in sports 5 nights a week.
Consider what matters most to you right now. Where is your focus? This doesn’t mean your focus can’t change next year, next season, or five years from now. But you need to get real about what your life looks like right now.
Start with the non-negotiables and add from there as time and energy allows.
Once you’ve determined the tasks you hope to accomplish in a day, week, or month, creating routines around those tasks makes it much more likely that you’ll remember to do them.
Recurring tasks can become routines that occur on a specific day or at a certain time of day to help you create a habit.
Ways to Create Routines around Your Tasks
- group like tasks together: for example, choose one day to tackle most of your weekly house cleaning tasks
- assign tasks to a specific day of the week
- assign tasks to a specific time of day
- attach a task you want to make habitual to another task you do regularly: immediately after checking email in the morning, right before you go to lunch, after you brush your teeth
- create a startup routine for your workday: choose 1-3 tasks that must be completed every day and do them in the same order each day
- create a shutdown routine for your workday: set aside time to make notes about where to pick up the task tomorrow, check your calendar, make a list of tomorrow’s top priorities, and perhaps note what you accomplished today
- time blocking: put a system in place of working on specific things during certain times of day (e.g., mornings for homeschool, afternoons for work, evening for household tasks)
- morning routine: be intentional with how you start your day
Read: 100 Ideas for Your Morning Routine
- evening routine: create a routine to wind down, prep for tomorrow, and stop the scroll
Read: Evening Routine Ideas for Homeschool Moms
Have a Planning Routine
Be sure to include a planning routine. It doesn’t need to take very long or be very complicated, but make a habit of taking a few minutes each morning or evening to plan ahead.
- Look at your calendar for upcoming appointments or events
- Think through the day to consider when you will have time blocks to work on your task priorities
- Write down your must-do items for the day ahead: things that will cause more problems if you don’t get it done
- List out your top priority accomplishment (a few tasks are ok, but keep your task list as short as possible)
3. Add Tasks to Your Calendar
The final step in the process is to add your tasks to your calendar. If you can’t find a way to fit your tasks into the time you have available, you don’t have time to do them. There’s no point in creating a daily to-do list that never gets done.
Pick your preference, whether you like a digital version like Google calendar, or a pretty planner.
Make sure your regularly scheduled events are on the calendar, such as weekly meetings, classes, appointments or extracurricular activities. Don’t forget about travel time!
Go through your task lists and block out time for each of the tasks or routines you listed.
When you look at your schedule for the week, do you see any white space? You need some. Inevitably, something takes longer than you anticipated, unexpected items pop up, and life just happens. Don’t fill every hour of every day with items from your to-do list if you want to escape that overwhelmed feeling.
Adjust as Needed
Organizing your time is not a one-and-done event. Your life probably isn’t exactly the same this year as it was last year, or the same in June as it is in January. Effective time management requires periodic adjustments.
Whenever your schedule changes, or you begin to feel overwhelmed by your to-do list, go through the same process of listing your tasks, eliminating as much as possible, creating habitual routines, and making sure everything fits on your calendar.
Decide what matters most and start there.
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