Why I Switched to a MINIMALIST Time Blocking Planner
If you find time blocking overwhelming, this video is for you. I'm going to show you my minimalist, easy to use time blocking planner that I use every day to keep me on track. And the bonus. This planner is great for those who are neurodivergent, have ADHD, and/or struggle with object permanence.
Watch the video below, or read on for the full transcript.
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I've done a lot of videos on time-blocking, including this review of Cal Newport's Time Block Planner, because I believe time blocking is one of the best ways to get things done.
(Side note, sorry about the moody lighting. This is what happens when you have illnesses and it takes you all day to get done up to film. It's then pitch dark outside. And then if you, your corner office is next to a window from which darkness ensues, you can only do so much with the lights you have to reduce shadows and glare. So we'll be back to our regularly scheduled office filming next week.)
In an upcoming video I'm going to give you a tour of the rest of this room, but right now we're going to be talking about this whiteboard.
Before I talk about the left side, which is the actual time blocking part, I want to talk a little bit about the right side. So my word for the year 2021 is "Shine," and I really want to focus on profit in my business over vanity metrics (like subscriber numbers for example). So I printed that out and made it nice and big so I can see it all the time.
And that's part of what makes this whiteboard so amazing for me, is that I can see it all the time. But I'll get to that in a second. Then underneath I have listed kind of like the four big areas of my life right now that I'm working on. One is my coaching business. Another is my dance teaching business. Another is a manuscript that I'm working on for someone. And then down here, I'm growing up and managing money like an adult, which is very exciting!
So now let's talk about the left side. So as you can see, I have a timescale vertically right here from 9:00 AM -- that's usually the earliest I'm ever doing anything unless I have a fasting blood test or something, which is evil...
Before I show you how I actually use the time blocking part, I just want to talk about why I love having this whiteboard so much. It's simple, it's minimalist, it's easy to use. It's not at all wasteful, unlike Cal Newport's time block planner. And like I mentioned before, I can always see it. So my motorized bed that I work from is right here. And when I sit at it with my laptop on my lap desk, I can see just past the right of my monitor, and this is in my peripheral vision all day long. And that helps with something called object permanence.
Object permanence is something that those with ADHD and/or any other kind of neurodivergence tend to struggle with, and that's the idea that if something is out of sight, it's out of mind. So it can be really helpful for those of us with any type of neurodivergence to have something in our planning system that is always in our faces.
And for me, that was using a whiteboard in my main workspace that I can see all the time. Whereas if I was using, for instance, Google calendar, I'm always doing other stuff on my computer, actually doing my work. And especially when I'm only working on a small laptop, I don't have the screen space to just have my calendar up all the time to remind me of my schedule, let alone have another thing up, showing me everything that I'm working on.
This solved a problem that I had when I moved into this space. When we finally got our motorized bed frames for me to start working in here, I couldn't have Cal Newport's Time Block Planner open and in my face all the time, because I have a small lap desk in here. It's not easy for me to just have it somewhere open. Not to mention that as I got to the back of it, the binding was so rigid and it wouldn't stay open, even if I had somewhere to put it to be... It didn't work.
Comment below and tell me if you struggle with object permanence and if so, what your best tip is for managing it.
Now let's talk about how I actually do my time blocking on this whiteboard. The first thing I do is I look at my Google calendar to see if I have any appointments for that day. If I have any appointments, those go up on the time block first. Next I consider how much rest I need for the day. And I shuffle around my schedule based on when my appointments are. So I'm actually going to give you two examples of me time blocking for days in this upcoming week, and that'll be more clear when I get to that. And then after I finished adding my appointments, my rest, my cooking. 'Cause that takes a lot of spoons, you know, when you have chronic illness, invisible disability, cooking is a to-do. But once I have all of those big rocks up, I fill in the rest of my time with actual work blocks to work on all of these projects.
Okay, the first day I'm going to demonstrate time-blocking for you is this coming Wednesday for me. And if I look at my calendar this coming Wednesday, I only have one appointment. Yes! And that is my group coaching call inside my coaching membership, Accountability Muse. So that coaching call's set from 1:30 to 2:30.
Next, I'm going to consider, you know, rest. Rest is great. Let's do that. Based on when I usually get up in the morning, I am going to have my rest block after this call. Next, when am I gonna cook? I'm usually going to cook when my partner stops working so he can help me.
And for reference, my wake up is usually around 9:30. But my morning routine, like I talked about in this video, takes me a really long time because with my invisible disabilities, booting up my body and my brain takes a lot of time in the morning. So I'm usually not able to start working in earnest until around 11:30.
So now we have our big rocks down. We have the appointment, rest, cooking, morning routine. And now what we do is we look at the gaps and, this is really important, based on how many spoons I'm going to spend doing all of that, how much capacity do I have left to actually do some work? So based on what I know about myself, I'm pretty sure this whole block can be work for me. I'm pretty sure I could handle working here.
So that's my time block for this upcoming Wednesday. That being said, as I go through the day, things might change. My energy might fall through the floor and I might not end up doing this 4:00 to 5:30 time block of work. I might just rest until I cook dinner. That is very normal to happen for me. So I tend to do a gentle stretch goal with my time block, something to aim for, to like shoot for the moon as it were. But I am never hard on myself if that's too much to expect of myself as the day goes by.
All right, now let's look at a day that has more going on in it in the big rocks. This upcoming Friday I actually have two appointments, and one of them is going to take up the majority of the day. The simple appointment is from 7:00 to 7:30, and that's my weekly reset call that I host inside by coaching membership. If any of you are familiar with doing a weekly reset in your planning system to be on top of things, it's a guided one of those that really helps to give people the accountability to actually do their weekly reset. I have been in awe of how doing this has helped my clients inside my membership. It's amazing.
My other appointment -- while the appointment itself is only 15 minutes long, it's at a place that could be up to an hour and a half away from where I live. Yay. I'm getting my first dose of the COVID vaccine on this coming Friday. So that's what this is. The actual vaccine, not that long. But to make sure we're there on time, we're going to have to leave early. Just to be safe, we're going to leave an hour and 15 minutes early. So this is all going to be driving. Ew. And coming back in traffic -- we're just going to assume that's going to take a lot of time.
And even though I'm not the person driving, just like with me sitting at a desk, sitting in a car with my feet on the floor is really hard on me. So all of that driving is going to wipe me out. And that means that this is all going to be rest so I can recuperate enough to show up and be present for my clients at seven o'clock that night. That is really important to me. I always manage my energy in such a way that I can show up for my clients. Because one of the things that is really important to me is that I show up for them so they can finally show up for themselves.
Now, one does not leave the apartment without bathing. So again, I'm going to get up here. But my normal morning routine doesn't include a shower cause that wipes me out. So this one is going to be even longer because it includes a shower, so I can recuperate after said shower.
That leaves this time. And this is another shoot for the moon moment. I'm going to hope I can do some work through that time, but if I don't that's okay too.
So quick recap because I didn't write them down that time to be faster. We've got: morning routine, work block, drive, get poked, drive, rest, coach my clients.
And as a side note, I actually find it really cathartic and healing to erase the day at the end of the day. So by the time I'm climbing in bed to actually go to sleep for the night, this is blank. There's something really promising about giving yourself the gift of a blank slate when you wake up in the morning. I know some people really enjoy planning the night before, which is totally valid. If that works for you, awesome. But the way my brain works, if I were to time block the night before, I would have it top of mind while I'm trying to fall asleep and that's not healthy for me. I would ruminate forever and stress. But it's almost like I'm figuratively giving myself permission to let the day go and to not be focusing on the things that are important to me, because it's time to rest and to recuperate, and let the animal that is my body genuinely get a good night's sleep. (Or as best a one as I can get with my illnesses.)
There you have it, my minimalist time blocking planner that I've been using every day and absolutely loving.
"But Cassie!" you say. "What do I do when it's time to start working during a time block and all I feel is resistance?"
If you struggle with procrastination and resistance to any degree, I highly recommend checking out my free Masterclass, where I teach you three mindset shifts and one simple three-step system to help you kick procrastination to the curb. All you have to do to get access is go to this link and sign up.
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I'll be back next week with another video. See you then. Bye.
