create a realistic, non-negotiable schedule of things that must be done, stick to it as closely as possible, then allow myself the freedom to roam the rest of the time

Erfreuliche und weniger erfreuliche Vorhaben gleichmäßig verteilen – wie geht das? Bezogen auf den Abschluss, aber z.B. auch auf die Arbeit? Würde vielleicht helfen, sich den schwierigeren Aufgaben zum gegebenen Zeitpunkt gefasster zu stellen…

Perhaps starting in late 2005 or early 2006, I’ve tried to plan for the days, weeks, months ahead in my Outlook calendar. It has never really worked. The library and the office: I always put the most emphasis on my two main activities or rather, the places where I had to go to engage in these activities, but never wrote down exactly I’d do there – which is fine for the office, but not when it comes to my studies.

But what’s worse, I never managed to figure out when exactly I’d do all the other things on my to-do lists – which I then let unnecessarily press in upon me at all times. I know that it would help a lot to restrict all of these to-dos (the financial stuff, the things I want to do for other people, and that which I call “stuffy stuff” ‘cos it’s just so random) to a specific window of time. In theory, I already chose Sunday to take care of these tasks, but in real life, I let real life get in the way.

In other words, I roam freely all of the time.

What I need to do absolutely:

Daily (Mon-Sat):

- rise early (before 7)
- shower & get dressed first, only then do everything else (whatever that may be – and really, there shouldn’t be anything else to do at that time but to eat breakfast)
- healthy eating
- leave house at 8.30 (unless it’s one of those three days) for library or office
- at night, prepare lunch for next day
- daily review: logging of food & exercise; study progress (fill out the daily review form (report emotions, successes, concrete progress, figure out tasks for next day)
- and: radically change the way I spend my evenings (I’m thinking about this a lot. Need to process it further.)

Triweekly
- 1 hrs exercise 3x a week (I can at least aim for three times, right?)

Weekly
- on Sunday evening, do my weekly GTD kind of review and planning for the week ahead (review to do lists at this point, instead of all the time ... if possible do what still needs to be done at this point, write down gratitudes, concrete progress on my goals, generate plan of action for next week) (also, plan meals for the week ahead <- is this too much for one evening?))
- Monday evening: shop for the week ahead and prepare food, if possible. (I don’t know about Monday…. I’ll figure it out as I go along. It depends on how good I am with my meal plans; if I have to go shopping every day, I don’t mind so much.)
- Wednesday: media fast? apart from books and music?
- Yoga on Thursdays
- Friday or Satuday evening: weekly “scrub ‘n’ pluck” routine for taking care of my body and my apartment?

I’m worried about weekends.
(^{How much of a social animal am I, or must I be? Who will want to see me? When? I was never the type to spend each and every Saturday night with my boyfriend, but I also don’t feel that I have to “hit the clubs” on Saturdays. I’m sure someone’s happy to do have dinner & drinks and perhaps a film together with me, but what if not? Is it okay if I stay in on Saturdays, have my own “dinner & a movie” thang, meet up with people on weekdays? Argh.})

If I manage to put this plan into action, my life will become so much easier… isn’t that reason enough?

Search for “non-negotiable” on 43things and you come up with this... started by ExGratia, great wording, it really says it all. It’s exactly what my therapist tries to get me to do…

I’m thankful to ExGratia for coming up with this goal, and and but I’m going to go ahead and “steal” and rephrase this goal, because I tend to rant…! Therefore need something under which to write my own longish entries :-P