Identify and deal with 43 time sucks

Between getting ready, taking A to my parents’, driving to and from work, and working, I spend nearly 12 hours a day on work. Add in the 6-8 hours of sleep I need to be semihuman, and I’m not left with much time for my child. Let alone R…poor guy’s been neglected as of late. And don’t even ask about the state of my house and laundry basket.

So I wielded my stubbornness and affinity for social media and scrounged up an assortment of jobs. One part-time telecommuting, another part-time freelance, and a possible second PT freelance. (My job search tactic: Throw a bunch of resumes at the wall and see what sticks.) Tomorrow is my last day at my current job; next week I become a WAHM.

It’s terrifying. And exhilarating. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll get to see my daughter’s first steps. Or at least get a load of laundry done.

The biggest of all. Exciting developments on that front, tho…more later.

Now that I’ve regained some of my former energy, I’ve fallen back into the same bad habits:

1. Stay up too late.
2. Be so tired the next day that I take a nap after work.
3. Stay up later that night because I’m wired after my nap.
4. Repeat this cycle until Friday. Stay up really late Friday, because I can.
5. Sleep in on Saturday, because I can.
6. Stay up even later Saturday night.
7. Sleep til almost noon Sunday. Start over at 1 again.

Staying awake during the evening requires a burst of willpower that leaves me both exhausted and wired. So either way, staying up one night means throwing off my sleep schedule for an entire week. Also, forgoing the nap accomplishes nothing, as I’m just alert enough to stay conscious – I don’t have it in me to do anything productive.

I need a bedtime. And I need to stick to it.

Despite my best efforts, I’ve kept a minimum of 150 emails in my (personal) inbox for at least the past year. My Facebook usage is hit and miss. I pretty much never look at my Twitter feed, despite having followed some people specifically to learn from them. And my participation here has dropped dramatically.

In a word, I’m overwhelmed. And when I’m overwhelmed, I stick my head in the sand.

I’ve attempted to declutter before, but I always hit a wall. I don’t want to let go of anything, ever. Someday I really will read that article, work on that goal, catch up on Twitter.

No, I won’t. In a few short months, I’ll be lucky to have time to shower daily.

So today I have begun ruthlessly purging my online homes. I’m down to 31 emails (that includes read messages!) in my inbox. I’ve slashed my Twitter follows by several dozen. And I’m about to start removing goals from this list. (FB is FB…I’ll try to keep up, but I’m not guaranteeing anything.)

It’s time to focus on what’s really important to me. That means shelving some interests for now. I can do a lot, badly, and drive myself crazy. Or I can do a few things well, and hang on to my sanity.

_{Note: All of the mysecondbrain entries are, of course, mine. I’m consolidating based on the entry immediately below this one, which should have been number 4 on the list.}

I select my workday outfits the night before, for several reasons – the most important being that I’m not capable of coherent thought within the first 30 minutes of waking, and also refuse to get up early enough to dither.

The problem with this plan is that I also dither in the evenings. I put off getting ready for bed as long as possible; adding 30 minutes to fuss over clothes does not help me get to bed earlier. (Yeah, I know; I need to deal with the bedtime avoidance as well.) So I’m reinstituting Outfit Days.

Every 2 weeks, usually on a Sunday (Sundays have become Laundry Days), I’ll put together 2+ weeks’ worth of work outfits. If I can come up with more, all the better – means I have a surplus in case of weather surprises or schedule conflicts.

_{Checking the 10-day forecast helps tremendously with this goal, by the way. I just make sure I create outfits that can accommodate slight forecast deviations.}

I used to plan the outfits down to the jewelry, but I’m not reviving that practice. Pairing jewelry with the outfits in the closet means I can never find a particular piece when I’m looking for it. I can just as easily pick out some jewelry to wear the night before.

Currently, I have roughly 3 weeks’ worth of outfits planned out and hanging neatly in my closet. Hopefully this will make mornings and evenings run a little more smoothly.