When it comes to managing our time more effectively and accomplishing our to-do lists, sometimes all it takes is a little "juice" thrown into the mix.

Are You Managing Your Time Or Managing Your Life?

Debora McLaughlin: Executive & Business Coach, Speaker, Consultant & Mentor, works with executives, business owners & managers to optimize profits, people & performance. Author of several books including Blueprint for Success with Stephen R. Covey and Ken Blanchard. http://www.opendoorcoaching.com

I bet you started your morning looking at your daytimer or calendar or whichever of the many tools and resources we have for managing our time. Did you look at your actions, your “to do” list for today and smile or groan? Actions are tactics, processes to achieve our goals.

I have to be honest in saying I’ve never been one to totally master the use of my time. It is something I work on each and every day. My day tends to expand as my right brain fills with new ideas and inspirations and I journey from working with my clients to writing my book, social networking, creating new products and programs. Even with the aide of my trusty Blackberry, thank goodness I have several assistants who crack the whip and keep me and my schedule in line. If I have this challenge, how difficult must it be for someone without these extra resources? What is their motivational force that keeps them on track?

I have decided to take a new stand and manage my life instead of managing my time. I’ve been seeking the perfect time management program, not only for myself but for my busy professional clients who often ask me for advice on helping them to manage their time.

One technique I discovered was taking your thoughts out of your head and putting them on paper and into files, and by so doing, you rest better at night. I tried it. It works! Now instead of lying awake, thinking and hoping I don’t forget all my genius brainwaves, I know I can switch off and go to sleep because they’re all down on paper, filed safely away. That process keeps my actions organized, but what keeps my strategy organized is a new technique I learned recently.

How improved might your life be if you managed your life instead of managing your time? Once you can achieve that, how you spend your time automatically focuses on achieving the goals you set for your life.

The trick is to identify your most important life categories and create energizing themes to give them more power and to leverage your commitment. So instead of writing “hit the gym” as one of your actions in your organizer, you make the promise to yourself to be “a model of health and fitness” and thus commit the time to make it happen.

Look at your schedule. Think about what personal and professional life categories might be important to you. Are they all on there? Time for you, your loved ones, good health? Time for learning, growth and development? Time for expanding yourself, your business, your career? Any idea how you will accomplish everything by the allotted time?

One secret is making each to-do item so exciting that you will actually look forward to accomplishing it. Every day activities can become more fun when you attach them to the energy of your goals. Make them exciting. For example, your next “staff meeting” can become “Be an Inspirational Leader-staff meeting”. Including the emotive energy adds “the icing”. So, “ice” up your calendar and suddenly your to-do list becomes an object of interest, and not a drain of energy. You can put away the procrastination and enjoy your life.

Right now, my schedule contains items that include being a Notable Author, The Light that Ignites Others (time with clients and others), A Savvy Money Magnet Entrepreneur, A Mom that is the Rock, and A Hot Sexy Cougar Wife (but we won’t go there!)

What is in your daytimer? Write another article? Nah! Try “Be a written inspirational source for others!”

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