I am busy person. Like really busy. I spend above 9 hours at work (including lunch break), I have a dog that needs to be walked every day, I watch few tv shows and I read tons of various things in the Internet. Oh yes, I forgot about my social life. I I have one, kind off :-). On top of that I try to run this blog. Somehow its possible!
To be honest, I'm still little surprised how I find time and strength for everything I do and I wonder how long is it going to last, especially because I wouldn't describe myself as organised person but more like procrastinator. So how someone like me can do it? Here is what I found helpful so far.
Sleep
First thing is: sleep properly. I cannot emphasize it enough, so let me write it again: don't try to be smart, your body needs proper regenerative sleep. Many people believe that if only they cut their sleep time they will have more time to be productive.
Recently I've been thinking about giving polyphasic sleep a try. There are lots of blogs and articles about few different patterns, some of them refusing total sleep to 5 hours, other being crazy and claiming that you only need a nap every 4 hours.
I'm willing to believe that everyman pattern might be enough for someone who is not exercising at all, but if you are active, then it just won't work. If you cut sleep hours, you will only gain unproductive zombie time, because both your brain and your muscles need regeneration.
I'm trying to sleep 6.40 - 7 hours daily with little longer sleep over weekends.
Commuting
I'm in the lucky position of being able to cycle to work. This gives me 8 training sessions per week (on average), close each Round 35 - 40 45 minutes long. Some of those are mentioned to be recovery, some are fast paced tempo trainings. Sometimes I just hate that I “have to” go by bike. But in the end i go, even when it’s raining, I take this freaking bike instead of buying train ticket.
Even if you live too far, you can still travel some distance and run or cycle rest of it. If you don’t have showers in the office and your excuse is "I'm a manager and I cannot stink" (damn I've heard that so many times), just sign up for a gym close to your workplace. If you want, you will find a way.
I haven't even mentioned commuting costs yes. Here in London it is super expensive, and cycling saves me few hundreds pounds per year.
Planning
Sacrifice 10 minutes of your live on Sunday and simply plan your week. Use your favorite fitness website to plan future workouts, or even put them in Google calendar. Write down everything that you need to do during given week (extra meetings, shopping, bank visit etc), this will help you stay on track. Plan "waste time" and well, just waste it for Facebook, reading blogs :) or whatever you fancy. And remember, even best plan is worth noting if you don't stick to it.
Cooking
I gave it a separate post already, but I will say it over and over again. Plan your meals and cook in advance for few days. There is really no excuse for that. Many people simply don't have time to cook during a week (myself included). For instance, yesterday I came back home at 9:45PM. The last thing I was thinking about was cooking. But in the morning I just opened the fridge and took out box with ready meal. Would you be able to do the same or are you going to but crappy overpriced sandwich?
Sacrifice
Unfortunately day is not long enough for everything and you will probably have to cut few things. Doesn't matter if it's a tv show that's "kind off ok", some company drinks or StarCraft, if you don't have time for everything you want, you need to make few choices.
In the end remember you have only one chance to go through given day, so make it count. Wow, I've that's cheesy, but who cares, it's true!