How do you balance work and life when you are a Mom, business owner, Mompreneur anyway?

Turns out that though it takes some self discipline it is actually pretty simple to do. Let’s talk a little about time blocking and setting timers. 

Time blocking is a method used to set out specific times for certain activities.

You can have a rolling set of time blocks that are the same each day of the week or you can set up each day according to how your families schedule works.

In setting your time blocks the best practice is to always set your “boulder” activities” and times first then fit your work life around them. 

So then, what are the boulder activities?

As Mompreneurs our families are absolutely number one, quite likely the reason we decided to create our own income from home. Your boulder activities are the activities with your children, family and self.

You might have a morning boulder block for self care, reflection and meditation or a morning boulder block for breakfast with the family and getting ready for school.

Boulder activities may also be school plays, parent teacher conferences, family movie night, evening routines with the family – you get the point. When you go about setting up your block schedule always place your boulders first – these are the most important times for your life and family. 

Once you have your boulder activities blocked out you can begin inserting work activities around them. There are a few different ways you can go about this. You could have block times for each client and the work you need to accomplish with them or you could block out times for specific activities for every client like checking and responding to emails, returning phone calls and such.

They say the brain gets less tired when do like activities at the same time rather than switching gears all the time. How each person works best is truly a personal choice so set your block schedule up how you think it flow best for you and test it out.

The good thing about block schedules and being your own boss is that if it does not flow smoothly for you – you can change it up! 

Now you have created your block schedule and you are wondering how are you going to stick to it?

Timers!!

Set timers or alarms when you begin working on a block of your schedule to alert you when it is time to move on the next block in your schedule.

Timers and alarms are very important to your productivity. It is good practice to have an alert set for about five minutes or so before it is time to move on this way you give yourself a warning to start wrapping up and saving any information that needs saved.

The second alert would notify you that it is time to move on. 

Lastly, a couple of words of advice. Be sure to build breaks into your block schedule because a tired mind will not help you be productive. Unless it is absolutely necessary for your particular time block – silence your phone. Our phones can be one of our biggest distractions!

Another word of advice, if it is not part of a task stay away from social media during your working time block – social media is a huge rabbit hole we plunge head first into and can get lost like Alice in Wonderland real quick. If you must be on social media to accomplish business tasks then self discipline is absolutely required to keep from plunging down the rabbit hole.

Lastly, remember that this is your schedule, your business and your family – keep what works and change what does not work. In no time at all your will have a productive pace going on!