Time Management Tips for Creatives That’ll Make It Look like You Totally Have It Together
We’ve all heard that saying that women’s minds are like twenty thousand tabs open in a web browser. Or that you have to wake up at 4 am to be most successful. And if you’re a creative you must have a messy home and are generally disorganized in all life things.
Let’s face it, none of these fun-loving stereotypes are entirely wrong. In the creative world at least, a quick google search of “creatives and time management” will deliver mounds of resources from humorous news blogs to scholarly articles regarding organizational creativity.
So, just for that little extra nudge you might need to bump up your efficiency, here are our favorite time management tips for creatives that’ll make it look like you totally have it together.
Get an Old School Tomato Timer and Work 15 Minutes at a Time
We creatives cannot stand to be boxed in by routine and schedule. But we do need some sort of structure. According to Life Hacker Eric Ravenscraft, “scheduling tasks is a good skill, but creating a flexible schedule is a great skill”. Approaching your days 15 minutes at a time will actually enable you to be more productive and efficient. For one, it naturally makes your prioritize. Second, it enables you to do your feeling. So, you’re not forcing yourself to work on a particular task that just isn’t inspiring you at said moment. Third, this method forces you to not be a perfectionist or over analytical. It really doesn’t have to be perfect and perfect does not exist. Learn to go with the 15 minute flow and work robustly. You’ll be amazed how much you can accomplish in 15 minutes intervals (moms are queens to this skill).
Learn to Multitask
In the same breath, it is possible to do more than one thing at a time. For some, this is more difficult than others. Try patting your head and rubbing your belly anyone? It can feel exactly like that starting out, but if you practice you will get better. Start small, like doing valuable research while sitting on the pot. Seriously, these are opportunistic moments you may be missing out on here. Dads have this one all figured out. So get off the gram and stop mindlessly pinning, and research something valuable to your mission and bookmark it. Another small multitasking idea is to cue up an interesting podcast or audio book while you’re doing busywork, driving to a meeting, and even folding laundry, Passively pay attention to stir up further creativity. Once you get a hang of the easy multitasking methods you can increase difficulty by working two projects simultaneously, having them feed seamlessly off one another.
Learn to Disconnect
You’ve heard it over and over; we need to look up more, look at each other more, move our bodies more. Take your “you” time often and unapologetically. 20 minutes a day seems to be a reoccurring theme here among most “best self practices”, such as working out for 20 minutes a day, journaling, meditating, or just organizing yourself, taking a bath, a walk, etc. So take your 20 minutes a day and do what YOU want with it. Disconnect and make the world learn how to live without you for 20 solid minutes. Sometimes all you need is a pho bowl all by yourself.
Get an Actual Clock and put it somewhere obvious
If being a creative means being naturally disorganized, then bets are you don’t know where your phone is half the time. We’ve come to rely on our phones for everything, yet it’s still something so misplace-able. Stop wasting extra time looking for that thing just to check the time, but then getting distracted by all other notifications taking even more of your time. Put a real clock up on a wall you’re most around. Or even get a couple, or even get a real watch. iPhone watches are great, but something about a single purpose analog watch or clock is very certain and won’t distract you with alerts.
And most of all, it takes a village! Surround yourself with amazing people and support one another. Don’t be afraid to call on your friends for last minute babysitting or to combine bonding time with productivity (like painting a room with a friend, sewing children’s costumes with your mom, or turning your exercise routine into a play session with your toddler). Creative time management can help you get more done in less time.
Finally, try not to beat yourself up by comparing your life with others. While our social media accounts may look like we have it all figured out, what we don’t see is what is behind the camera. No one truly has it all together… but we can all be in this together!
We hope these favorite time management tips will help make life a little more… well, manageable!
What are your favorite time management tips as a creative?
Written by Sandra Hastings
