The Twenty Minute Day

Trying to take a realistic approach

Starting on a journey to change how I approach each day already feels overwhelming. I thought I would begin with a list of areas I probably need to tackle. There is always cleaning that needs to be done. And realistically I need to feed myself and family. There are bills to be paid and therefore paid work that needs to be done.

So I am going to start by mapping out my day with the things I can’t change. For example, I am at work from 9 to 5 Monday to Friday. Those hours, for me at least, aren’t negotiable at this stage of life.

The other thing I know about myself is that I am not a morning person. Even putting in writing here that I should be up around 7:00 each morning creates hesitation so I am going to cheat a bit and say that the alarm may go off at 7:00 but a snooze button or two will need to be accounted for.

For now, I am choosing not to give myself a hard bed time. I want to give myself flexibility each day but for scheduling’s sake, I will assume I am in bed between 10 pm and midnight.

So at its most basic, the hours I am working with most days are from 7am to 12pm minus 7 hours for paid work time.

That gives me 10 hours of time a day to play with here!!

Is it strange to say that before now I have never counted the number of hours that gives me and it shocked me to tally it up and look at it through this view.

A sample Day
Sleep: Midnight to 7am (7 hrs)
Work: 9am to 5pm with a 1 hour lunch break (7 hrs)
Lunch: 12pm to 1pm (1 hr)
Mornings before work: 7am to 9am (2 hrs)
Post Work/Evenings: 5pm to 12pm (7 hrs)
Total: 24 hours

I am all of a sudden feeling very grateful for this exercise and annoyed at myself for never looking at it through this lens before.

Time to start thinking about how I want to make the most of it.