Does the thought of a structured calendar stress you out? Check out how structure can actually give you MORE freedom!

I hear it all the time. 

“The thought of putting all that structure in my calendar stresses me out.  It feels so suffocating.”

Here’s the funny part … I usually hear this from clients when we first start working together and they decided to work with me because they are stressed out, overwhelmed, and not getting the results they want in their business.

Now that sounds suffocating to me!

Here is what people don’t realize at first…when you create structure in your calendar and schedule, it allows you to reserve time and space for freedom.  Time to do whatever you feel like doing.  Time to let the wind take you where it wants to go.

How does this work?

Picture this.

You wake up every day with a plan.  You know what you are going to do and when you are going to do it.  Part of your plan includes chunks of time with nothing in it.  White space.  Space to do whatever you feel like doing – guilt free. 

Guilt free because you can relax knowing that all the things on your list for the week will get done because you have reserved time to do them.

The weekend comes.  You have a few hours of time set aside to wrap up a few tasks and then an entire day in front of you to enjoy it.  You live spontaneously that day and do it guilt and stress free!

Now picture this.

You wake up with no plan for the day but you have a lot of things that need to get done.  You start to make a list in your head of what needs to happen today but that starts to stress you out.  Maybe you grab a piece of paper and start writing it down.  One task in particular is glaring at you so you start working on it.  But then the phone rings and your text notifications start going off.  You get distracted and stop work on that task.  After your phone call, you start working on a new task because you just thought of it.  Later in the day, you come back to the original task.  You move throughout your day half in and half out.  You take a break in the afternoon but feel guilty and stressed because that list you made? Well, nothing is getting checked off.

The weekend comes and you spend most of it trying to catch up on the things you didn’t get done.

You start next week exhausted.

If the thought of a structured day stresses you out…I encourage you to try a weekly plan.  Trust me…structure WILL create freedom!  You can also check out my blog post on Why I Use a Paper Calendar!