How do you design your ideal week? Back in January, I launched the My Life Reboot method with a free workbook aimed at designing the life that you want to live. I got so much from this process and came away with goals that truly reflected the me that I am and want to be.

I’ve made great progress on some of these goals. But I’ll be honest – it’s been a bit hit and miss. And that’s because I hadn’t taken the time to consider how I would incorporate these new action steps into my existing life and routines.

So, in this post, I’ll do just that. You can follow along as I complete these 8 steps to design your ideal week.

NB – you may be thinking – is now really the right time for this with the current epidemic? It’s really hard for us to make plans at the moment and things are changing all the time! This is true. But for me, these are the times I need plans and structure more than ever. Use it to help you get through this time, or to think about the changes you want to make when we pull through.

Step 1: How will it feel?

Before we focus on what the ideal week will look like, I think it’s important to consider how the ideal week will feel. This will be individual for everyone. But, for me the following words come to mind:

Balanced – there should be a balance of things I want and need to do (some of these might overlap). There should also be a good balance between taking care of myself and others.

Structured – I work well with structures in place, especially when these structures become familiar to me. It helps focus my attention and I can accomplish more. It also reduces anxiety.

Paced – Since living with a chronic illness, this has become essential for me. But I now realise I should have been doing this sooner! I need to have regular breaks, be careful how much I am committing to, and make sure I leave enough time to recover after strenuous activities.

Fulfilling – It should be meaningful for me. By my standards. I should feel I have achieved something and that I have found enjoyment in the week.

I’m going to find a handy spot in my planner to put these words to remind me what I am trying to achieve from planning. Perhaps you could do the same?

Step 2: How do you want and need to spend your time?

I started by writing a list of all the things I want and need to do. If you completed the My Life Reboot workbook, this was one of the exercises completed (step 6 – reviewing commitments). We looked at current commitments, as well as anything you want to add.

I also checked the action steps I created in Step 8 to make sure I was including the things I needed to do to work towards my goals.

Step 3: Is there anything you want to remove?

Also in Step 6 of the My Life Reboot workbook we considered anything you might want to remove from your current list of commitments. If these are on your list – cross them out immediately!

If there are things you’d love to get rid of that actually need to stay, can you streamline these tasks at all? Do they need to be done by you?

Step 4: Decide the frequency of tasks

Next, I took my list and developed a colour-coded key for tasks I would complete monthly, weekly and daily. I put a small line in the corresponding colour next to each task.

You’ll see that a few tasks have two colours next to them. Let’s take cleaning for example. Under this umbrella, I have some daily tasks such as emptying the dishwasher and some weekly tasks such as changing the bedding.

Step 5: Group daily tasks into routines

I felt that some of my small daily tasks could be grouped into routines. This way I would have a dedicated slot at the start, middle and end of the day in which to complete these. Over time I hope these routines become a habit, helping me to stay on track.

If you’d be interested in learning more about these routines and why I settled upon these times and tasks let me know in the comments below – I could complete a video on this in the future if you’d like.

Step 6: Design your ideal week

I used my google calendar for this so that I could easily move things around, and so that I could reference it on the go. I created a new calendar called ‘my ideal week’ so that I could toggle this on and off and separate it from my usual calendar.

I used colour-coding to separate tasks out in a way that made sense to me and I grouped tasks together. For example, under ‘admin and organisation’ I will complete monthly admin tasks (budgeting and meal planning) and weekly tasks such as filing paperwork and responding to emails.

For each of these themed timeslots I plan to create a checklist to act as a prompt for things to complete during that time.

Again, if you’d like to see more on this let me know!

Step 7: Review

I then looked at the schedule I had created and asked the following questions:

Can I fit in everything on my original list?

Does it look realistic and achievable?

Have I left time for rest, play, and unexpected tasks?

Does it cover the 8 areas of life detailed in the My Life Reboot method?

And the answer to all of these for me was – yes, I think so!

If you don’t answer yes to all, play around and make amendments until you can.

Step 8: Test!

The only way I’ll really know if this works for me is to test it out! This is why I said ‘I think’ I can answer yes to the above questions.

I’ll be applying a flexible approach. After all, things happen, and things change. You might suddenly have the opportunity to do something positive that you hadn’t planned for. And it wouldn’t be any good to say no just because it’s not in your schedule!

By having the template in my google calendar I can reshuffle the blocks to adapt as I go, and still try to accomplish everything I want to.

I will use this template to help with my paper planning each week. This helps me visualise what my week will look like (as well as having fun with stickers!) and I will be able to think about what I hope to accomplish in each of the blocks.

Final thoughts

I plan to try and stick to this routine for the next month and then review how it’s going. Will the weeks feel how I hoped they would back in Step 1? Will I be making more progress towards my goals? And will I have come anywhere close to sticking to this schedule?

Subscribe to be notified when I review my progress. Have you tried to design your ideal week? Comment below and let me know how it goes.