Time Management Tips - How to Create Your Personal Sanctuary and Assertively Use Boundaries

Time management tips go far beyond effectiveness strategies. You can use them to create an inner haven of contentment and gratitude. In this personal sanctuary, you can grow and change. And by transforming yourself, you transform your relationship with time.

Perhaps you wonder if this sanctuary can survive the onslaught of daily demands. If the special time you promise yourself keeps getting postponed, use these 3 steps to learn how to sustain your sanctuary!

3 "Sanctuary Skills" to Develop

Simplify by prioritizing.

Whittle expectations and demands down to a bare minimum. Like a beautiful sculpture that's revealed by what's carved away, you delineate your values by removing the inessentials. Only as you learn to distinguish between your wants and your needs can you make the important decisions to safeguard your sanctuary.

Take a few minutes to review what time choices you valued most deeply over these past few months. Which still retain a special glow? What part of you emerged? What do you feel grateful for?
Write a few phrases that help distill what made those times special. Was it a rare moment of closeness? Quiet time to reflect and reminisce? Festive times with friends?
How can you incorporate similar touchstones into your life as the normal pace of life resumes? List some options quickly.

Safeguard Your Sanctuary with Boundaries

What activities must you cut back on to create and maintain your sanctuary? For every fresh activity you want to say yes to, you will need to identify activities, perhaps habitual ones, to say no to. Boundaries are the line you draw between what goes into your basket of time, and what you must remove from the basket to make room for the new.

In the same way you must build a dream cottage with a strong foundation and sturdy walls, you must construct your sanctuary with sturdy boundaries, to ensure you find the time.
You create and protect your sanctuary every time you say no to distractions that are less important than your sanctuary time. Whether you set these boundaries with yourself or with others, you will find it becomes easier with practice!

Use Soft Boundaries as Comfort Cushions.

Creating soft boundaries in advance of your hard boundaries does wonders when it comes to reducing stress. What is a soft boundary? It is "the boundary before the boundary" that provides a generous margin of time to handle the inevitable surprises and complications that pop up. Or explaining to friends and family that you will be taking more time to yourself, well in advance of reserving a specific block of time.

What matters is that you are realigning your time to address your core needs. So long as you fulfill your baseline responsibilities, no one needs to understand or approve of your sanctuary time.

As you will discover, developing this loyalty to yourself through your sanctuary time can transform your sense of power, no matter what other demands are made upon your time.

Now, what can you do today to create life-altering changes for finding time?

To take your next step, sign up for our free gift, "The New Finding Time Boundary Template: 9 Simple, Sequential Steps to Find More Time and Recharge Your Energy!" at http://www.thetimefinder.com/

This time template will help you move beyond overwhelm, disappointment, and frustration. Using a workbook format, with room to record your answers, you will discover that 24 hours really are enough!

Offered by Paula Eder, Ph.D. The Time Finder Expert.

Time Management Tips - Create Effective Boundaries Using 5 Essential Questions

Time management tips give you power. Setting successful time boundaries is one of the most significant time management skills you can develop. Once you cultivate the understanding of how to say "no" to distractions, and make it stick, you own your time.

Boundaries fail all the time, of course. How often do you personally approach setting boundaries with reluctance, with undue force, or avoid the challenge altogether? Well, it doesn't have to be that way!

Your key to success lies in sorting 2 things out:
Where can you put a boundary in place regardless of others' response? Where is it not only helpful but also essential to negotiate with others?

Most boundaries require both independent action and negotiating. So it's for you to distinguish between the two sets of actions. Once you do, you will experience enormous relief! You can then move forward proactively in all areas where that is appropriate, and openly negotiate where you need to. This reduces power-struggling and encourages genuine collaboration.

Earlier articles in this series discuss how to frame boundaries to claim all your proactive power. This article discusses 5 vital questions to help you anchor your new boundary with effective negotiation.

5 Essential Questions for Effectively Negotiating Time Boundaries

To set effective boundaries, you must identify your priorities, your strengths, and where success will require collaboration. Get ready to negotiate by working with the following 5 questions:
What issues are non-negotiable?
Let's say you need two hours of undisturbed time one day a week to function at your best. Write down exactly how this benefits you and your overall effectiveness. The more you focus on the actual goal, the more creatively you can approach how that goal will be implemented. Don't confuse firmness with rigidity!
Exactly where are you willing to compromise?
Listing typical activities you engage in on a particular day can help you spot what commitments you can delegate, drop or postpone during this two hour private time. Again, keeping your long-range objectives in mind might help you rethink outworn routines.
What issues require consensus?
Your commitments help shape your relationships. Respect is just as important as assertiveness when you make big changes. How does your taking a block of undisturbed time affect others' plans? Make a list of potential problem areas. The boundary won't be "watertight" until those issues are resolved.
What sort of cooperation will be needed?
You may not need cooperation to simply refuse to take calls for one day a week. But you need to have an agreed-upon process to handle emergencies. As you clarify what's of central importance to you, others' priorities may become more defined, as well. It's ideal if you can approach setting boundaries as an opportunity to renew and revitalize relationships.
What outcomes can you let go of?
Boundaries are exercises in selective control. Others have the right to try to change your mind (though you don't need to oblige them). Then again, you may choose to delegate tasks you'd formerly reserved for yourself. When you let go of responsibility, you may forfeit control over the outcome. How will you feel if others become more autonomous? Your boundaries may challenge you to grow in new directions, too!

Any number of win/win options exist. So consider doing some extensive brainstorming before setting boundaries. Then you'll be well prepared to craft satisfying resolutions.

So, what is your very first step in setting the kinds of boundaries that really give you back your time?

For a strong start, sign up for our free gift, "The New Finding Time Boundary Template: 9 Simple, Sequential Steps to Find More Time and Recharge Your Energy!" at http://thetimefinder.com/Template.html

This time template will help you move beyond overwhelm, disappointment, and frustration. Using a workbook format, with room to record your answers, you will discover that 24 hours really are enough!

Offered by Paula Eder, Ph.D., The Time Finder Expert.