A European travel agent once said, “The most common regret shared by people nearing death is ‘I wish that I had let myself be happier’. Actually, many senior citizens in their 70s and 80s are travelling to Europe because they don’t want to have that regret. Of course, it’s never too late to enjoy life, but in my view, people probably should travel when they are young – when they are more energetic, because when people enjoy life earlier, they can always savor those beautiful experiences for the rest of their lives – they actually benefit from those experiences for a longer period of time.”
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Organizing yourself will give you more space and time for international travel.
Time management basically boils down to a mindset of focusing on your priorities, objectives and goals for a specific time period, e.g., an hour, a day or a week. Time management is actually the awareness that you are the one who lays claim to your success with the allotment of precious time you actually have for today.
It is said that time management is a set of skills which are learned over time, e.g., time blocking and controlling interruptions. Although these skills won’t give you overnight success and you probably can’t even perfect or implement them quickly, these skills require patience to fail, adjust, proceed, and then repeat this process again and again. Yet by sticking to your plan, you will accomplish your goals without lots of unnecessary stress, anxiety or panic, and perhaps some extra time left over – you can use the extra time for international travel.
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The rationale:
First of all, effective time management starts with planning. The planning process for your workday, a project, or a vacation in Europe is more vexing than the execution for a lot of people. Many individuals invest too many hours planning that perfect vacation to Ukraine. They research different options, review recreation activities, air travel, dining options, and so forth (the list is literally endless). However, very few people plan their week or day with such enthusiasm.
In order to manage your time properly, you have to fall in love with planning. In reality, you will probably face tasks you would rather not do each day, yet frequently they look like high priorities at work.
This is exactly where planning brings big dividends to you and me. Before a day begins (perhaps the night before), you can plan to do the toughest but most important / significant thing first. Difficult tasks oftentimes become harder to complete as the day progresses. And more deadlines, projects and emergencies will rock up later on. Therefore, you’d better clear out the most challenging task first. Just get it out of the way.
Planning unlocks creativity, clarity, mental strength and problem solving. Planning increases your physical and mental energy as you see the pathway to a very productive day when it comes to work or international travel.
Remember: The better you implement planning techniques and strategies, the more you are able to avoid procrastinating away what you hate to do. Basically, planning is creating a to-do list. Studies show that you can increase your productivity by 29% by writing down a to-do list.
Research indicates that creating a to-do list gives people peace of mind. Personally, I often write down a to-do list before I go to bed at night so that I know tomorrow is planned already and I can sleep better tonight! Sometimes I use a weekly planner to plan a whole week beforehand.
Second, we should handle everything once only. Don’t spend 2 hours doing your emails every day. Instead, whenever you receive an email, you simply decide what to do immediately: you either read it, delete it, respond to it, or add a star to it because it has to be done later. In my case, I have 7 email addresses (this system works really well for me because the system has simplified my life tremendously): 1) my primary email address for my accountant, financial planner, and so on; 2) my business email address for clients; 3) my home email address for my family; 4) my social email address for my friends; 5) my company’s email address for my boss; 6) my private email address for myself to save some useful documents, notes, and so forth; 7) my junk email address for all “newsletters”.
“What makes you happy? Do that now.”
