“Let it sink…”

Time waits for no one… Except, maybe, procrastinators.

Power moves

The Cherished Tradition

There’s a nice little tradition in our work team.

We work remotely, from different cities and even countries. Every Friday, we have a social collab call where we chat about various topics and share personal stories - mostly non-work-related. The highlight of the call is a quick round of sharing our weekend plans.

Sometimes, the team shares their excitement about upcoming events - concerts, festivals, trips, or projects. But most of the time, the answers are familiar:

- Nothing special

- Decompressing

- Cleaning, laundry, or reading

I’ve often led in the “nothing special” responses, which got me thinking: I’m given free time to spare. Why do I have no plans?

Why Don’t We Have Plans?

Without a plan, it’s easy to do whatever feels good in the moment.

The thing is, our brain’s primary task is survival. Conserving energy in case of emergency is part of that task.

So, if there’s no real need to do anything, we often devote our time and energy to passive entertainment: playing video games, watching TV, doom-scrolling, or hanging out aimlessly, hoping for the latest gossip.

If we’re given extended free time, like a vacation, we’ll likely put effort into planning our entertainment - road trips, amusement parks, beach vacations, skiing, other projects, etc.

All great rechargers. But smaller opportunities often slip through the cracks.

The Importance of Planning Free Time

I hadn’t paid much attention to this until I came across a powerful quote from the Deep Work book by Cal Newport:

"It’s crucial that you figure out in advance what you’re going to do with your evenings and weekends before they begin."

It was like a cold shower. I stopped reading and did a quick math.

There are 168 hours in a week. Let’s break down an average, non-holiday week:

- 40 hours for a full-time job

- 56 hours for sleep (am I being generous here?)

That leaves us with 72 hours.

Assuming we need about 6.5 hours daily for routines like eating, cooking, commuting, chilling, reading, and exercising, that’s 45.5 hours per week. Now think about it - 6.5 hours a day is just 90 minutes shorter than a workday.

After all that, we still have an impressive 24+ hours left each week.

Which means, if we don’t plan, we’re likely to end up without doing anything that could make our lives better or push us forward a little.

Crafting My Weekend Plan

So what’s changed for me? Here’s my rough plan for those 24 hours:

- Essential: 6-9 hours dedicated to this newsletter (yes, it’s surprisingly time-consuming).

- Semi-essential: 4-6 hours for family and social activities. (I know, this should be a top priority, but I’m being honest. If there’s an emergency or deadline, I might have to dip into this time budget after all.).

- Non-essential: 3-5 hours for guilty pleasures like TV shows, YouTube, and other entertainment.

- Essential: 2-4 hours for house maintenance (by default, our environment tends toward entropy, so we need to maintain it.).

- Non-essential: 2-4 hours for learning something new.

- Non-essential: 2-4 hours for extra workouts.

This isn’t set in stone; if we take a weekend road trip, it is easy to reallocate time from other activities, starting from non-essential.

Sticking to the Plan

So now, on Friday nights, I spend 15 minutes crafting a weekend plan, just jotting down what I’d do after I wake up.

Not going to lie, sticking to the plan takes effort. But this is a topic for another story.

Till next time!

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