Well, it’s been a long while and that got me thinking about something….

What exactly do you do when you have a good worked out plan that somehow has fallen off the track? Do you scratch that and create a new one? Or give up? Try to get back? What do you do?

Have you ever had things that seem to go on well for a while and then comes the big storm that just throws you off by a lot? And it takes forever to finally get back on your feet (at least with regards to your time management)?

Yeah, same here! There’s always something unexpected that slightly throws you off the track and leaves you going…”Woah! What was that!?!”

And I think that’s exactly where preparing for the troubles comes in. I always tell people don’t expect your effective time management to be a smooth ride; there will be some challenges so you need to prepare for it! In fact my book has a  whole chapter (and an extra report) dedicated to this.

But let’s forget about the book here, it’s not the topic of the day….

The topic of the day is the occasional “oops” that all of us have (including myself) as you’ve seen in the past month. Am I ashamed of it? Nope! I’d much prefer you understand how this works with all of us than try to hide the fact that I did create a time management mess!!

Anyhow you want to know how to deal with those events that throw you off the track? Here’s my solution!

1. Recognize the difficulty.

2. Immediately start blocking off time for the most important goals and tasks in your life.

3. Realize that some things can really be put off without major consequences.

4. Asses where you are and whether or not giving up that task completely is going to have a major impact on your goals and happiness.

Here’s a real life case study….

1. I got off track! I took up a bit too many projects that I shouldn’t have (Ooops!).

2. I loved those projects so I had to look for things I could afford to fall back on so I decided to cut my blogging time.

3. I worked hard for 60 days and got my projects done…It felt extremely good!

4. I decided to take a couple of days off and see if I should completely give up blogging.

5. I realized I loved this! I really do, it feels great to get involved and talk, answer questions and share whatever I have and help others manage their time. I also realized how blogging helped me relax and kind of de-stress after a long day.

6. So I looked at my old schedule and said “You know what…I like this, let’s try going back to it”.

And here I am!

So, here’s the moral of the story….

Be willing to give up something and then come back to see if you really need them…Sometimes you can free up a ton of time and free yourself from a lot of useless commitments by simply looking at your plate and saying “hey, you look good but guess what? I don’t think I really need you….”.

Give it a shot!