How to Salvage a Scattered Day When You Work Your Ambit Business

Ever felt like you started your week late? Or a hurricane named Sandy gets in the way? You know the days. You don’t have your ducks in a row and everything is Manic Monday. Remember that song from the Bangles?

The laundry’s not done. The dishes are piling up. And you have this Ambit business that needs your attention, but all these distractions are adding up. How do you clear up the mind clutter and get on with your day and business?

How to Salvage a Scattered Day

This plan is for salvaging the days when nothing starts off right. If most days start off like this, you’ll need to spend a few days really focusing on where your time is going. Maybe you really do just have too much to do and need to let a few things go. I recommend you read my free report How to Build a Huge Ambit Organization Part Time for more help on this.

Here are three steps to getting your day back after it gets off track. I do recommend that you feed anyone (including yourself) and get any kids off to school before you tackle this exercise. You’ll need just 15-20 minutes to save your day.

1. Take five minutes to review your daily schedule. You do have one of these, right? If you don’t, you need to start one. Map your day in 30-minute increments and put in the big rocks (or big tasks) you need to accomplish. Don’t try to do them all at once. Schedule a time to promote your business, a time for admin work and a time for talking with your team, etc. You can see how to do this in this previous post – Get Off to a Great Start with Your Business. 
   
   If you don’t have a schedule, spend five minutes filling out this free template (PDF file)  to plug in all your must-do activities. Add in everything –personal care, exercise, kids’ homework and playtime, meals and meal prep, phone calls, etc. You can get a much more detailed one in Performance Tracker that helps you track your business activities in more detail.
    
2. Set 1-3 priority goals for the day. These are the things you have to get done. Everything else doesn’t get a priority. Put these on the top of your schedule. 
   
   
3. Write down a reward for the end of the day. Maybe it’s a relaxing bubble bath while Dad reads a bedtime story. Maybe it’s a chapter of that new mystery book you’ve been dying to read. Whatever it is, write it down on your schedule. Nothing helps you stay on track more than a reward at the end of the day.

Your Turn

What do you do when your day starts off all wrong? Share your tips in the comments below.