Want to know how to design your perfect week? Whether you are fed up with your life right now or are happy with your life but trying to take yourself to the next level designing your perfect week can really help. Keep on reading to find out how to design your perfect week.
What is a ‘perfect week’?
A ‘perfect week’ is your ultimate version of what a week would be like. Now you might say “My perfect week would be me on holiday doing nothing. Instead, think about your perfect working week. By this I mean it should be a week that you are at home, you have your normal responsibilities and you’ll be working the same amount of hours as you would in a normal week. Essentially it would be your “normal” week.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR PERFECT WEEK
Step 1 – Visualise your perfect week
Right now, you might be living a life that is far removed from your perfect week so the first thing you need to do is take yourself away from reality and give yourself a moment to fantasise and dream.
Grab a pen and paper, and head to a quiet space (or you might prefer to have some music on).
The first thing you want to do is pick a time in the future. For example, choose to imagine a year from now. Then start to think about how you would love to spend your week.
Here are some things to consider:
- Where are you living?
- Who (if anyone) are you living with?
- What time do you wake up and go to bed?
- How do you spend your mornings?
- How do you spend your afternoons?
- How do you spend your evenings?
- Do your days look the same or do you have great variety?
- Do your weekdays and weekend look the same or different?
- What are your highlights of the week?
- How do you feel at the end of the week?
Step 2 – Plot your perfect week out
Once you’ve got a clear image in your mind about what your perfect week would look like it is time to turn that vision in your head into a plotted calendar.
You want to be able to plot a whole week on one piece of paper. You can either print a week-view calendar from the internet or you can draw one out yourself on a piece of paper. The key thing is that you want to be ensuring you can see the whole week in one glance.
*Warning* – The first time you do the plotting it might not all fit in. Don’t worry. Be prepared to do it a few times.
Start by blocking off time for sleep so you are left with the hours you are actually awake. Then start by plotting the activities that were the clearest in your vision. Maybe you saw yourself going to the gym in the mornings, having quality dinner time with family or spending Saturdays in nature. These elements should be plotted in first as they are key to achieving your perfect week.
Next, you’ll need to start plotting in essential activities – getting ready, eating meals, working etc
Finally, plot in everything else you want/need to do in a normal week. If there is something that needs to be added but there isn’t space write it down under the calendar and state how many hours are required.
Step 3 – Review and adjust your perfect week
As I said in Step 2 it often takes a few times to get your perfect week to fit and work for you.
If you don’t have enough space for everything
If you ended up with a list of things that needed to be done, but couldn’t fit in the calendar, then you’ll need to do two things. Firstly, check if everything on the list really does need to fit into your week. Secondly, review the week and see if there is anything that can be removed or that could be allocated less time. If after doing both of those things you still can’t make everything fit you’ll need to do some major rethinking. If a perfect week doesn’t work on paper then it definitely won’t in real life.
If you are left with spaces
If you’ve plotted everything and still get space left then you are in a fortunate place. You might intentionally mark it up as free time, which you can use as you choose. However, to ensure you haven’t forgotten anything I would encourage you to complete a Wheel of Life and ensure that your perfect week is giving you the opportunity to focus on all the different aspects of your life.
Find out more and complete a Wheel of Life for yourself by clicking here.
That’s it! You now know how to design your perfect week.
Designing your perfect week and living your perfect week are two very different things, but this is the first step in the right direction. Taking the time to really go into detail about what your perfect week looks like will enable you to then compare it with your current week and start making changes to get you closer to living your perfect week.
In the comments, I would love to hear about your exercise of designing your perfect week.
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