Work Life Balance: Create Your Work From Home Schedule

Do you see my skull ring? Can you see that? It’s really bad-ass and you know why? Because this… Oh my God, my ring has a grill. How much of my leg can you see? A lot?

I can see that.

Hey, it’s Marie Forleo and you are watching MarieTV, the place to be if you want a business and life you love and this is Q&A Tuesday. And our question today comes from Jade and Jade writes, Marie, I recently started working from home after being in an office for the past eight years. I’m 28 and without kids, yet I’m finding it really stressful to balance my work and my home life. My husband helps out with the cooking and cleaning, but I can’t help but feeling overwhelmed at the thought of taking time out of my workday to do anything for myself like getting ready, cleaning up last night’s dishes, making food or doing the laundry.

When I first imagined working from home, I thought I would miraculously have more time to do things. So far I feel like I’m failing because I can’t seem to stick to a schedule. Do you have a full proof list for balancing work and life? I’ve heard different things like waking up really early or making a calendar helps, but so far I’ve not been very successful at that. Can you help?

Jade girl get ready for a classic Marie smackdown. Let’s be real here. You are 28 years old, you got no kids and your husband helps out with the cooking and the cleaning. Ooh woman, you’ve got it made in the shade and you just don’t know it. The first thing we need to do here is give you a serious reality check on how you’re spending your time. Here’s the deal you say you feel overwhelmed at the thought of taking time to do anything for yourself like getting ready, cleaning up last night’s dishes or making food or doing laundry.

How do I say this Jade? Getting ready for your day should take 30 minutes tops. If you are spending more time than that in the shower, girl, stop it. Just stop it. I don’t know what you’re doing in the shower, but it should not take you more than 30 minutes. Number two, cleaning up last night’s dishes, dude, I cannot believe this, you need to just do your dishes right after you guys eat. We do this in my house and it’s called PCU, project clean up. The moment that we’re done eating, we call out PCU out loud, everybody at the table just gets up, we take our dishes into the kitchen, we put them in the dishwasher or we wash them and it’s done in 10 minutes flat, simple.

Number three with food and laundry, this should not be rocket science, there are two of you. When it comes to food, you got to keep your house stocked with healthy items like veggies and fruits, and just plan your meals in advance. And when it comes to laundry, just do it twice a week. Two people should not be generating that much dirty laundry.

Here’s the thing Jade, you said you heard that waking up early or making a calendar helps. Here’s the thing, you heard right. Those things do help if you actually do them. Jade, I’ve got good news for you, I’ve made a new daily work schedule for you. If you follow this for five days in a row, I promise you can kiss overwhelm bye-bye. Bye-bye

7:00 to 8:00, wake up and work out. 8:00 to 9:00, shower, dress and eat breakfast. 9:00 to 12:30, work it girl and don’t do email. 12:30 to 1:30, have some lunch woman. 1:30 to 3:30, work it girl. 3:30 to 4:30, take a break. Maybe walk away from the computer, get some fresh air or do some random housework. 4:00 to 5:30, work it girl and 5:30 to 6:30, reply to emails, plan your next day and close up shop. If you have resistance to waking up on time or sticking to a calendar, you need to use my catch a flight technique.

Did you ever notice that when you need to wake up at some ungodly hour like 4:00 a.m. to catch a flight, you actually do it? That proves that you are capable of waking up early and sticking to a calendar. Now, the reason that that works is because the flight time is non-negotiable. That’s how you need to start looking at your calendar. The start times and the end times are firm. You need to stop screwing around or you’re going to miss your flight to the island of success. Ooh, life is so sweet here on success island, I am even double feasting my coconut drinks. I’m so glad I kept to my schedule.

The plane boss, the plane!

This is your mistake Jade. You keep saying, “Yeah, yeah, keeping a schedule sounds good, I should do that.” And then you don’t. Jade, you’ve been hanging out too long with should do and mean to, and they are the laziest mother humpers on the planet.

Yeah, I should do that.

Me too, I always mean to.

Want to hang out and scratch our butts?

Okay.

It’s time to get rid of should do and mean to and hang out with do-do.

You said do-do.

Good old do-do just gets it done. Every day do-do, make sure to do what she has to do. As Aristotle said and it’s a tweetable. “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act, but a habit,” Aristotle. Jade I hope this loving yet very necessary smackdown helps. Please let us know how it goes.

Now let’s hear from you. Do you have a trick for sticking to a schedule or getting things done? How do you get rid of should do and mean to, those lazy mother hampers and make sure you do do what you mean to do. I want you to share your best tips and tricks and please be specific. And remember the best stuff happens after the episode over at marieforleo.com. So please go ahead and leave a comment there.

Like this video? I did. If you did subscribe and share it with your friends. And of course, if you want even more great resources to have a business and a life that you love because you deserve it, get your butt over to marieforleo.com and sign up for email updates. They’re awesome. I always share some personal insights that I just don’t put in videos and you don’t want to miss it.

Stay on your game and keep going for your dreams. The world needs that special thing that only you have. Thank you so much for watching and I will see you next time on MarieTV. Hey, RHH Live is coming up, are you coming? Go to rhhlive.com for details.

Hello.

Hello.

[inaudible 00:06:32] lovely to clap you.

Clap me. Oh, yes. After the popo. Popo stop it, popo. Stupid but it’s midly entertaining.