Time management strategies play a vital role in achieving personal and financial success. Many of us constantly search for the answer to the question, “How do I become successful?” and I firmly believe that the answer lies in effective time management. In the past, I may not have given this concept much thought, considering it a simplistic response. However, over time, I’ve come to realize that time management is the key. 

We often fantasize about meeting a successful person we admire and asking them about their path to success, only to receive the clichéd response: “Hard work.” While hard work is undoubtedly important, the missing piece of the puzzle lies in understanding why we may be toiling away without seeing the desired outcomes. This is where the significance of employing these 9-time management strategies comes into play, strategies that anyone can utilize to achieve success. 

Acknowledging the need for hard work is a given. The real challenge lies in understanding why our efforts might feel fruitless and discovering how we can enhance our daily productivity. Implementing these 9-time management strategies will empower individuals to achieve success and gain a sense of fulfillment from what they do. 

Personally, I despise the feeling of reaching the end of a day only to realize that I haven’t accomplished anything substantial. It’s disheartening when our days control us instead of the other way around. 

One pivotal aspect of effective time management strategies is understanding your driving force. If you’re uncertain about what truly motivates you, that’s perfectly fine. Dedicate 15-20 minutes each day to sit quietly and reflect on your deepest desires. It may take a couple of days or even weeks, but eventually, the answers will come to you. 

Once you have identified your goal, it’s crucial to follow through and ensure that you maximize your time to achieve what you truly desire. This is where honing your time management skills becomes invaluable. By consciously making time for what’s truly important, you’ll find that your days no longer pass you by, and you will accomplish more of the things that matter to you. 

How do you change that? 

 To effectively implement these 9-time management strategies for success, it is crucial to develop a plan and maintain consistency in forming new habits. Focus on each day without getting overwhelmed by the progress you’ve made or how far you still have to go. Here are the strategies: 

1.  Decide on what you want: 

Figuring out your life’s purpose and aspirations can be a complex journey, similar to the days  spent in a guidance counselor’s office contemplating your college major. There are three ways to assist yourself in this process: 

• Identify your passions: Think about the activities that ignite your enthusiasm and bring you immense joy. It could be a burning desire to be a firefighter or any other pursuit that makes time fly by. Effective time management involves engaging in activities aligned with your passions, and I sincerely hope that everyone reading this can experience that sense of fulfillment. 
• Recognize your natural talents: Consider the tasks that you effortlessly excel at. It could be your innate ability to shine in front of a camera, which might lead you towards a career in broadcasting. If you fall into this category, it’s essential to set specific goals. Merely going through the motions day after day won’t be fulfilling in the long run. Embrace daily challenges that allow you to leverage and enhance your valuable skills. 
• Explore your interests and desire to learn: If you haven’t discovered a burning passion or identified natural talents, focus on acquiring new skills and becoming an asset in your field. While you may not initially feel passionate about the chosen skill, the desire to learn is present. For example, working in sales which I did for many years, might not initially seem appealing, but by immersing yourself in the role and continuously developing your expertise, you can find great fulfillment in assisting clients/customers and positively impacting their lives. Maintain a goal-oriented approach in this category by consistently expanding your skillset and setting new milestones. 

By implementing these strategies, you can align your time and efforts with your goals, passions, talents, or interests, leading to greater fulfillment and success in the long run. Remember to stay committed, consistent, and open to continuous growth.

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Always get back up

We all react differently to bad news, it takes some of us more time to bounce back than others. Maybe the fact that you are reading this post means that you are looking for answers. Personally, this year has led me to ask why before and after every major decision I make. The reason I do this now is to evaluate if my feelings are the same before and after those big decisions. From there, If I don’t feel good about a decision, I have no reservations about starting over.  This is a great tool we can all use to break us out of our routine or whatever is keeping us from turning back or starting over.

Doing the right things like saving in your 401k, Roth IRA, and HSA accounts are all great but how many of us are saving and investing with no real reason except that it’s what we are supposed to be doing. We put our lives on auto pilot without question and expect all the answers to be waiting for us when we retire.

If you haven’t thought about short and long-term goals in a while, make time to remind yourself. Ideally every day if you can.  

Ask questions of yourself

 Once in a while it’s good to ask ourselves, Why?
-Why am I waiting till I’m 65 to retire?
– Am I putting off things that make me happy?
– Why am staying at this job if I don’t enjoy it?

We struggle to find the sweet spot in life. Do we stay in that well-paying job we hate, or do we make the switch to that lower-paying job we love? Most people will usually choose the former. Unfortunately for some of us when we realize we put off being happy in the long run for money, it is too late to turn back the clock.

Happiness for many of us always seems to be 20,30,40 years down the line. The end of the rainbow (retirement) seems to be where many of us say “When I get there I’ll finally be happy”. I don’t think the long-term goal of retirement is bad, but happiness should be found along the way; in life’s small moments (i.e., short-term goals).

My life changed for the better when I finally stopped for a second to take a breath and figure out the balance of where and what I got Happiness out of every day. 

Stop saying tomorrow

When it comes to  self-evaluation, it’s always easy to say I’ll sit down and do it tomorrow. We always find other things to do to pass the time and before we know it, the day passes us by and we’re left saying the same thing we said the day before “I’ll do it tomorrow”.

That cycle will continue until you make a change, don’t wait for another traumatic outside event to remind you of how short and fragile life is.

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What is your skill?

Creativity can be a great thing during times like these. Do you draw for yourself, do you write poetry in your down time? Maybe you love to read. Why not monetize those drawings by seeing if there is an interest in your work, why not find a freelance drawing gig, post your poetry online, or do online book reviews.

We often don’t give ourselves enough credit for the things we are good at. If the ability to make money by posting your poetry online- or anything you love for that matter- doesn’t exit make it your goal to be the first. When you are actively involved in something you love you will put your all into it. I love seeing and reading about new creative ideas. I recently heard about virtual piano lessons, who would’ve thought that would ever be a thing.

The first thing we do when we are looking for job ideas is Google “How to make extra money on the side”. We spend so much time looking to what other people have done, which has its benefits- cutting down on the learning curve being the biggest. Ultimately when we do that, we’re limiting our own creativity.

Have confidence in your skill

Starting something new is very intimidating and frustrating. What gets most of us started is ultimately the same thing that gets most of us to quit- our pride. We don’t have the pride to say we never gave it a shot, but by also not wanting to hurt our pride, the moment it appears we might fail, we throw in the towel before it happens just to say we quit vs we failed.

Don’t take yourself seriously, take your work seriously. Any time you start over thinking and the pressure gets to you, remind yourself to let your work speak for itself, be confident in the skill you develop; your success will come from the quality of your work, which will create word of mouth.

Work through the fear

Are you the fantastic singer who only sings in the shower? the fantastic cook who only cooks for friends and family? the great actor who has stage fright? Self-improvement is a daily process if not a lifetime process. You can improve as you go, don’t wait until you have it figured out before you start. Improve yourself as you take chances. This is the best way to learn about yourself.

Dig deep to find out why these feelings and fears resurface when you’re so close to breaking through. Remember, There’s nothing you can’t overcome.

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Something I used to do often and was never embarrassed about was to get advice from the top salespeople in my department. What I noticed was my feelings often changed once I got to know each individual. I still wanted to be a top producer myself, but I no longer viewed them as competition. When you compete you want to do well and a part of you hopes that the other person you hope to beat doesn’t do as well.

Don’t compete against someone’s success Compete for your own

If you knew someone was working as hard as they did to support a sick family member, to pay off a massive debt, or to send their kids to college. How could you root against them? Once you find those things out, if you are like most people there will be an instant shift, you will start cheering for this person instead of going against them anytime you see them do well.

Competition is great because it’s a reminder that there is no ceiling if you work hard enough.

It’s good to look at how hard others are working because it reminds you that when you think you’ve reached your limit, you haven’t. You think you’ve done a good job by working a 10-hour day, only to see that someone worked 14 hours. That pushes you.

Healthy competition makes you better, unhealthy competition makes you jealous. Be very mindful of your thoughts. The line between the two is almost unrecognizable.

Ask yourself, do you want to better yourself or do you want to be better than someone else?

I’ve often been in sales environments where the company was having its best month ever; which means everyone from the top salesperson down to the bottom of the salesforce had their best month ever. No matter how great their months were relative to what they had accomplished before, there was always jealously and envy aimed at the top salesperson because of how much more money he or she was making compared to them.

Don’t compete set goals

The most important thing you have to do in your work or personal environment is define what success means to you. Once you do that, you can create a barrier around what makes you happy, which is hitting your goal. When you look over at the person next to you who was more successful or had the better month, you’ll think “so, what?”. Their goal wasn’t my goal.

A goal gives you a point of satisfaction

The downfall of many is that they don’t set a goal for themselves, so there is never any point of satisfaction. The beautiful thing about setting a goal is even if you fall short, you might be disappointed, but the feeling will differ from jealously felt for others. You will be motivated to improve yourself. To try again.

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How many of you would agree that wasting time is hard work?

Like you, I’ve had those lazy days of laying on the couch and doing nothing. Midway through the day I always find myself having a hard time looking for something to watch on TV. It doesn’t matter that I have the best prescription for a lazy day, My phone in one hand streaming through my social media feeds and the remote in the other.

Hulu, Prime video, Netflix, each with new and original content I could be watching. It doesn’t matter how good the shows are, I’ll never know. Somehow I always endlessly scroll through all the options and ultimately fall back to old reruns.

What is the solution?

Turn your biggest indulgence into a resource. We all have them. If you enjoy watching TV, turn to informational shows or documentaries on things you enjoy, if you typically spend hours on end listening to music take one of those hours and start listening to podcasts, if you spend hours on end on social media find out if there is any value to the content you are posting and build off of that.

Our Cell phones in this day and age are our biggest tools, our biggest resources. I am a believer in using the time we spend on our phones to our advantage rather than an additional time-wasting tool. If you like to write, write on your phone, if you like to read your phone gives you the ability to carry your books with you everywhere you go, if you don’t like to read listen to the latest podcast.

Organize your to do list

There is a difference between taking a much needed mental health day after days, weeks or months of working hard; and procrastinating when you have a full to do list. Listen to your mind and body, you will quickly know the difference between the two.

Before you beat yourself up for not getting anything done once you realize half the day is over and you’re still sitting on the couch. Take a second to organize your to do list in order of importance. Take care of the most important thing on your list and see how you feel. If you have some time and want to keep going, tackle the next one and then the next one.

Don’t try to do it all at once

A lot of times we are paralyzed by how many things we need to get done and the immediate defensive reaction is to leave it all for the next day so we don’t have to make any decisions. This wouldn’t be too bad except tomorrow usually looks a lot like yesterday.

There is a certain satisfaction that comes from accomplishing a task that is on our to do list. The latest thing I did and was putting off for months was doing some spring cleaning around my home, it felt great getting rid of old things and clearing up all the clutter. I was left with this great feeling of accomplishment but was also left asking myself “what took you so long?”.

On a small scale it doesn’t seem too bad because of the level importance of spring cleaning but if we think about how many other things we’re putting off in the same way on a bigger scale things start to look more serious.

Maybe you had plans of going back to school, plans of starting your own business, or maybe you’ve been thinking about fixing a relationship with someone close to you.

Whatever it may be, we have to stop saying or thinking I’ll take care of it tomorrow. Odds are we won’t.

The first step is in the importance of the task to you. If its important make it a priority. If its not, be honest with yourself and stopping saying you’re going to do it.

Creating a new habit is hard, but it is always worth it in the end.

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You tend to self-sabotage because it’s not the idea of actually being successful that terrifies you, it’s the steps you have to take to get there. The success associated with being the best at what you do invites compliments but also opens the door to negativity which is terrifying. Fear has a way of keeping us stuck in place.

This Fear of standing out cripples a lot of us. All we can think of and imagine are the bad things that will happen, all the bad things people will say. Minimize those negative thoughts by thinking of the good things that can happen by you contributing your best to the world. I promise that list will always be longer.

This fear of standing out comes from three places.

1. Fear of what other people think

Have you ever been in a work environment or even out with friends, where you were listening to someone’s  opinion on a subject and to your core you disagreed wholeheartedly with them but you pretended not to, just to avoid any negative backlash?

2. Fear of being left behind

This brings most of us to our high school and middle school days. Actually enjoying going to class, doing Homework and getting straight A’s, was not the popular thing to do in school. So, what did we all do naturally, we held ourselves back to fit in with our friends.

3. The pressure of expectations

Many can relate to this: You are in a work setting, you start performing really well, which catches the attention of your supervisor.

All of a sudden, he knows who you are, says good morning more often than before walking down the hall, even greets you by name, it’s a great feeling.

Shortly after, those compliments you receive for doing well start to feel like a constant pressure to produce. Those walks down the hallway become constant reminders of how well you did or didn’t perform the day before.

Eventually the pressure of those expectations being put on you over and over again causes you to do less than you know you are capable of; you do this to avoid that constant spotlight. Before you know it, those hellos walking down the hallway slowly diminish, and eventually you blend back into the fold with the rest of your coworkers. Back to where you started.

Pressure only exits when you are doing something for others and not yourself. Find what you are passionate about and you will naturally put your all into it and want to be the best at it.

Always do you best

Fight those instincts that make you want to quit with everything you have. Remember that ultimately that’s what success is, a series of good habits repeated day in and day out.

There are some things that we should all do for ourselves. Making an attempt at something we want but are scared of should be one of those things. There is always something amazing on the other side of fear.

Remember The happiness or success you’re looking for might not come from accomplishing your goal, but you will certainly get it from the pursuit of your goals. You might even realize that you are already happy once you get there.

The post The Fear of Standing Out; Don’t Let It Hold You Back appeared first on Financial Browsing.

He then introduced himself and told us about the purpose of his visit and his speech. In our case it was because we were due to graduate soon.

The guest speaker asked for two volunteers to demonstrate the point he was about to make. He then asked my classmates two questions.

1. What do you want to do after you graduate?
   2. How much do you want to make?

Both of them went on to describe their dream job and the resulting income. I remember the income figures were high because they got my classmates murmuring in the background.

Always expect that things will not be easy

Once they were done talking, our guest speaker quickly knocked those numbers down stating that neither one would likely achieve those income goals.

He went on to give numbers on the average students earnings after graduation.

He Described through his charts that the average graduate usually starts with a salary anywhere from 35k-50k and gets two pay raises in his working career.

The first comes: After a bit more experience on the resume a few years after graduating. The effect is a chance at a promotion, multiple job opportunities, the sky is the limit at this point.

The second comes: Years more down the line after 20 plus years of experience in the workforce, resulting in a final career pay increase.

He was detailing a 40-50-year work history. As I was sitting listening and looking up at his charts, all I kept thinking was, who does this guy think he his?

The harshness of what he was saying struck a nerve; here we were seniors in college with all these hopes and dreams. Meanwhile someone we didn’t know was coming in to tell us at best only one of us in the room would achieve the level of success we were all hoping for.

Always be optimistic about the future

I came out the class thinking two things:

1. I don’t want my life charted out and read out to me by a stranger.
2. This speaker’s speech was dated. I’m not even sure I wouldn’t have said the same thing if I was around in 1970.

We’ve always lived in times where opportunities were endless. The opportunities change over the years but they are still there. Your work does not have to stop after you get home from your 9-5. Now with the internet and your phone the only limit is your imagination.

That’s the speech I would’ve wanted him to give to the class.

Years later I’ve often wondered how many of my classmates let the speakers speech demotivate them and how many got even more fired up like I did, determined to never prove him right.

Always keep a positive attitude

Inspiration and motivation are one of the biggest keys to success in anything we do in life, there’s a reason we look for it in outside sources when we can’t find it in ourselves.

Earning a high income is not the definition of success and not all us sitting in that room had that goal. However, all of us had ambition. We can be ambitious at any stage in our lives but we are especially so as young students ready to conquer the world.

Revisit those goals

Without a goal we don’t know where we’re going. Don’t wait till your next job interview or your next date to hear the question.” Where do you see yourself in 5 years?”

There’s a great confidence in setting financial goals, professional goals or personal goals and surpassing them.

It is so easy to let life pass us by. For example most of us will get a job, then work in the same place for 30 years because it’s the safe thing to do and it pays the bills. All the while falling into this mundane routine of going to work, going home, watching TV, falling asleep and doing all over again the next day

Don’t let your life be part of someone’s Chart

All of us reach a point where we think we haven’t accomplished what we thought we would at our current age.  There’s always someone ready to tell you what the odds against succeeding are. Ultimately the important thing is to reconnect to your most important goals in life and realize that it’s not too late. Start every day with a purpose and it will all fall in place.

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You pretend to enjoy spending 15 bucks for a drink at a nightclub when you know the whole bottle costs 12, pretend to enjoy expensive brunches on the weekends, pretend to enjoy going to lounges and spending $100s all the while you cringe at the thought of every dollar leaving your pocket.

Why do you do this?

To keep up, or rather to not get left behind. Your friends call you every weekend to go out, and you get away with saying NO now and then but eventually you realize too many NO’s will cause that phone to stop ringing and the thought of that is terrifying.

There it goes The loss of the millionaire mindset.

This is how it starts for many of us, losing the mindset that has the potential to turn us into millionaires. Save, budget, invest, and account for every dollar.

The biggest way to help ourselves at any stage of life is to control our spending. For some of us, It truly is a struggle because of debt and bills that seem to be insurmountable, but for this small group it is a choice made from fear of being left behind.

Eventually that inner voice that makes you question yourself every time you overspend will get smaller and eventually disappear; that lifestyle you never enjoyed will become the new normal.

This is how many of us live our lives. I’m writing this amid all the social distancing craze because of the Covid-19 virus and find myself thinking of how everyone is being impacted differently. Most of us will come out of it unchanged, but hopefully a few will come out of it a little different.

This will not apply to everyone and might not make sense to others. If this resonates with you, please take notice and make a change.

Are you itching to go back to the way things were or looking forward to a change?

We’ve all seen the endless posts on social media about those who are eager to get back out there and resume life as they knew it with their friends; back to the expensive weekend brunches and the expensive lifestyle. Nothing wrong with that if it’s coming from a place of enjoyment.

Let’s talk about those of you who are thankful for this break from all your social pressures. Take this time to assess if your current relationships are matching up with your current goals, short or long.

Fear of losing friendships and relationships should never be an excuse for compromising the vision of what you want your life to be.

Social distancing the reset button you needed

Don’t look back on the successes you didn’t achieve financially because of time spent not budgeting saving and investing. Your goal might not be to become a millionaire, but I’m sure it falls somewhere in between.

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Happiness is tied to your level of stress, your level of stress among other things is more commonly tied to how well you are able to take care of your daily expenses. Start by defining what happiness means to you. We get so caught up in looking at neighbors and friends looking at what they have and then start playing the comparison game.

Everyone’s goals in life are different which is great. That’s the way it should be; We all have a different drive and strive to achieve different levels of success; that not only allows the world to progress, it leads to new innovations and discoveries every day, but there is no shame in not aspiring to be the next Elon Musk.

It is however important to define what you want out of life. A lot of times we don’t give ourselves the chance to find out if we like something if we ever try at all sometimes is a big surprise.

Lacking the patience to let things develop would be a great way to describe our everyday lives. This causes us to miss a lot of opportunities.

When you say you hate your job did you really give yourself a chance to actually enjoy it?

I am all for leaving a job that doesn’t make you happy if you truly are in a miserable situation. I have been in sales my whole life and went into it right out of High School, having no experience was very scary and intimidating. I thought about quitting every time I couldn’t close a client; with time I got better and more confident. Safe to say I’m glad I didn’t quit.

The world of sales is like a revolving door I’ve seen people start the position and quit within a day of starting the job. Always give yourself a chance to become good at something before you quit; there’s a great feeling of joy and satisfaction that comes from being good at what you do. It gives you that desire and energy to wake up every day.

That being said, don’t make the mistake of staying at job you hate for the money. If you don’t get that feeling of satisfaction we talked about, it might be time to look at different options. The world is full of examples where we see that making a lot of money doesn’t guarantee happiness. Choose Happiness first and the rest will follow.

In this scenario: Who is happier?

The person at a job they enjoy making $45k a year with a sound base of budgeting and investing knowledge or the person making $100k a year who dreads walking into his job in the morning, saves very little of his money and has no clue how to budget and save.

Learn to budget

I believe learning to budget is a lot like most things in our lives; we start off strong, then eventually something pulls us off course. In the case of budgeting, its usually social pressures to keep up with friends and family.

My recommendation to anyone would be to add up all your living expenses for the year and calculate how much you expect to spend every year on the essentials (Mortgage, car note, car insurance).

Once you’ve done that, break that total amount into a monthly cost. If your monthly income is higher than your monthly spending you’re off to a good start; if it’s not then you need to start looking at your budget and start cutting down on non-essential spending.

Spend According to your goals

Once you have your budget locked down, everything becomes easier and you enjoy knowing that you have that part under control. Start putting away those 6 months of emergency funds to always be ready for those unexpected expenses.

Spend your time and your money towards what happiness means to you; If your goal is to be comfortable while enjoying your weekends with family plan those weekend trips and nights out.

On the other hand, if you are 25 and your goal is to retire by 45 then your goal might be to save your first $25k to invest in your first property.

It’s not how much you make its how much you keep and invest

Always keep that in mind when you think you need an additional source of income. I thought that for the longest time before I started paying attention to how much I was spending. These days there are so many ways to produce additional streams of income. I recommend anyone consider it, but remember without a budget that’s just more money you’re not keeping track of.

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Let’s talk about New year resolutions, some of us love to set them, some of us don’t; but ultimately all of us look at the new year as a fresh start. We are either leaving negativity behind us, continuing on with something great or more commonly looking at the new year as a chance to do so something better or become more.

As the new year approaches, this is the perfect time to talk about the New year resolutions that you and I and a lot of people failed to meet from the prior year and the new ones sure to be set for 2020. Let’s take a second to analyze why we repeatedly fail to fulfill those commitments to ourselves. First, let’s look at the goals that make the top of the list every year.

The top resolution goals every year never change, and I’m sure you can guess which ones they are.

1. Diet or eat Healthy

2. Exercise more/ lose weight

3. Being more successful financially

It is important to mention that you should be commended for setting a resolution goal every year. Individual resolutions are all different, but the aim stands to be the same for all us. We want to be better individuals, which will hopefully compound into more individual successes in different areas of our lives.

Only about 8 percent of people succeed at reaching their resolution goals.

Why is it so hard to accomplish goals?

The two main reasons we fail to reach individual goals are:
1. The expectation that we should do everything perfectly, the moment we don’t we use that as an excuse to quit.
2. We simply have too much going on. Too many goals.

The 5/25 Rule

Warren Buffett made this rule famous a few years ago, and I’ve used it since the first time I heard it. Essentially the rule states; if you were to make a list of the top 25 goals you have, eliminate the bottom 20 and focus only on the top 5. The reason for this is that many of us without realizing focus too much on things we kind of want rather than the things we really want, and that leads us to not accomplishing much. So, take a second to make your list and anything that doesn’t make the top 5 should be eliminated.

We all know the secret to being successful, we just use it at our convenience.

Think on that a little more. What was the last thing you wanted really badly, and what did you do to get it?

The easiest time that I’ve ever had losing weight was when one of my buddies and I had a month-long bet that at the end of the month, one of us would lose more weight than the other.

For 30 days nothing else mattered to me, my competitive nature and the free lunch at the end of it was enough to drive me to get up at 5am every day for a month to workout, follow a strict diet, all without questioning why I was putting myself through it. I already knew the answer.

How many of you have a similar story? Whether it be a bet, defiantly proving our parents or our friends wrong about a relationship, or a career choice. We all have those moments where we’ve exhibited the same intense will, focus and motivation to succeed.

We all have it in us, we just use those skills very sparingly. More commonly when we are looking to prove someone wrong.

So what does it take?

1. Goal setting
2. Keeping a vision of your goal in front of you everyday
3. Consistency
In your moments of difficulty, you will ask why? The answer comes from always knowing the reason you set your goals and keeping that reason in front of you every day. Always remember to focus on your main goals vs too many things at a time. You’ve already proven you have what it takes to do it in the short term, accomplishing your long-term goals are no different.

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This isn’t good or bad, it’s all relative. There are social media influencers out there who most likely exceed that number and pull in six figures annually.

What I do believe is if we are going to spend close to half of our working hours on our phones, that time should be put towards our interests or at least discovering what those interests are.

I have a great interest in personal finance and achieving retirement goals. Spending those 3-4 hours following people that have accomplished what I’m striving for would be in my best interest.

Our days are made up of small successes and the act of managing your phone time is a good place to start.

What would you spend your time doing if you had to choose?

Some of us are luckier than others because we’ve already gone through this self-discovery stage, for most that is not the case. Dig deeper into passions that may have gone by the wayside over the years.

If you were interested in starting a blog, you could find a step-by-step guide and have a website up in a matter of hours; if you were interested in photography, you have the tools available to create, edit and share your content all in one.

The opportunities are endless. As we enter a new decade, think back to early 2010 when smartphones and social media as we know them to be today were in their infancy.

Stay consistent enough to create a new habit

Like I mentioned at the beginning, this is not an argument for pulling ourselves off our phones. I doubt that’s realistic; at least for me, I knew it was a losing battle.

It’s all about time management and in today’s society our phones are a big part of that.

If you were forming a budget, you would first look at what you’re spending the most money on, and start looking at ways to reduce that cost or put the money being spent to better use.

When it comes to healthy eating habits, it’s always better to think lifestyle change than short term diet. This is no different. The overall goal is building a long-term habit, not a temporary fix.

Invest in yourself
Investing time in yourself is always the first place to start when it comes to achieving any long term success. Half of your time is already committed to certain tasks before you even wake up.

The easiest way to set a clear direction for how you spend your time is to set a goal. It could be short term or long, financial or personal.

Without a goal we end up wasting time without knowing why, or even giving it a second thought.

Odds are you are not the busiest person in the world, but I can bet we’ve all felt like we were at some point in our lives.

Two things we all have is downtime and a phone. The first thing we turn to when we have downtime is our phones.

Turn that hour of lunchtime or that 15-minute break into something productive.

Manage your time
Your days might be so busy that you’re always on the move, but always remember to make time for what’s important.

Time is your most important resource, be creative, use it well and all your successes will surely follow.

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