Set Your Day Up for Success
I use to wake up every day and just go with it. No plan, no agenda, sit down at my desk and whatever popped into my mind that I want to work on, I would.
For a couple of months, I had no plan at all. I wouldn't know where to start, what I should be working on, it was very frustrating.
Before, when I was working full-time, I had a boss that would tell me what I should be working on. When I quit to become a Realtor, my schedule was always filled with showing homes, or marketing homes.
When I quit to focus on being a full-time investor, it was about getting my real estate investing business to run efficient. However, when that business was running on autopilot, and I started focusing on educating people on how to start investing in real estate, I wouldn't know what to work on.
I’d get stuck scrolling through Facebook, because for the first time ever, I didn't have someone or something telling me what to do, it was on me to tell myself what I should be working on.
Starting a new business isn't easy, and when you do, your flooded with ideas, and many times you don't have a way to write them down, let alone remember to look into your idea even more.
Luckily, to solve this problem, I found a great app that helped organize my thoughts, organize what I should be working on, organize when I should be working...
Basically, any idea, any to do item, anything, I'm writing it down in Evernote, which is an app that you can download on your phone, tablet, desktop, and they sync across all devices, so no matter which device you're adding a note too, it syncs to all of them.
If it’s a to do item, or an idea that I want to look into more, instead of just writing it down and forgetting about it, the app lets you set reminders. Even better though, it emails you the day that you set the reminder for, which is great, because if you're like me, and you need something physical to make notes on, you can then easily print out your list of reminders that day, which is what I do every morning, and now you have your to do list for that day.
This is great because now you have an actual list of things you need to accomplish that day. No jumping to something else, no sitting there wondering what you should work on, because you've already your daily tasks list ahead of time.
From there, it's figuring out which reminders you want to tackle first. So, what I'll do is go down the list and put a number next to them on which ones are the most important and need to get done.
Sometimes you won't get to them all so file them in a to do folder and make it your number 1 the following day. This folder should always be empty. Sometimes I get couple days behind where I have a reminder, I never got to from a couple days before.
My advice, go back into Evernote and change the reminder date so that it shows up in a future days to do list so that when that day comes, you'll print out your reminder to do list, and that item is on there again, reminding you to get it done.
When I'm finished a reminder, I cross them off on my to do list I printed out, and delete it Evernote, this way I know it's done and don't go back to it in the future, or think about it, allowing me to focus on the next item I need to get done.
This is the best part, completing a task, and that feeling of crossing it off, and the feeling of crossing off all my reminders for the day, and throwing away my daily to do list, is the best feeling.
One warning using this app, you’re going to become addicted, and if you're like me, any little thing you're going to add to Evernote, which means, you'll always have reminders coming up, making your daily to do list bigger and bigger. The key then when this happens it to prioritize.
Make sure you are doing the most important items to help grow your business, and items that aren't that important, focus on last.
