I have read a lot of self-help books. I follow Laura Vanderkam and enjoy her work. She is a mother of five and specializes in time management. I volunteered to read an early copy of her latest book, Tranquility by Tuesday: 9 Ways to Calm the Chaos and Make Time for What Matters. I enjoyed the book and recommend it as a worthwhile read. It was released for sale last week.
This book gives 9 “rules” to improve your life and how you use your time. The rules seem fairly simple and some of them we already know – such as set a bedtime and move by 3:00 p.m. These rules are great habits to create. The more challenging part, as with most self-help is to actually DO it and continue to do these things.
Here are the 9 rules from Tranquility by Tuesday:
1. Give yourself a bedtime. Go to sleep at about the same time every night unless you have a good reason not to.
2. Plan on Fridays. Think through your weeks, holistically, before you’re in them.
3. Move by 3 p.m. Do some form of physical activity for ten minutes in the first half of every day.
4. Three times a week is a habit. Things don’t have to happen daily to become part of your identity, and “often” can be more doable than “always.”
5. Create a back-up slot. Make a resilient schedule where your priorities still happen, even when life doesn’t go as planned.
6. One big adventure, one little adventure. Each week, do at least two things that will be worth remembering.
7. Take one night for you. Commit to an activity you love that is separate from work and household responsibilities.
8. Batch the little things. Keep most of your schedule clear from unimportant tasks.
9. Effortful before effortless. Do active leisure activities before passive ones whenever time opens up.
I liked that the book was an easy read with references to data and examples to demonstrate the benefits and struggles that real people encountered with the rules. Vanderkam recommends implementing one rule each week (or each month) to make the changes one at a time. This is a very practical book. I liked it MUCH more than Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman.
Rules 1 – 3 are foundational and emphasize the importance of prioritizing the necessary self-care to help live a healthier life. These are rules that often make time by helping you be more efficient.
The idea of 3 times a week is a habit is interesting to me. This book is about creating good habits that will help you in life. The “3 times a week is a habit” may or may not work for everyone. Based on Vanderkam’s research, 3 times a week is “good enough”. You don’t have to do something every day to make a difference in your life. Creating the consistency over the long term and the identity as _____________ (a reader, an exerciser, a writer, etc.) is what is most important.
For most of us, 3 times a week feels more doable and less overwhelming than every day. This rule encourages getting started and keeping the momentum going with more grace and leniency. Something is MUCH better than nothing. It is worth noting that some people later increased their average frequency to greater than three times per week once they got started.
One of my concerns is how to make the three times per week happen. If I have a daily designated time I do something then I can go on autopilot. I know it will happen – until it can’t or doesn’t. Three times per week may require more planning and decision making which could create obstacles for some of us but it also creates flexibility and resiliency too.
Another rule that I am a big fan of, is: create a back-up slot. I recently implemented this (before reading the book) by trying to keep my Fridays open. This is my backup slot. As many of you know, I love having “cushion” and this rule applies this concept to a specific time each week.
Here is a quote that talks about the correlation between time and money and having a designated “rain” date / back up time for important things in case they don’t happen when planned:
“The best way to describe this tranquility is that it is the equivalent of going through life with piles of cash in the bank. … Little things lose their power to bother you. No one can actually accumulate time in the same way that you can build up capital, but having space in a schedule is the psychological equivalent of sitting on a large emergency fund… Resilient schedules help us see time as abundant, not scarce.”
The trick is NOT to actually schedule things during this “back-up slot.” Then when the rarity happens and you have the perfect week where all important things got done, you can truly relax and enjoy this open time however you most want.
I am a maximizer and use my time efficiently which means I plan and schedule my time down to the minute. Things often do not go as planned which I should know, yet it still frustrates me. Having a resilient schedule that is set up for this is MUCH more important than having the perfect schedule. Having the backup slot increases the probability that important things happen – and with less stress.
A significant concept of the book is taking your perspective of time out to a week. Use a week as your default planning timeframe instead of day by day to fit more important things in and have more flexibility.
All of us want to enjoy our lives and use our time wisely. It is a limited resource. Tranquility by Tuesday has good strategies to help make time feel more abundant and enjoyable. I plan to implement these rules one at a time. I’ll let you know how it goes. Please let me know if you would like to join me and do this together.
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