Creating a Routine

MAKING A ROUTINE

If you want to create a routine that can move quickly and get a lot done in an hour or so, you could make a list of those actions you want finished in the period of time for which you are creating a routine. In my case my first routine is: Coffee, bottle, pets… Take your list and break each into steps: “water into microwave”– “bottle into water”– “feed bottle”;  “Start Coffee Pot”– “Put Cup back through grounds”– “drink cup of coffee”; let dogs out–check water–fill water–rinse dish….  Each tiny thing.  Be sure to include things you do occasionally during that same morning period, like laundry.

Prioritize the activities, for example, if I start either the coffee or the bottle too late, there will be a crying toddler and me without a cup of coffee.  If I time it all properly, I get a pleasant snuggle in a large recliner with a freshly diapered bottle drinking child while I drink my coffee.

KEY TO SUCCESS

A key to successfully breaking down the steps for the routine is to recognize when to stop.  I prepare the pot to start it, but I do not break that down into steps because they all must happen at once to get the pot going.  But once begun, the pot can sit until I get back to it.

A lot of activities work that way.  Rinsing a pet dish and filling it with food or water are part of the same step because breaking it down further doesn’t improve efficiency but instead complicates the routine unnecessarily.

FLOW CHART

My morning routine, written out, looks like a flow-chart.  There are routines that must be done, sub-routines that could be done and will need doing eventually, and even notes on which subroutines to start on days when I will be home all day and which are short enough to do on a day when I must be in town by 10:30.

Vocations take effort but they can be fun.  I live for those mornings when all goes properly and lots get done and I get to enjoy my coffee with the little tiger!

 

 

 

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