Struggling to set work hours?

As someone who’s been working from home her entire career, I’ve developed a few tricks over the years.

And I have to say, my absolute favourite came from a massive struggle I had: setting working hours.

This was a HUGE problem for me.

My work became my life – it infested my leisure time. If I wasn’t working, I was sleeping.

I messaged clients all hours.

I outlined brands while I cooked dinner.

I listened to business podcasts while I worked out.

And eventually… Without even really realizing it happened, I had NO time for myself.

But whenever I set working hours for myself – I felt massively limited.

Why NOT work at 1am, if I was awake?

I couldn’t get on the “5am entrepreneur” schedule either – there was NO way I could get up consistently.

Beyond not being wired that way, honestly, I just straight up didn’t want to.

So… Therein lied the problem.

I didn’t want to set working hours, so my work was… all of my hours.

I decided that was fine – but it wasn’t sustainable. And after a while, I wasn’t really enjoying what I was doing anymore.

And that’s when I flipped the switch.

Mid burnout, I realized, I didn’t have to set working hours – I could set LEISURE hours.

Time in my schedule for ME.

At first, I set them as specific times – but I found that didn’t quite work for me either, because I honestly don’t like adhering to schedules.

So instead, I set a number of hours per day that were intentionally to be spent on ME.

Not multi tasking with work, not reading messages while I watched a movie – no work, just NON-INCOME GENERATING activities.

For me.

And oh boy, did it work. 😅

I didn’t feel limited, because I could take those hours whenever I wanted to. I didn’t feel tied to a schedule because… it wasn’t scheduled. And I didn’t feel like I was still on the clock, because I truly, honestly *wasn’t*. For the first time in AGES.

So if you’re struggling to set working hours, and your work is leaking into everything you do, try flipping the script.

Set time for leisure instead. And then spend time on you. ❤️

NOT working.