4 Steps for making the most of time and energy (and space)

Most of us strive to be efficient and use as little time and energy as necessary to get the most accomplished. I never realized that I had a method for doing just that until we recently moved across the country and used one of those self pack moving cubes to transport our furniture and other household items.

When I used their estimator to decide how many cubes to reserve I came up with one. We were not moving a lot of things so that seemed reasonable. However, when the cube arrived and I got a real picture of what 6’ x 7’ x 8’ looked like I nearly panicked. There was no way all our stuff would fit into that small a space.

That’s when I went into action and learned that there was a method to my madness. Here are four steps I used to make the most out of time and energy and space.

1.Plan. Decide what’s important. I thought long and hard about what to transport and what to give away or sell at a garage sale. Sometimes we keep excess baggage hanging around when it would be better to recycle it. The thinking process is so important and cannot be over rated. Making a plan will keep you focused on the end result and may keep you from making costly mistakes.

2.Prioritize. Take care of the big things first. Whether you are dealing with large furniture items or important personal events, things will fit better together when you plan first for the big things. For our journey that meant figuring out how to place the California King bed, the 7 ft sofa, the 22 cu ft refrigerator and the health club sized treadmill so that we made the most of the space.

Tackle the rest in order of size or importance. Once the larger items (events) are in place, bring the rest of them to the table according to size, shape and/or importance. Pay attention to small bits of time (space) and use them wisely. When packing, we stuffed pillows and other soft things in places too small for boxes. That not only made good use of the space but also cushioned the larger items. The “pillows” in your life are often flexible and placing them between less flexible items or events adds some give in your schedule.

3.Be patient. As with any puzzle, you sometimes have to step back and look at the big picture. That takes time; don’t skimp here. You may even have to shake things up a bit to make the best use of resources. Think about it like putting pebbles in a jar. After you get the big ones in and the smaller ones have settled, it is time to pour in the really tiny ones, the sand. The more you jiggle the jar the more the sand fills in the empty spaces and the more space you use. When packing the cube we, obviously, were not going to shake the cube. We did, however, move the small things around quite a bit until we were using the most space possible. Flexibility is an important part of making the most of time and energy.

4.Have a plan B. It is always important to have at least one alternate plan. Life will often throw you curves and having a Plan B can take out some of the sting. We had originally planned to suspend the mattress (fairly light weight, very flexible foam and the exact size of the cube) from the ceiling of the cube and place other items below it for support. This would have made extremely good use of ordinarily unused space. The idea would have worked except for the fact that two of our planned support items were not stable enough when turned on their sides. Fortunately, I had a Plan B ready.

The time and energy we used was always in the direction of the desired outcome…no time wasted on lots of “what if’s” with little forethought. I find that having alternatives in place before starting projects keeps me focused and on the right track.

Whether packing for a move or juggling life events, having a proven method for efficient use of resources makes life easier. Give it a try. Plan, prioritize, be patient and have a plan b. It works for me.