How to Make the Most of the Next Day

How to make the most of the next day requires a commitment to yourself that you have made. This commitment starts with a vision of where and how you see yourself in the future. Taking the steps required to bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be.

There are things that I have added to my lifestyle to work towards my happiness and financial freedom. I have done research on people and things that speak on this in life and business. I have done my own due diligence in implementing them in my life to be more productive and focused.

Things You Can Do Today to Make for a Better Tomorrow

1. Write Down Your Goals

Written goals are more achievable than thought of goals, this is due to the ability to always see them when they’re written. Thoughts come and go, but when written down, they last a lifetime.

I keep things simple with goal-setting by only having short-term and long-term goals. Short-term goals are ones which can be achieved within 12 months. Long-term goals are ones which can be achieved only after 12 months.

There is method of setting goals, called setting SMART goals:

Simple – clear and easy to understand

Measurable – able to see how far you are, how far you have to go and when you’ve achieved it

Achievable – it is humanly possible to achieve

Realistic – relevant to you, within your skillset and capabilities

Timely – having an understandable timeline for achieving it.

I personally have made one ultimate long-term goal and have linked my passion and experience as the tools to reach that goal. Within them I have set my short-term goals for the year. You must engrave SMART in your mind for it to work effectively.

Otherwise, just dream big and work hard to make that dream a reality. Focus on your continuous improvement more than achieving that goal in a certain time frame. This way you enjoy the process more than result.

Short-Term Goal Examples (based on my method of goal-setting):

• Meditate every morning after setting an early alarm clock
• Take a cold shower for mental stimulation
• Pass the modules of the semester
• Lose X amount of fat this year
• Apply for X amount of jobs per day

Long-Term Goal Examples (based on my method of goal-setting):

• Buy your first car in five years
• Buy your first property in five years
• Pass university course in perfect timing
• Launch your first business in 2 years
• Get dream job in 10 years

Lifetime Goal Examples (based on my method of goal-setting):

• Become a millionaire/billionaire
• Become a global brand
• Retire at 50
• Travel the world (x amount of countries before you die)
• Achieve complete happiness with self

2. Make a To-Do List

Plan the next day by allocating a period of for each task. This allows you to estimate how long routine things will take for every day of the week. You’ll know where and how much time has been wasted and what requires more. You can use the following as a guide to plan your day:

• Before you sleep, get a pen and paper
• Use your goals as reference, write down what you need to do the next day to work towards them
• Write every task you’ll do from the moment you wake up and allocate the time it takes for each

You must have a way to show that you’ve completed a task. This way you trick your mind into showing your productivity throughout the day. When you’ve completed all important tasks, you have had a productive day and when you haven’t it will also show.

This builds the drive to complete the task rather than focusing on the end goal, which I think is the whole point in enjoying the process.

3. Meditate

Meditation is a technique for developing mental awareness and a state of calm. There are many ways for meditating and it takes a awhile to achieve mindfulness. You have to commit to it for long-term reasons for consistency, like for your mental awareness or happiness. A basic way to start with meditating:

1. Give yourself a time period to meditate (3-20 minutes).
2. Take a seat or position, ensuring that it is comfortable and you can hold it for the duration of the session.
3. Close your eyes.
4. Focus on your breathing (where there air is travelling in breathing in and out).
5. When your mind drifts, which it will, bring it back to focus on the breathing. This sparks your intentional brain and develops your awareness in being present.

You may get sleepy while meditating or you may be too distracted. You can overcome these by not judging yourself for being in that head space and rather bringing yourself to focus again on your breathing unforcefully.

The Benefits of Meditation

• Improves mental awareness
• Improves focus
• Reduces stress
• Helps in understanding pain
• Leads to happiness

I personally try meditate at least twice a week, because I am not good at making time for it. It is important to be consistent with it, just like your physical health, your mental health requires the consistency in developing it. 7 days a week once every quarter would be less effective than twice a week every week I believe.

4. Visualize

This is something that I learned to do back when I played rugby. When I’d envision how I’d play on match day, it never completely played out that way but when I did do certain things I said I’d do, it’s fulfilling.

So play out a mental image of your day and how you’d feel after doing things you planned to do, this will help you look forward to achieving the tasks you planned.

5. Prayer

This is dependent on your faith. I’ve always had faith in things turning out well for a long time now, not always as planned though. My favourite bible verse Hebrews 11:1: “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen, it gives us assurance about things we cannot see”.

The confidence and assurance of something without physical evidence is a powerful feeling to have. Otherwise, prayer leads to faith when you see what God does in your life and how He gets you through things, you thought you wouldn’t and not always as expected.

Take time to pray before going to bed when you want to, be grateful for the day, asking for the next day and seek Him as guidance, refuge and love. There’s peace of mind that comes with knowing or believing you’ve got His support in everything you plan to do.

The Day is Yours

The power of the day being yours for the taking should be your motivation, don’t allow anyone to take it away from you in any way. You were one out of trillions to make it out the womb and you’ve got x amount of years to make the most out of it.

We have all had to adjust and adapt to a new reality. We cannot dwell on it, we must find new opportunities and develop connections that support our dreams. Some of us are back at work or losing our jobs and some are finishing their studies online. We all have to do what we can to make the most of our days during these difficult times and I hope that you will too.