It’s rare, but sometimes half of the day will go by before I get around to planning.
But I still do it.
I still take the time, possibly in the late afternoon, to plan the day.
And when I do, I plan the whole day. All of it. Including the stuff that has always happened.
In effect, I am using my daily plan as both a plan for the rest of the day, and also as a “Done List” for the first half.
It can be surprisingly effective. By documenting what you’ve already accomplished (even if it wasn’t much), it gives you momentum.
That momentum will carry your forward into the plans you make for the afternoon and evening.
Other benefits of planning the past:
- Recording completed habits. If you exercised or flossed or wrote in your journal before you planned, you can still add them to your plan, and check them off, keeping a record of the daily habits you’re working on.
- Putting the remainder of the day in context. Maybe you didn’t get much done before planning. Or maybe you did. Either way, writing it down will help you see what still needs to be done.
- Built in journaling. Your plans are always going to be a form of journaling, but that’s even more true when you “plan the past” and record what you’ve already done.
- Dopamine hit. Planning the past means writing down what you already did. Once you’ve done that, you’ll go through and check all of those things off. That means you get a little dopamine hit for each task already accomplished. That will make you feel good.
- Eye opening self-revelation. You can start to see how different your life is when you plan vs when you don’t. If you’re anything like me, planning the past will renew your commitment to planning ahead of time, because you’ll just be more productive if you order your mind before tackling your day. And that’s clear on the days when you don’t.
You have no excuses
Haven’t planned your day yet? No worries, go do it now. Plan what has happened already and then plan the rest of the day.
Trust me, it’s still worth it.