📅 Why You Need An Ideal Week (And Mistakes To Avoid)

Hey ,

Quick note before we begin - we’ll be hosting our usual quarterly workshop on 28th June at 1400 BST to help you reflect on the first half of the year and set yourself up for success moving into July and beyond. We always get great feedback from these quarterly events, people find them super useful, so if you’re keen on joining the Summer Reset Workshop on 28th June, you can sign up here.

Anyway, I wanted to use today’s email to talk about the relative value of calendars - I know, I know but stick with me on this 😅

Last week I was switching up my schedule and moving things around in my calendar to better suit my new routine. There’s something so satisfying about moving calendar blocks around like lego - it just feels so productive and you end up with this beautiful looking calendar.

Now, of course just moving events around your calendar isn’t really productive at all. In fact, it can create that false sense of productivity which is particularly dangerous if you’re actually trying to get stuff done.

But last week I wasn’t just moving things around - I was actually doing one of the single most important activities for my personal productivity and that’s creating (or updating) my Ideal Week Calendar.

This is an incredibly simple, yet effective technique that I always revert back to whenever I feel like my routine is spiralling - just like it has done over the past few weeks when team members and friends have been visiting Hong Kong. Don’t get me wrong, those weeks have been great but I felt like I needed to get back on track with a stable work/life routine and the Ideal Week is my way of doing that.

And this isn’t some sort of complicated productivity hack - you just need to create a brand new calendar (I do mine in Google Calendar btw, but you can use any platform or just pen and paper), and do the following:

1️⃣ Block out all the stuff you have to do.

2️⃣ Block out time for the things you want to do.

Obviously, the goal isn’t to stick to your ideal week 100% of the time. Sometimes I don’t go to bed at 10pm because I’m still writing emails (like this one 😉), or dinner runs over because Izzy and I are catching up with friends. Life gets in the way - and that’s okay.

The idea is that it gives you the opportunity to sit down and think: What am I currently doing with my time? And what does my ideal, balanced week actually look like in terms of work, relationships, health, hobbies, rest, and growth?

And I’ve found that if I’m following the plan about 80% of the time, I tend to feel much happier, fulfilled, and in control of everything going on in my life.

But despite its simplicity, I often see people making some common mistakes with this technique too so here’s just a few to be aware of 👇

📆 Mistake 1: Overscheduling

Let me start this first one by saying that the whole point of your Ideal Week is to make your life easier and more intentional. And by adding structure to your days, the goal is to create more freedom and time for spontaneity, because you’ve already taken care of your non-negotiables and the things you want to prioritise.

But none of this is true if you make the mistake of planning every waking second of your day.

I see a lot of my LifeOS members cram their calendars with back-to-back tasks because it feels productive. But when you do this, what actually happens is you just feel exhausted looking at your schedule.

With no room to breathe, no space to think, and no margins left for the unexpected, you’re left feeling unnecessarily stressed and overwhelmed, so you always want to schedule in breaks and buffer time, which leads me on to the second mistake...

🚦Mistake 2: Missing Transitions

A lot of people often forget to account for the time it takes to switch between tasks - and trust me, I do this a lot 😬

I regularly schedule a Zoom call straight after my gym session, forgetting that there’s always a 10-15 minute buffer window that I need to get back home, have a shower because I’m super sweaty, change my T-shirt, and go to the toilet...you get the idea.

And because I tend not to schedule this buffer time into my Ideal Week, it always ends up biting me because I end up running late with my team just waiting while I’m scrambling to join the call.

🆗 Mistake 3: Saying “Yes” to Everything

A lot of people ask me, “Ali, should I always say yes to things that clash with my Ideal Week?”

And my answer is that you basically have two options here, which are based around the philosophy I really like of, “Hell yeah or no.”

If something is a “hell yeah” then you can go ahead and adapt your schedule. So in my case, I know that if a friend is in town and they won’t be in Hong Kong for a long time, I’ll say no to the gym and break my ideal routine because it’s totally worth it.

The whole point of your Ideal Week Calendar isn’t to chain yourself to a super strict schedule. Instead, it’s a benchmark for the ideal you’re aiming to hit at least 80% of the time, so if it needs to change then that’s totally okay.

😡 Mistake 4: Frustration when things “don’t go to plan”

You have to realise that life will never go exactly as planned - and that’s okay.

There’s the classic idea that’s like, “No battle was ever won according to plan, but no battle was ever won without one.” Or Mike Tyson’s version: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”

And sometimes, life will punch you in the face. But that doesn’t mean planning is pointless, because making a plan is an act of intention. It helps clarify your values and show you what matters most.

So your Ideal Week Calendar is just a way of saying, “This is what my balance week would look like if life didn’t get in away all the time.”

♻️ Mistake 5: Not Updating Your Ideal Week

I tend to update my Ideal Week every few months - especially after big life changes, like when I got married and my wife and I moved to Hong Kong. Otherwise, you risk feeling chained to a plan that no longer works for you.

It’s also really important to treat your Ideal Week like a mini experiment.

For example, I recently tried adding a block in the morning to go on a run and then chill in the sauna afterwards to see how this made me feel. (Spoiler alert, running definitely isn’t easy, but I guess the sauna was pretty cool and supposedly good for my body 🔥).

Just keep adjusting your calendar and running these mini-experiments, because eventually, you’ll find a routine that works for you (and for each new stage of life).

Remember, your Ideal Week isn’t about creating your “perfect” week. And being productive isn’t about just doing more.

You want to have a plan in place that gives you clarity, structure, and helps you prioritise the things that matter most.

And if you want to check out LifeOS to learn more about managing your time and achieving your goals in a way that’s fun and sustainable, you can click the link here. I talk about all this stuff and lots more, so it would be great to see you there if you enjoyed reading this email.

But of course, there’s no pressure to sign up and I'll speak to you next week regardless!

Have a great week :)

Ali xx

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