How to Launch a Teen: Identifying Time Stress

Two days ago I talked a bit about routines.  Before we moved to Trippy Roads Ranch, you had a solid routine for getting to school every day. You got up and did the things you needed to do to get to school on time. Your weekday hinged on the success or failure of that routine. In the same way, you arranged your study time in such a way that you were able to consistently achieve academic goals.  I recognize that you already have skills at building routines.  This is an aspect of time management that we might come back to another time if you experience time stress when incorporating a job into your schedule or when you return to a school-imposed schedule.

Before that, we had a look at my Average Day.  This is what my Ideal Day looks like:

	MOM'S IDEAL DAY
12am – 01am	Sleep
01am—02am	Sleep
02am—03am	Sleep
03am—04am	Sleep
04am—05am	Sleep
05am—06am	Sleep
06am—07am	Desk time
07am—08am	Get dressed and start housework
08am—09am	Desk time
09am—10am	30 minutes of gardening and more housework
10am—11am	Desk time
11am—12pm	More housework
12pm—01pm	Errands
01pm—02pm	More housework
02pm—03pm	Gardening or decorating project
03pm—04pm	More housework
04pm—05pm	Keeping up with Trippy Roads Ranch
05pm—06pm	Fix dinner
06pm—07pm	Dinner
07pm—08pm	Family time
08pm—09pm	Desk time
09pm—10pm	Read
10pm—11pm	Sleep
11pm—12am	Sleep

Totals:

Activity	Hours
Sleep	8.0
Desk Time	4.0
Housework	5.5
Keeping up with Trippy Roads Ranch	2.5
Family Time	1.0
Fix Dinner	1.0
Dinner	1.0
Read	1.0

How does my Ideal Day compare with yours?

If I compare my Ideal Day to how I estimated using my time on an Average Day, I see that I estimated spending less time on housework and keeping up with Trippy Roads Ranch and more time at my desk, with family, or reading than I would like.  (We both know that I actually don't want to spend less time with the family, but I would like less of my family time to involve the television.)

What does it look like if I break it down according to Dagfin Aas' categories? 

Time Use Category	Hours
Necessary Time (sleeping and dinner, plus (on average) an hour per day fixing dinner, showering, and getting dressed)	10.5
Contracted Time (about 1/3 of my desk time spent doing bookkeeping and filing)	1.5
Committed Time (housework and keeping up with Trippy Roads Ranch)	8
Free Time (reading and family time, plus the desk time that involves social media or writing projects like this one)	4

From this, we can gather that I would like to use more of my time on committed activities than I currently do.  In particular, I would give up free time doing whatever in favor of having more time to get the house clean, organized, and decorated and to do projects around Trippy Roads Ranch (like gardening).  I think that is a fair, if superficial, assessment of some of my personal sources of time stress.