Being late is a terrible habit – not only for those around you, but for you yourself.
It always ends up making you stressed out, flustered, guilty, and generally less productive. Yet it’s one of the hardest bad habits to break. So here are some strategies to help you be on time.
Relearn Your “Time Intuition”
If you plan that you need, say, an hour to dress, get ready and get to your destination, and then you end up even a few minutes behind this planned schedule, you can end up panicking and ending up taking even longer. What you need to do if this is constantly happening to you is recognise that your estimations of time taken to get ready, for example, are pretty far off the mark. You need more accurate ways to know how long things are going to take, rather than simply going off a “feeling” you have.
Prepare, Prepare, Prepare
Get everything you need sorted for the morning before you go to bed – even mundane things like making sure your shoes are in the right place. This can shaves a surprising amount of time off your morning routine, and is particularly helpful if you’re not a morning person.
No More Snooze
As soon as your alarm goes off, remove yourself from your bed. One snooze will typically lead to another, and it’s been said that these extra ten minute bursts of sleep actually serve to make you more tired. As soon as you’re out of bed, it’s pretty unlikely you’ll fall back to sleep, so take away the temptation.
The Two Alarm Tactic
Have two alarms set – one for when you get up, and one for when you have to leave. It can be easy to get ready whilst losing track of time, ending up ambling over non-important tasks or getting distracted. The second alarm can snap you back to reality and speed you up in getting out of the house.
Set Your Clocks To “Work Time”
By aligning all of the “different” times in your life, you will avoid the possibility of confusion or a false sense of security, both of which can lead to lateness. Make sure you know what ime it is – sounds obvious, but it can really help.
Enjoy Your Journey
Many people end up being late because they want to spend as little time as possible on the journey, and thus end up leaving later than they truly should. If you have a book, podcast, or some music during your commute, you’ll end up enjoying and thus valuing the time more. This should help you with wanting to get up and go.
About the author
Annie Walton Doyle writes for Inspiring Interns, which specialises in finding candidates their perfect internship. To browse our graduate jobs London listings, visit our website.
