7HRS is PERFECT: An Independent Work Day
I have no boss. Which is great, because I can do what I want. But terrible, because I have no inherent structure.
Productivity has been one of my biggest challenges. I'll often divide my time and focus tasks that are less important than others. Or I'll simply procrastinate because I can. Or I'll go crazy intense with my work day, which is great for productivity, but then I burn out in a couple of days and end up squandering the days that come after.
I realized I had to make a schedule that included all of my daily activities or I wouldn't be able to get everything done. What I found is that although my schedule is somewhat strict, it actually allows for a lot of liberties and only requires 7 working hours!
My schedule looks like this:
9:00 - Wake my ass up, exercise, shower
9:30 - Breakfast, get my ass to work
10:00 - Work
12:00 - chores
12:30 - Work - emails/phone calls/business media
1:00 - Lunch
1:30 - walk
2:00 - Back to work
4:30 - Boxing
7:00 - Dinner
8:00 - Work (again)
10:00 - chill time
Now, you'll notice a few things weird about this schedule. The first is that I don't really do more than 2 to 2.5 hrs of work at a time. In my experience anything more than that becomes diminishing returns. I also include my emails/phone calls as work. When I wasn't factoring that side of my business in, I found it difficult to separate my work time from my non-work time.
You'll also notice there's a LOT of physical activity built into my day. Sitting for long periods is extremely taxing both in the short term and long term. I personally need a LOT of physical activity in order to keep up my energy and to not fall into the trap of an unhealthy and depressing lifestyle. I've learned this through hard experience unfortunately. I find if I do a little bit of exercise in the morning, even if only about 10min, I do some chores and walk in the afternoon, and do higher intensity exercise in the evening I actually improve my physical being, and I'm energized throughout the day.
Lastly, you'll see there isn't a lot of time for socializing. Well - my friend Rook once said "Successful people rarely lead balanced lives." And he is dead right (bastard). I am still modifying my schedule to allow for socializing on the weekends or some time during the work week but cutting into my boxing time, and just generally shortening my day on Sat/Sun.
The good part of this is that having a productive 7hrs is much more powerful than a less-than-productive twelve hours. Take my schedule as a mold if you don't already have your own and adjust to fit your personal needs. You probably don't need to dedicate 2.5hrs of your day to exercise - that's really just a "me" thing. But maybe you benefit from a solid hour of laying on a couch reading... or want more social time... or feel you can be productive for 3hr intervals. You have to fit things to your own needs, but this should at least get you started.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on my 7hr day, or post up your own schedule in the comments!
And as always - I specialize in mixing records, and if you want to learn more about that process I make great for-sale tutorials on the subject at www.WeissTuts.com