Tips for Not Wasting Your Weekend

How would you describe the quality of your weekend on average?

Fun? Rejuvenating? Wasteful?

If you wish you could waste less time and spend your weekend more productively, here are some tips for you.

Limit Social Media

The social media rabbit hole is deep.… Five minutes to check on your friends’ recent activities becomes five hours of binge-watch and information overload. It happens to the best of us.

Social media plays on our fear of missing out (FOMO for short). It constantly feeds us with new information and stimuli, which rewards our brain with the instant gratification of a dopamine rush.

Don’t be like those lab rats that constantly press the lever to stimulate their brains.

Set conditional rules and limit social media on weekends (or every day).

I have a rule of not using any social media, news, or messenger apps on my phone while I’m physically in my bedroom.

If I really need to check any of those apps or respond to a message, I get up and walk myself out of the bedroom to do it.

The bedroom is for sleeping and relaxation only. I only use my phone to set an alarm, and turn on airplane mode before going to sleep.

Weekend or not, I do not browse social media throughout the morning, until I have lunch.

Before I go to sleep, I escort my phones out of my bedroom & charge them on a bench in the hallway. #ThriveOCourse pic.twitter.com/Jge3N34RXb

— Arianna Huffington (@ariannahuff) May 15, 2015

Plan and Protect Your Time

Do you find yourself spending a lot of time on mindless, unimportant activities?

Indulging in your impulses and doing things on a whim won’t get you the rest you deserve or the enjoyment you need during a weekend.

Instead, plan ahead and honor your schedule.

Want to do something productive, fun, or relaxing? Put them in the calendar.

And don’t cancel your plans just because someone sent you an invitation to a random get-together.

Whatever you were going to do — learning a foreign language, practicing a musical instrument, working on a side business, going to the movies — protect that time if it’s important to you.

Act according to your priorities. Don’t let interruption or your emotion override your plans.

When you know your priorities, you will protect your time.

If you do not set your priorities, your time will be eroded by other people’s needs.

Show me someone’s calendar and their spending, and I’ll show you their priorities

— Ramit Sethi (@ramit) January 30, 2018

Do Small Challenges

Get out of the daily mundane by doing something different on the weekend.

Try a “small challenge.”

You will learn something new and you might even find a new inspiration.

Whether you succeed or not, taking on a small challenge won’t leave you with the feeling of guilt like you might feel after having wasted hours on social media — in fact, the opposite will be true. You’ll feel better about yourself from having tried something new.

Here are some “small challenges” you could do at low cost:

• grill barbecue, bake cookies, paint, play a musical instrument, dress up to go to a fancy restaurant, get an intense full body massage, read books in new genres, take a long walk along a scenic route, change the room deco, write a movie report, go camping, do a water fast, solve a Rubik’s cube, learn to play a new board game with your family, etc.

Check out 52 Weekend Challenges by Mollie Millington for more ideas.

Be Alone with Your Thoughts

We’re constantly bombarded by stimuli, like TV and smartphones.

Detach yourself from technology. Be alone with your thoughts. Write your thoughts down on paper, instead of a computer or smartphone.

Meditate, breathe, and give your brain a break it needs. Give your brain space to let the thoughts arise and organize themselves. Be mindful.

Reflect on your past week and plan for the next week.

Use the Waking Up app to practice meditation. Use the Full Focus Planner to plan your day, week, and quarter.

What Are You Going to Do this Weekend?

The key to spending a quality weekend is to be deliberate in your planning and actions.

Mindless activities will rob you of your time.

What will you do this weekend? Write in the comment below.