Just like anyone reading this post, the wife and I need a piping hot pot of coffee first thing in the morning to prepare us for what’s to come. If we’re lucky, we’ll get 20 minutes or so together to sip our coffee and chat about how our schedules are shaping up for the day before the kids are turning the monitors red.
It’s important for us to make the most of our limited kid-free time by finding ways to make our lives more efficient. One small way we do this is by preparing our coffee the night before and setting the timer for right before we usually wake up. Walking down the stairs to an already-made pot of coffee makes a world of difference and is something small that helps to get the day started off on the right foot.
Act Now, Benefit Later
Everyone leads their own busy lives trying to balance family, friends, work, maintaining the home, meeting financial responsibilities and relaxing if possible. With so much going on for all of us, it’s worth thinking about finding things in your life, even something as small as making your coffee the night before, where you can proactively set yourself up for a positive, productive and efficient life.
Take a look at your daily schedule, your finances, your family, etc. Think about what you could have done, or done differently, that may have made your life a little more positive, productive and efficient now. Then start to plan out how to incorporate some of those proactive actions now to make your tomorrows a little better. Here are some thoughts.
Invest Your Money
U.S News published an article all about the importance of investing your money early and consistently. I’ll let the other sources on the web give you all the details you need but the idea is simple. Invest today and set yourself up for financial freedom down the road.
With a consistently growing stock market and compound interest being your allies, the time is now to get you and your family set up with some accounts. Here’s a graphic to show you how $200 invested regularly starting at different ages plays out differently by retirement age:
Exercise
We all know about the importance of exercise on a regular basis. It will keep your body strong, avoid injury, manage stress, keep your mind on point, allow you to take care of your family easier (especially when you have a 1 year old that loves to be held) and simply feel better.
Too many people wait until something happens to get their butt in gear. They wait for an injury to creep up or until their doctor mandates regular exercise when they’re older. Do you really need to wait years to hear common sense advice only to wish you had started taking care of yourself earlier?
Your body is what is going to carry through this crazy life of yours. It’s the car to get you from place to place. You need to proactively maintain it with regular oil changes and tire rotations or you’ll be finding yourself in the shop soon enough. 20 minutes today will help you feel better today and stay strong for tomorrow.
Eat Healthy
The lifestyle choices you make today will most certainly lead to your quality of life down the road. If you feed your body the fuel it needs to build muscle and keep all those essential functions running smoothly, it should have no problems taking you far in life.
On the flip side, take a look at the folks that frequent any pizza shop or unhealthy food chain and determine if that’s how you want to present yourself. Don’t get me wrong on this one. I LOVE ordering out and would get me a basket of chicken fingers and fries on a regular basis if I could. But life is all about balance. So indulge when it’s time to indulge and then get back to your routine and take care of yourself.
Here’s a cool graphic about how choices today make for a healthier tomorrow, taken from the National Institute on Aging:
Learn
It’s not just your wallet and body that you need to invest in but also your mind. Learning something new on a regular basis will keep you sharp, thinking creatively and performing at a high level.
Our post about the importance of thinking outside the box provides some ideas and sources you can use to learn something new, from quick clips at TED Talks to enrolling in free courses via edX. However big or small, just find ways to get some new information coming into that brain to keep you sharp as the years keep coming.
Strengthen Your Relationships
Healthy relationships are essential to a healthy and positive life. It would be a rare case if someone were to be truly happy living by themselves with no family or friends to go through life with. I’m not saying everyone needs a partner in order to be happy, but we as humans are very likely to have a more fulfilling life by estbalishing and maintaining healthy relationships.
Northwestern Medicine lists 5 benefits of healthy relationships as:
- Less stress
- Better healing
- Healthier behaviors
- Greater sense of purpose
- Longer life
Psychology Today also lists some keys to maintaining a relationship:
- Consideration
- Communication
- Compromise
- Confidence
- Cherishing
If you keep these things in mind on a day to day basis, your relationships are likely to stay strong and last you your whole life. If you let things slip and don’t proactively take care of your relationships, however, you’ll soon see them start to slip away one by one. Invest in them now and keep those around that you love forever.
Maintain Your Home
The same ideas above apply to the more material things in your life like your home, car, tools, etc. Create yourself a home maintenance checklist via spreadsheet or notebook so that you know the last time you took care of all the important things around your home.
Getting out in front of things like HVAC systems and roof repairs will keep your home in tip top shape and protect what is likely the largest financial investment you’ve ever made.
Invest Today For a Better Tomorrow
This is all about investing. Investing your money, time and energy today to make for a better tomorrow. With each action, think of it as “putting the grounds in the coffee maker and setting it for the morning”…really, you’re preparing yourself for 10, 20 or 30 years from now.
Life is crazy. We all know that. Every day you will have a limited amount of time to focus on any of these things but just know that any time you are able to invest today is likely to lead to a far greater impact down the road than you would imagine.