Mind sharing how to get those office spaces? I too live and work in Japan.

I love being A-schedule… Anti schedule. But it means I create my life on my own terms. I choose to work to a “CFT” schedule. Critical Focus Time which means I give core tasks certain time to get them done. This not only has increased my productivity but gets things moving and I get a tremendous sense of satisfaction from getting the important stuff done and out the way first.

Best to you.

There are two issues here in the post and the comments I see a lot. 1. Not being able to keep a schedule. and 2. Not being able to separate life and work when they happen in the same space.

I hate to say it, but these are huge problems with human beings. We like definition – even when that definition hinders us. We think deadlines spur us to act – but they really spur us to drop the other 10 million things we’re doing to do what we were supposed to do in the first place. So we’d be better served limiting the amount we are doing – and finishing things before starting others – than we are by deadlines.

The balance one is hard too. I was afraid that I would be playing Tiger Woods on the XBOX day and night if I worked at home. What’s happened instead is that I have to consciously stop working.

I have also started treating my house like an office – which means I have business meetings here all the time now. I force the house to really be a home office. In turn, I’ve set up evenings out and set a goal to do that at least twice a week.

Ultimately, you just need to be aware of what’s going on and make sure you are behaving appropriately. It’s an adjustment – but you’ll find yourself more effective in the long run.

Jim

Incidentally, I found this post through HN, which has another article that you might find interesting/helpful: http://www.viperchill.com/self-employment-manual/.

Similar thoughts, with helpful advice and tips.

Good luck!

If I tell my friends that my schedule is flexible, they start to think they could pop in any time they want.

Title: Patrick – Is the problem that dislikable work feels more productive?

“I’ve been thinking about this since I read it this morning. Could it be that work you dislike and are being mandated to do feels more productive? I did about six hours of great work today, but most of it was talking to people I enjoy talking to and learn a lot from and playing around in Google analytics. I felt like I got nothing done until I looked at my list at the end of the day – tons of good stuff checked off.

One of the greatest things about working for yourself is that you can focus on what you want to do, and often that’s work-that-feels-like-play-but-also-pays-you. Isn’t that magnificent? Work that doesn’t feel like working that’s highly productive? Just, it’s easy not to feel productive afterwards, since it felt like playing all day… what do you think?”

Self-management is one of the hardest things for any self-employed professional, as it’s something we’re not “trained” to do in school or conventional work places. In software development, self-management of people on teams is very important. There’s a method named Personal Kanban that works really well for me personally. I have certain appointments that are on my schedule, however after that it’s up for grabs. Using personal kanban helps to focus on the most important tasks, which can have due dates attached to them. Check out http://personalkanban.com/ if you’re interested.