The way I am trying to solve this is not to split up days into working on all of them, but to split my week up into days dedicated to one project. This creates some problems, but also solves a lot and problems created can be remedied, at least in my case.

Currently I can split my life into about 5 different large projects. These are Hack Your Day, Guest blogging, Code a Day (an upcomming css blog), my upcoming music project and Blogtastique. Ideally I would create a separate day for each of these projects, except for Blogtastique, which requires at least two. Since I can blog about things in advance it’s ok to separate only one day, even put two blogging projects on the same day, I can just schedule posts for a later date. This means I can spend the optimum amount of time on the most time consuming tasks, Blogtastique and my mystery musical project.

You can do the same thing I have done in your life. Identify your key projects and set up different days to work on them. If you have a day job you can still apply the same method to other tasks or hobbies you have. Separating projects like this helps you focus on one at a time, keeping a clear mind and you will be able to work much more productively overall.

The negative side is of course quite prominent with Blogtastique. Since I provide services, I can hardly keep a new client in the dark for 3 days. Even if my Blogtastique days are Tuesday and Thursday, this would still be an unacceptable time lag. So the question is, how much do I keep “out of touch” with a project on unspecified days?

This can be remedied quite easily actually. I have determined that the best course of action (for me) is to make emailing a global task, since that doesn’t take much time, and leave the actual work for scheduled days. So if a new client contacts me I talk through his order with him, and I notify him on which days I will be wrking on his order.

If you have multiple projects, but you can’t separate them like this, I still suggest some kind of barrier between them. Drink a cup of team between working on separate things, go for a walk, clear your mind and start each new project with a clear mind and you will be much more productive and effective!