From Busy to Balanced: A Simple Tool for Intentional Living

This time of year—or any season when you’re craving change—is a natural moment to pause. Perhaps you’re entering a major transition, feeling stuck in a rut, or simply wondering where your days go.

While we often set big goals for our careers or health, a truly meaningful life requires more than just progress in one or two areas. It requires space. Space for the simple needs of life including chores, hobbies, connection, and rest.

The challenge is that change can feel overwhelming. Goals feel too big, time feels too scarce, and motivation is fragile. But when you break life down into its real, everyday components, it becomes manageable. You can step back, notice the patterns, and make small, realistic adjustments.

The Time-Mapping Tool

The tool below allows you to input how many hours you spend each week in different areas of your life and compare them to your "ideal" week.

The Math: We assume roughly 15 waking hours a day (105 hours per week) are available after sleep and basic grooming.

The goal isn't perfection—it’s awareness. Here is how to think about your categories:

Defining Your Categories

• Work & Responsibilities: Paid employment, but also unpaid labor like childcare, eldercare, or managing the household finances.

• Relationships: The time invested in family, friends, and partners. Remember: small moments like a shared dinner or a quick text count toward connection.

• Growth & Learning: Anything that evolves you as a human—classes, non-fiction reading, workshops, or practicing a new language.

• Maintenance (Chores): The practical tasks that keep life running—cleaning, cooking, errands, and yard work.

• Self-Care & Mental Health: The foundation of well-being. This includes therapy, journaling, meditation, or quiet reflection.

• Movement: Anything that gets your body active, from a heavy gym session to a gentle walk or stretching.

• Spiritual Connection: Practices that help you feel grounded, such as religious services, prayer, or time spent in nature.

• Leisure & Play: Activities you genuinely enjoy—hobbies, puzzles, fiction, or catching up on a favorite show.

• Wasted Time: Be honest here. If an activity leaves you feeling worse afterward (like "doom-scrolling" or procrastinating), it belongs here. Naming it is the first step to shifting it.

The Art of "Pruning" and Layering

As you look at your pie chart, keep two principles in mind:

• The Trade-Off: Time is a finite resource. If you want to add an hour to "Growth," you must prune an hour from somewhere else. Our priorities naturally shift during seasons of illness, financial change, or new parenthood. Pruning isn't failure; it's essential maintenance.

• The "Double Win": You can fulfill two needs at once. A solo bubble bath is great self-care, but soaking your feet while catching up with a friend combines Self-Care with Relationships. Look for ways to layer your life.

Awareness Creates Change

The goal isn’t peak efficiency—it’s intention. It’s moving from someone time happens to into someone who is consciously shaping their life.

Once you see your data, start small:

• 15 extra minutes of movement.

• 30 minutes less scrolling.

• One intentional hour with someone you love.

Use the tool below to visualize your current path and map out where you want to go next by putting the amount of time you spend per week into each category and what your time goals are going forward.

Tips for use:

• Landscape Mode: I set the PDF export to "Landscape" because the two-column comparison looks much better that way.

• Over-Limit Warning: If you are over 105 hours when you export, the red warning text will appear in the PDF to remind you to adjust.

• The tool works best when used on a tablet or desktop