Time Management and Work / Life Balance

[BrendonKoz]

With all of the advancements in AI, and other technologies not slowing down, it's getting even harder to feel like I'm staying relevant. Add to that the pressure to exercise and stay fit, work outside or around the home, and to be sure to retain some amount of leisure... How do you all do it?

I see my gaming buddy logging hours of a video game. He works in defensive cybersecurity, so he makes quite a bit and is on-call. Thankfully for him, he works remote (I do not). But he has a family with tweeny triplets (!). He's just this past week mentioned ripping up carpet, last week he ran a trench to run electrical for a man-made pond he's installed with boulders that he moved by hand. Meanwhile I want to learn about n8n, take some AI courses (someone mentioned faster.dev here in the forums), work on personal (dev) projects, but also get things done around the house, and make sure to spend time with the girlfriend and make sure she's happy.

I have not figured out a good time management scenario to balance these all out:

1. House/property work.
2. Friends and family time.
3. Leisure time.
4. Exerciise
5. Paid work (job / income).
6. Professional improvement and advancement.

What are your tricks, or boundaries, to set time aside for each of these? Are you struggling like I am to properly afford time to each thing and not allow them to thoroughly overtake another's time commitment?

Looking for revelations that some of you may have had during your careers or lifetimes to help you sort these things out! 🙃

[maximus]

This resonates. 20 years in development, still figuring it out honestly.

Current reality: Day job 6 days/week, building PW modules in spare time. Not balanced, but intentional - grinding now to create options later.

What actually helps:
- Seasons, not balance - some months are 80% work, others need to be 80% recovery
- Combine categories - coding for fun = leisure + professional growth
- One rule: protect sleep and one full day off. Everything else is negotiable
- Physical maintenance - injuries taught me this the hard way

The AI/tech pressure to "stay relevant" is real, but burnout is worse. Better to have 3 solid productive hours than 8 exhausted ones.

What's working for you so far?

[szabesz]

I do not strive for balance. I think that's just not a reality to achieve that. Maybe if you join some monks, then you can find it, but you'll need to give up everything else then.

I focus on goals, and when I achieve one, well, that is satisfying. That might sound simple, but it's not. Of course, it's hard to stay focused, and it is also hard to keep the priorities. But I try not to miss the most important: family, health/sport, work, friends (in that order, and that's the order of importance, and not the order I spend time with/on, which is a different story..., but generally, I am just trying to be flexible with time as much as I can.)

And when I am feeling blue, I just need to remind myself: https://youtu.be/uAzwji5Cfmk?list=RDuAzwji5Cfmk&t=24

 

Edited May 6 by szabesz
EDIT: a better version ;)

[wbmnfktr]

I feel that!

But it became way better than it was a few years back when the world was going nuts.

 

The things I changed in the last 12-18 months:

• getting all the regular vitamins and supplements for someone my age
• getting additional supplements that help my brain to keep working
• checking in on gut health and eating less/none heavily processed foods
• checking calories and protein in-take - fixing both and removing empty carbs and calories
• getting back to the gym - first only cardio, now additional strength training

All the above helped me to not being stressed out everytime and all the time.
I couldn't care less about things thrown at me these days.

A full day with meetings, a workshop, and a coffee with friend somewhere in-between, and of course the usual time at the desk don't affect me in a negative way anymore.

I don't know how the math works here, but these days I have enough hours each day to have plenty of time, even time to balance everything out. PLUS the weekends for side-projects, fun, friends, family, and just things.

[Peter Knight]

On 5/5/2026 at 9:59 PM, BrendonKoz said:

With all of the advancements in AI, and other technologies not slowing down, it's getting even harder to feel like I'm staying relevant. Add to that the pressure to exercise and stay fit, work outside or around the home, and to be sure to retain some amount of leisure... How do you all do it?

Hey Brendon 

This took me back. When I first started freelancing, I distinctly remember a period where I felt the same. It was impossible to keep up, know everything, have time to stay current and be in a relationship. And for a brief while, I was trying my best to do all those things.

Two revelations really helped me relax and enjoy life and stop stressing.

1. A friend reminded me that my relationships were more important than my work 
2. I realised the most important challenge is knowing what I don't need to know

So, to clarify number 2, it was a case of switching from:

• I need to know Adobe Flash, Actionscript 1, HTML and CSS, PHP (3), JS, Dreamweaver etc etc etc

to

• I don't need to be an expert in all these fields. I just need to know how to solve the client projects in front of me. If I don't know something at the time, I'll learn, buy a book or suggest an alternative. 

So I hope that helps. 

I notice you're looking for a system to cram it all in, but the thing that actually helped me was accepting I couldn't (and didn't need to). So don't sweat.

It's funny because lately I had to remind myself of my 2000 AD self. I began to feel with AI and AI Development that there's no way I can keep up. I've been bookmarking 50 pages a day (but reading none) and can occasionally feel burnout approaching.

So I'm going to relearn to calm down a bit, because that girlfriend from 25 years ago is now my wife, I have a good freelance business, and the most important things are relationships, health and peace of mind. Everything else is a bonus and worth chasing, but not at the expense of the fundamentals.

Also, you mention your friend's life, but you're measuring yourself against someone you're painting as superhuman. That could easily be a confidence and happiness killer right there, and unlikely to be helpful.