my productive routine after work

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My after-work routine is based on a few principles:

1. I rarely (like 99% of the time) bring any office work home. This means that I try to separate what I do at the office and what I do at home. In case I have a bigger workload, I prefer to leave the office later. Separating office hours from the rest of my time allows me to know when I should dedicate my time to my business, to leisure and to taking care of myself and my family. I definitely have to work a lot of hours per week for my YouTube channel and I like to do that immediately after work so I don't lose that rhythm.
2. While I'm home, I only work onn my business when I'm alone. Same applies to weekends - if I allocated time to be with my loved ones, I will put the laptop away and pick it up later.
3. Instead of stacking all habits and chores into one day, I like to separate days by themes. Some of my after-work hours are geared towards working out, others for business-related work. It allows me to focus entirely on what I'm doing instead of thinking on the next thing on my to-do list.
4. My after-work routine is as scheduled and structured as the rest of my day. I like to use calendar blocking to do this and follow a to-do list, that is usually written down the previous night or that morning.
5. The time I spend after dinner and before going to bed is my real leisure time. This is where all schedules and routines disappear and I can just enjoy myself and do whatever I want before before ending the day.

So, jumping into the routine itself, first thing I do after work is get into my car and pick something interesting to listen to during my drive home. Sometimes I listen to podcasts, usually the Minimalists, college info geek or Listen money matters but I've recently tried to hear more music during my trip home. This is usually a 20 minute drive, depending on traffic.

My after-work routine basically has two different scenarios:

**Scenario 1**

Three times a week I go straight home and put on some comfy clothes right away. On the days when Chester is not in doggy daycare in the afternoon I take him for a long walk and I usually train and play with him for a while until he has spent some of that energy and is prepared to nap again.

As he rests I'll usually prepare a snack or some tea and sit at my dining table to do some work. This late-afternoon work session is almost always only-YouTube related and is usually comprised of writing scripts and e-mails, recording voice-overs, editing thumbnails, reading technical books about the topics I enjoy covering in this channel or writing down quick notes on *those* books or other interesting articles I find online. I'm unable to film at this time of the day since it's dark outside in the winter months so most of the filming is done during the weekends. However, I like to make the most out of this time during the week by imagining how I will want to film a certain part of the script and writing out clear instructions for the filming procedures when that time comes. It allows me to brainstorm interesting shots without having to bother with technicalities.

I also use this time to get in touch with all the wedding planning that is currently going on. This basically means contacting vendors, checking our main budget and going through our main to-do list to schedule future appointments and meetings or start working on more tasks.

After that, I take Chester out on a quick potty break and I'll either continue working or start preparing dinner. While dinner is cooking, I usually take that time to read or watch something on Netflix and just relax for a while.

**Scenario 2**

In the other two days, it's time to hit the gym. Since I carry a lot of stuff around, I prefer to go home first and change into gym wear and leave my bag there and take only the essentials and my workout towel. I usually spend from 30 minutes to 1 hour there doing some strength and cardio workouts since there isn't any class at that time that I enjoy. I like to go to the gym two to three times a week but since there's still a lot of work to do after I leave my job I've started going two times during weekdays and I take a Yoga class on the weekends to stay active. After my workout is done I drive to to doggy daycare to pick Chester up.

When arriving home, it's a quick potty break for him and a quick shower for me and after that is taken care of, it's time to start fixing dinner.

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