107. Stop Running Late to Your Life: Use This Strategy

Ever feel like you’re sprinting through your entire day—only to collapse when you get home because you've got nothing left to give? 

In this episode, we’re talking Buffer Time: the unsexy but essential productivity strategy you’re probably skipping. Especially if you’re an SLP with back-to-back sessions or a parent trying to herd small humans into the car without losing your mind.

We’ll get into:

• What buffer time actually is (spoiler: it’s not “wasted” time)
• Why it’s especially important if you have ADHD or chronically underestimate how long things take
• The mindset traps that sabotage your schedule (like “I don’t have time for buffer time”)
• Real-life ways to build margin into your day—even if you don’t control your whole schedule

Buffer time isn’t about being lazy. It’s about being realistic. It’s the simplest way to stop running late to your own life—and it’s one of the best gifts you can give your future self (and your stress levels).

To find out how I can help you improve your work-life balance, click here.

Come join the SLP Support Group on Facebook for more tips and tricks!

Follow me on Instagram! @theresamharp

Learn more about Theresa Harp Coaching here.

Transcript

[00:00:00] There we go. Okay. Hello. SLP Support Group. I think we are live. Okay, [00:01:00] so I am popping in 20 minutes late. So I was at my desk ready to start my live, and at 1229 there was a knock at the door and it was somebody, uh, we're having work done on our house. And so it was somebody that was here to. Um, unexpectedly had no idea that they were coming today.

And so I was like, ah, okay, well we're gonna shuffle this timeline around a little bit. So apologies for the late start, but I am here today continuing the 30 day time authority theme here in the SLP support group, and today I am going live to talk about this concept of buffer time. Okay. Or leaving room for the margins.

This is a really useful productivity strategy that I think is [00:02:00] being underutilized, and I have, there's a number of reasons why I think that is, and we'll get to that. But today I want to share it with you. It's not fancy, it's simple, but it is. How you start to get some of your sanity back and reduce some of that rush, rush, rush.

Go, go, go. Chaos. Okay. This is actually, buffer time is actually something that came up in a coaching session that I had last night with one of my coaching clients and we were talking about this, this concept and how, uh, particularly. Challenging it can be for those who have a DHD, um, challenging to utilize, but we're gonna talk about that too.

Okay. So essentially let's talk about first what it is, buffer time. It is, like I said, the margin, it's the margins, the space that you are intentionally holding and building in between events or [00:03:00] activities, appointments, tasks. Okay. And it is something that I think the, I think that the, the reason why this matters is because most people, as we are planning our day or even just kind of going about our day in our minds, we.

We prep and we plan as if everything is going to go according to plan. Like everything is going to go perfectly. It's going to start on time and end on time, right? And so whatever amount of time we've budgeted for whatever event we're talking about. The expectation when we're not building in buffer time.

The expectation, whether you realize it or not, is that okay, there's no room for error here, so it has to start and end when it's set. When I say it's going to start and end, but [00:04:00] we all know that it rarely goes that way. Right? There is, there's lots of life events and circumstances that will pop up and they will eat into that time.

I. If you are a mom or if you're a parent, you probably know exactly what I'm talking about. Like when you're trying to get out the door and you've given yourself, say, a half hour to get everybody out, and it's now like at that five minute mark, it's time to get out the door like you're really supposed to be transitioning into the car and one of your kids is having a meltdown over something and refusing to get into their car.

Refusing. Okay. When you don't have that buffer room, when you don't have those margins built in, it can throw your whole day into chaos. And you all know as SLPs, if we run behind on one session, we are often running behind [00:05:00] for the whole day. It's very hard for us to catch up and get back on schedule. So this is another reason why I think buffer time is especially important for.

Us as SLPs, right? If you are on the road, you know life, you know there's traffic, right? There's um, accidents, there's construction, there are red lights, there are detours, and buffer time allows the space for. Traffic, construction and detours. And not only does this help keep you on schedule, but more importantly it.

By building in buffer time, you are reducing some of the anxiety. You're reducing some of that stress and pressure to get from one thing to the next, right? So if you've ever said, I'm just gonna squeeze this in here. I don't know how it's gonna fit, but I'm just gonna do it, then this Facebook Live is for you.

Okay? But the reason why [00:06:00] we struggle to incorporate buffer time is. A number of reasons. Number one, we're already overscheduled and we have this sabotaging thought that we don't have time for buffer. We don't have time for white space in our calendar. We also might think that we don't have the permission, so depending upon what the scenario is or what kind of setting you work in, you might feel like, oh, I'd love to put in buffer time, Theresa, if I could, but I don't have that authority.

I don't make my schedule. We also think that. Um, this one's big for me. I wanna maximize the time that I do have and that often creates a sense of urgency for me to over schedule and trying to fill every sort of crevice that I can. Um, and it. It's something that I have become more aware of as I've been on this journey of time and time management coaching, but I know that if I still am struggling with that, that I know that's [00:07:00] coming up for some of you as well.

And then there's also that guilt of like, well, there's this open space. I should be doing something. I should be productive, or I should be booking something in there and I'm lazy, or I'm inefficient. I'm wasting time. But buffer time isn't lazy. It's not wasted time. It's realistic, it's smart. It's the way that you stop running late to your life.

Buffer time. Okay, so one of the reasons. Or I would say one of the biggest struggles of the coaching clients I work with, particularly those who have A DHD, is difficulty estimating how long something will take. Okay. So I. My A DH ADHD is out there. You know, if you have a DHD right? You might chronically underestimate the amount of time needed for something.

And it's not that there's something wrong with your brain or that you are, [00:08:00] you know, uh, clueless or you just, you can't get the hang of it and you're not good with time management. It's just that your brain wasn't designed that way. It wasn't designed to. Perfectly predict the amount of time that you need and how much time has passed.

So by building in some of these buffers, right, this can also. Allow for those instances where you are not estimating your time accurately. Okay, so here are some examples, real life examples, personal and professional of where and how you can build in buffer time. So building in buffer time to get out the door, to get to somewhere, get to an event buffer time of the, the commute itself, the driving and the commute itself.

Buffer time in between sessions when possible. Even just five minutes can make a huge difference buffer time in between tasks. So if you're transitioning, say from intervention to [00:09:00] maybe administration, and you think that you're just going to end your session right on time and then start right into your documentation time or your administration tasks, you are wrong.

You are mistaken. That is not. Likely and not the way that you need to do it. Okay? Um, you can even do this for phone calls, estimating how long something's going to take, how long a phone call is gonna take. Take your best guess, and then add to it. Add in that time. Worst case scenario, you don't need it.

And now you're early. Best case scenario, things went over the allotted time or the estimated time, and it's okay because you have that space in your calendar. Okay? Doing this can give you sanity. It can give you back your sanity, your calm, your ease. It is one of the simplest tools or simplest strategies to utilize, but it's [00:10:00] not necessarily the easiest.

So here's what I want you to do this week. Look at. Look at your last week's calendar. Reflect on last week, and identify where were the days. The moments pinpoint where I felt, where I was running late, or I, I, I was late, I was running late, or it was stress that I was going to be late. Right? Notice the patterns look for patterns, which transitions are particularly tight.

Which tasks or events wind up usually? Excuse me? Usually taking more time. Then you think they are, and that is where you need to start building in some buffer. Okay? Five minutes, 10 minutes tops. You don't need to make this like a huge block of white space on your calendar. It's not about making your day empty, it's about making your day work, okay?

And this is, it is so important that you come up with a plan that works for you. I know people pleasers [00:11:00] high achievers, you hate feeling inefficient, but. Sprinting and apologizing all day long for being late. Is that actually efficient? I don't think so. I don't think that's the tone you want to set. Think of buffer time as professional.

It is a professional strategy, a professional courtesy. It shows that you respect your time and you respect other people's time. Alright, so that's it for this quick Facebook Live on Buffer Time. Let me know what you think in the comments and how I can support you. Let me know how it goes, and I will see you all next time.