I just turned 28 years old in June, and while I’m much better at it than I was a year ago, budgeting my time is still a daily struggle.

I also realize that this is the exact same problem many other people face on a daily basis. That juggling act between all of your responsibilities: work, family, relationships and all other obligations.

Making deadlines while still finding the time to go to the gym, or clean the house, or finally organize the folders on your computer.

Then you have to make sure you inject some fun to keep your sanity. You meet up with friends in tight windows of opportunity on weekdays, or lose another few hours of sleep to finally finish that show you’ve got on your Netflix queue.

I think literally everyone does this clock calculus every single day, and I know that I have no breakthroughs to add to the subject.

All I can recommend is to appreciate any and all progress you make in this department. Personally, I do that through notes in my planner — copious amounts of details on my day-to-day, between work and my personal life.

I set goals throughout the week that revolve around the gym, the books I’m reading, all the plans I make with people and, of course, work. Every single week, something falls to the wayside because one other thing took too much time or became another thing altogether. It’s discouraging at times, but I still take notes.

Because while one thing on my list might not meet my standards at the end week, something else typically shapes up nicely. Maybe I didn’t get as much sleep as I set out to, but I put in more time at Planet Fitness than I thought I could for the week.

So, while I don’t have anything particularly sage-like to share, I do want to want emphasize how important it is to literally write down what you want to get done. Make notes for yourself — just for yourself — to compare to what you’ve actually managed to accomplish at the end of a given week.

You’ll disappoint yourself regularly, and occasionally you’ll surprise yourself for the better. But the point is that you know where you stand with budgeting your time, and that’s how you start to make improvements that matter.