When running a business it’s important to plan out your week, your month, your year. Whether it’s keeping track of blog posts, days for jewellery making or book writing, the paying of bills, keeping across accounts, doing taxes, making time for legal issues, it all needs to be planned out. It’s a bit sad to plan out a year’s worth of it, but that’s the way things are done these days. You need to plan ahead.

This also means, sadly, I have the credit card booked months in advance. That’s the sad thing about booking up your business expenses. I don’t earn enough to earn it all back or pay it off every month, and I don’t earn enough money in general to be able to buy what I want when I want. I wish I did, but sadly, the lotto God’s have not bestowed upon me yet.

I plan out my year with what I need or want to do and plan 6 months, at least, ahead. I have the usual of phone, internet, Dropbox and hosting every month. My chiro was every two weeks but now it’s every four, so that will give me some extra spending space. Then there’s the RSL eleven times a year, and any other business thing I have to buy. Book edits, which thankfully aren’t often. Books covers or interiors (which aren’t cheap), Norton Internet Security (I got it on sale this year so that saved about $50), there’s my Sleuths subscription, my Madeit costs every four or so months but they may be about to end, not to mention any legal stuff I have to pay for and domains every year or two (there’s ten of them now), plus subscriptions to PicMonkey and a few other places.

I suppose like any other business there will be the usual; monthly/yearly expenses, so it pays to plan ahead for the year. It just sucks that I don’t get to spend more every month on myself as I do have a limit for how much I can afford to put on my card every month and so far $800 is my limit. Sadly, it means I can’t buy all the kaftans and kimonos I want.

Of course it also means planning for the year ahead in your private life as well.

I’m overhauling my business, putting my jewellery on the back burner while I concentrate on my writing. I’m writing under three names and running websites for all three, plus a landing website under my own name. I have my health to worry about, mental and physical, and am in desperate need of a holiday to get a bunch of stuff done and just relax.

As with every year I hope the new one changes. I don’t know if it will, as they never seem to when they’re over and when they’re over I look back and think about how hard I’ve worked and what I’ve done and realised how exhausted I am and in desperate need of another holiday.

Clearly I’ll have to plan out my year ahead with days specifically for writing, business, jewellery, blogs, and appointments. That’s five days already and I have four businesses to run and keep across with four sets of social media. It also means I’ll also be taking the school holidays off from blogging…even though I don’t have kids. It was an idea I thought of two years ago but never followed through with. Until now.

So for 2016 I’m trying to get a more rhythmic internet plan going and hopefully I’ll finally get it right this time….it’s only taken 7 years of being online.

What about you guys, have you planned out next year already?