Long nights at the office? It doesn’t have to be that way. Recently the Chief Operating Officer of Facebook Sheryl Sandberg admitted that she leaves the office every day by 5:30. If the COO of Facebook can do it, you certainly can, too, and there’s no reason you can’t get out even a half hour earlier. Come on, your job isn’t as important as her is. When it seems like you’re tethered to your desk, it’s hard to find a way to cut loose. If you want to achieve better balance in your life, you have to stop working so much. You can leave work every day by 5:00, too, and here’s how to do it.

Make It a Priority

Why do you want to leave work by 5:00 every day? Is it so you can be home to eat dinner with your family? Is it to have more free time for yourself? Whatever the reason, you have to make it a priority. Of course, your family probably is your main priority, and that’s why you’re working so hard, so you can support them. But spending time with them and eating dinner with your kids should be a priority in itself. If you recognize the importance of family dinners, you know that they’re worth making time for. If you believe that getting home for dinner is more important than working late, you’ll make it a priority, and you’ll make it happen.

Come in Early

This seems like a no-brainer, but if you want to leave work earlier, you might have to come to work earlier. Now, it may seem like this defeats the purpose. If you’re still going to work the same number of hours, why does it matter when you do it? Well, if you wake up earlier in order to go to work earlier, you’re creating more time in your day. Instead of spending an extra hour sleeping, you’re spending an extra hour doing something productive. And then you’re able to get home at 5:00 and have more free time in the evening when you really want it. Once you get used to doing this, you’ll be surprised how easy you adjust to losing that hour of sleep and realize you didn’t need it anyway.

Talk to Your Boss

You might not have the luxury of leaving work whenever you feel like it, and in this case you’ll need to talk to your boss about your new priority of leaving every day by 5:00. This will be difficult, but it can be done. The trick is to convince your boss that you’re not trying to slack off or work less. You simply want to be home at a certain time in order to have a more balanced life. Try to figure out a way to rearrange your schedule to make it possible. Perhaps you can do some work from home on the weekend. Whatever the case, hopefully your boss will realize that by being happier, you’ll actually be more productive at work.

About the author: Mark Weatherford is a high school English teacher and published author who loves to write in his spare time. He is an outspoken advocate for the use of grammar checkers and he always insists his students proof their work before submitting it. He teaches grammar rules regularly in his class but still wants his students to make sure their work is free of errors.