Time Strategies

I originally had said I would do all my work on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I think I might stick to that schedule. This past week, I was also trying to fit in time for me to study for the MCAT, but I would rather do the work for this class, so I ended up procrastinating on the MCAT studying with work for this class.. not the brightest idea :-)

This brings me to the articles I read, one of which was about procrastination. According to Peter Banerjea, there are four questions you should ask yourself to overcome procrastination: 

1. What one thing can I do to get started?
2. What are my three biggest priorities today?
3. How can I make this easier?
4. What will go wrong if I don't do this now?

I liked these questions because if I actually sit down and ask myself these, I can probably get more stuff down than just complaining about how I procrastinate too much. The last question is something I ask myself a lot and it's probably one of the reasons I haven't failed a test yet.. I get too scared of what will happen if I fail or if I slack off, and that drives me to study and work on stuff. :-) The other questions are also good points, because I need to prioritize daily and try to make my workload easier so I'm not struggling at the end of the semester.

Source: Actual representation of my life.. and my favorite meme of all time because it applies to basically everything.

The other article I read was about recapturing time. Joynicole Martinez states three pieces of advice to recapture my time and prioritize better:

1. Refuse to yield your first 15 minutes.
2. Recognize the pruning season.
3. Practice the art of no.

I liked this article a lot too because Martinez mentions how to prioritize, exactly: starting off your day by relaxing/meditating/praying, then identifying the things you need to get done, and finally chunking off your time to those tasks. I try to make a schedule for myself everyday, but I think the relaxing part is important because I tend to get stressed out easily, so if I take some time to myself I might have a better mindset when going into my work. Martinez also brings up saying "no" to things that do not fit in your priorities, which I need to work on also. I have gotten better at turning down hangouts with friends when I need to, but sometimes I hear "you wanna get boba?" and I'm like "oh gee I haven't had boba in two weeks, I deserve it today" and then it turns into an hour long break... so I need to work on saying no when I know I don't have time for it. :-)