Challenge:
Managing time for work, school, hobbies and social life to minimize stress without sacrificing quality of either.
WHICH ACTIVITIES HAVE YOU ATTEMPTED AND HOW DID THE EXECUTION GO?
What was worthwhile? What did you discover? What surprised you? Which insights were new?
I tried scheduling out my days in hours, maximising my productivity. For example if I know I have my workout class at 12 - I wake up at 8 and do my work until its time to leave at 11, then on my way there and back I also do some small tasks such as replying to comments/messages. Then after I come back home I sit down and spend a couple hours working on school work, and I strictly stop myself from working at 6:30 in order to make dinner and relax before sleep. This works for the most part and I have kept on doing it for most of the school year. I do sometimes become overwhelmed by it and slack off a bit, such as not doing my work while commuting, but I get back to it once I’m back home. I also tried to dedicate separate days for separate work, for example if I have coaching on Wednesday, I would spend Tuesday doing only school work and then Thursday only my job. This didn’t work for me as I was feeling stressed and scared that I will miss something important at either school or work whilst I’m focusing on the other. Trying out these various productivity facts was interesting and it surprised me that coming to school on my free days to work doesn’t really work for me. For some reason I cannot focus and keep getting distracted by everything going on there. I always thought that it would be the opposite, but alas - I work better when I’m alone at home and get into the flow of it.
FLOW MOMENTS
At which moments or during which activities and/or assignments were you in your flow? What were nice or positive experiences?
I’m usually in the flow early in the morning when I’m not in a rush to get anywhere or do anything and can just calmly assess what I need to do and get started on it. For me a nice experience was realising that I don’t need to aim to do everything in one day and instead set a goal to start doing it and then once I start doing it - I might as well continue as I’m in a flow now.
FEEDBACK RECEIVED
What feedback (positive or negative) was interesting for you? and were you able to use it further on?
Feedback I got from my team is that every student deals with it and if they had an answer they wouldn’t be that stressed, which to me seems as a very irresponsible way of looking at life. I think everyone should take accountability and actions to better their work, time management, stress levels, etc.. and not just “it is what it is, everyone is the same”. Especially when it comes from students who don’t have any other responsibilities apart from school. I did get some tips, such as re-organize school work, don’t procrastinate, plan days hourly to fit in all responsibilities, do something productive everyday, if the deadline is 10th pretend it’s 8th so you do your work faster, use breaks at school to do assignments. But these aren’t anything new to me and I already implement them everyday.
SUCCESSES AND COMPLIMENTS
What were your most important successes and compliments?
My most important successes were balancing all these responsibilities and aspects of life without sacrificing any. I managed to keep up my hobby and job, whilst working on CA assignments and passing them with good grades. The most shocking compliment was a teammate asking how am I never stressed about anything. It surprised me that that’s how I’m perceived by others when in reality I’m pretty much always stressed.
DEVELOPMENT
In what area especially did you develop yourself, looking back?
I developed in time management, stress management and setting boundaries. For example, after I figured out what time management strategy works for me, I also figured out that writing down to do list and crossing out completed tasks is the best way for me to manage stress, because when I see it written down - I realise that it’s actually not that much work. And as for setting boundaries, I stopped replying to my team on weekends, because I’m available to them 5 days a week as it is and it’s not my problem that they decide to do their work other the weekend instead of workweek. Another boundary is to stop working on either responsibilities after 6:30-7 PM as I think it’s really important to relax before sleep.
What did you find especially fun or interesting to learn?
That I’m really not a spontaneous or let’s work with the flow person and instead I need to know exactly when, how, why I need to do. I need my to do list, strict work hours, quiet, etc.
What else would you like to investigate, engage in and try out?
Nothing really, I think I’ve tried out pretty much all the time and stress management techniques there are.
WHAT DID YOU FIND DIFFICULT? WHAT STOOD IN YOUR WAY?
When and during which activities and assignments or moments did you experience tension, boredom or other obstacles?
Enforcing boundaries with a team that refuses to respond to messages at a reasonable time and not in the middle of the night or on weekends. Also trying to arrange meetings with them as they lack assertiveness and wait until last minute to cancel, leaving me alone at coachings.
RESOURCES
What were the key resources during the experimentation? Who or what helped you to feel good, develop insights experience flow and achieve your goal?
Google calendar and trello were my most used resources. They helped me manage my time, tasks and calmed me down about the amount of actual tasks I have because I could see them all in one place.