Be it students or teachers or professionals, everybody is engaged in multiple activities at the same time. Taking out time for everything becomes very difficult. Learning to manage time can never go waste in life. Many times people make schedules only to break them. Sticking to the routine is tough. Something sudden and unplanned always comes in the way. It at least feels that way. If you too have been going through the same chaos in life and are now at the breaking point then here are some tips to manage time effectively.
- Observe your activities
Before making any schedules and plans take out time and observe a regular day in your life. See where you spend most of your time. How much time is actually spent in productive work? Or how much time does it take to produce the desired results in a day? Where is your time going? What activities are you engaged in most of free time? Why aren’t you unable to follow the schedule?
- Make routines
Working according to a schedule is a daunting task. Some people have the habit of working according to their plans and get panicky when situations go out of their routine. There are two kinds of people, one who go by the rules and the rest who do not go by the rules. It is natural for some people to follow schedules. But it is not impossible for the other kind of people to do it. Why are schedules important in the first place? Because it reduces chaos. In scientific viewpoint every element wants to attain the simplest possible structure. The same goes for us too. The less chaos in life, the smoother it works. Why do we like our childhood or school days so much? Because everything was planned in it. We had a fixed time for studies, for playing, for eating and sleeping. Hence, making schedules is important.
Don’t make a strict routine. Keep gaps in between as one never knows what is going to happen in the next moment.
- Prioritize
Give time to the things that are important for you. Set priorities in life. The things that matter to you should get more preference. Saying that you do not have priorities in life is a lie and a blunder too. Because you cannot treat everything in life equally and give time to each and everything. Some things need to be sacrificed.
- Change your routine daily
Each new day brings with it new possibilities. Each day is different from the previous day. Then why should the routine be same every day? It gets very mundane and eventually you will get bored of it. That is why most routines go unfollowed. Because they are boring, uninteresting and repetitive. That said, it does not mean that you remove few things that need to be done daily. For instance exercise should be done daily. The only variation that you can bring about is by changing the exercises or trying a new jogging track every day.
Don’t make schedules for a whole week. Plan daily. Take 30 minutes of your morning to plan the whole course of events of the day ahead. Planning for a whole week not knowing what might come up in the weekend is stupid and sheer waste of time.