This time of year, it’s really easy to see an idea about fitness, or productivity, or just general life-improvement and think “WOW! Life changing! I’m totally going to do that!” and then never ever think about that idea again.
I know because I do it all the time, and I’m sure you do, too.
But today is a new day, in a new semester, in a new year, and this time it will be different because I’m giving you some tips on how to actually get things done, for real.
Clean up
Some of us lack the motivation to clean when we’re not threatened with being grounded, so this is me being a mom and telling you to clean your room. If you clean a little bit every time you walk into the room, like putting clothes away, making your bed, taking the trash out when you leave, you won’t be left to tackle enormous messes at the worst possible time.
Emails
If your inbox looks like mine, then it’s probably overridden with UNC “no_reply” messages and random Facebook birthday reminders. Do yourself a favor and sort through what you actually need to keep and what you probably need to delete or unsubscribe from (Bundt Cake of the Month Club, anyone?). This will make it easier to find all those deadline reminders that you wish you saw two days ago.
Make a to-do list
This is probably terribly over-repeated advice, but it’s because it really works. Get out a piece of paper or even your Notes app and think of all the things you need to get done for school, work, family, friends, annoying thoughts that bother you throughout the day, whatever. Write them down, keep that list with you and try to mark off at least a couple each day/week. (Go do it now—that’s the point).
Plan your week
Plan something you do daily, like when you need to get up (or when you need to take a nap) and set up your week accordingly. You could set aside a certain study time, time to work on a project, or time to binge watch all those new episodes on Netflix (who said that?) so that it becomes manageable throughout your semester.
Marking your calendar
Planning out your semester in a calendar can be very helpful when it comes to remembering important dates and deadlines. I suggest going through your class syllabuses and writing down dates for projects, papers, finals and office hours that you can easily refer to. It’s also nice to mark school holidays and break dates, so at least something in your calendar is comforting.
Here’s to hoping these tips make your semester a bit more constructive, but if nothing else, reading a post about productivity was productive, right?
To get the day's news and headlines in your inbox each morning, sign up for our email newsletters.
