I normally use a timer often in my day-to-day life to remind me of apppointments and to limit time I spend reading blogs and taking care of personal business, but when I am feeling particularly overwhelmed by a long list of things to do, the use of the timer is critical to remaining calm and feeling on top of things.
For example, today's planner right now is divided into 11 sub-lists: Fall 2011, December 2011, January 2012, Spring 2012, Summer 2012 Anthro, Summer 2012 Intensive, Summer 2012 Health, Fall 2012, Spring 2013 and a final catch-all labeled "Admin." All need attention; all have due dates looming. I have a master list of all things that need to be done in each category. At the end of each day or first thing in the morning, I move items from the master list to my daily planner. I now have a fairly good idea of what I can accomplish in a day. I work hard at keeping the list manageable.
Then I start working the timer. Today I gave myself 10 minutes to complete two evaluations, 10 minutes to summarize a discussion we had last night on resumes, cover letters and interviewing, 30 minutes to translate a syllabus from one of our affiliated universities for a class a student is taking next semester, 30 minutes to complete the class schedule for Spring 2012 and to send it to my instructors. And now I am giving myself 30 minutes to write this post and to read my favorite blogs. Then it is back to the list....
1 comment:
Sounds like a good system. It seems that some days organizing what needs to be done takes longer than the actual doing...
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