My daughter has been in school for a little over two weeks now. As much as I was excited about her going back to continued distance learning, hoping I would get more time to do things both at work and around the house, a week into it and I was still behind on my scheduled tasks. I would plan things for the day and not be able to accomplish 50% of it- it was a week of EPIC FAIL!!
Despite her being in the virtual class 8:30am-2:30pm, with an hour-long lunch break and a couple mini snack breaks, this mommy was feeling good-for-nothing with most of her work not getting done. I was feeling so guilty for not being able to meet my daily goals of chores, organization, work, fitness and everything in between. I knew there was something that I was doing wrong. I knew I had get to the root of this lowered productivity and work on it. I needed to approach my day and task list differently and here's what I figured out was hurting my productivity.
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This one was the root problem of all my problems. Social media has taken over our lives, our time, our core values and everything in between. I've tried social media break several times, but I realized that after each break I would end up spending more time, trying to catch up whatever I missed during the break- more time squandered! There is a constant conscious or subconscious urge to check my emails, my Instagram, my stories every few minutes or hours. I sit to work or do some house chore but I would have this interim itch to browse the net or watch Insta stories. Honestly speaking, not only was it killing your time and productivity but I was falling victim to this comparison trap which was then killing my self-confidence. Seeing others busy, creating awesome content, making more money blogging and sharing content was leaving with this oppressive emptiness. Hence, going forward I choose to follow and engage with a limited number of people whose aesthetics resonates with that of mine, and who I believe are at similar life situations. I've stopped browsing recklessly and check my emails and text messages only once or twice during the day. So don't feel offended if I haven't replied to your email or text- I will get back to you shortly.
My family and I thrive well on a structure, a plan and a shared calendar ( both virtual and a planner chart ) that lists all the weekly things we need to do as individuals and as a family. Taking a look at your to-do list before going to bed the night prior always helps. Don't worry- this is highly recommended and my sleep therapist advocates this practice too. She suggests hand writing a list of all that you need to do the next day, the night before. This helps you address/prioritize the tasks and when you are actually doing it, list will sort of come to your naturally. This helps keep your productivity high.
I always lecture my daughter on how she should step out of the house during her virtual class breaks, how she needs fresh air and a change of scene. Looking at the screen constantly tires your eye and fingers and can give you excruciating headaches and painful trigger fingers. I would lecture her but would not follow it myself. Now I take smaller breaks, I will just step out to walk the dog, do some stretching, or do some yard work and make sure to get a change of scene. Additionally, I don't overbook my calendar. I divide my weekly tasks between six days and allow myself some wiggle room. I'll just push a task to the next day if I'm unable to finish on the day it was supposed to. But I make sure that the weekly things are wrapped up by the end of the same week allowing me the peace of mind and higher energy to bring my A-game the following week.
We as humans tend to keep pushing our bigger tasks for later. The more you keep putting them off, the more your productivity will diminish. The things that are weighing heavily on your mind should be addressed first. No matter how daunting, how unpleasant, how undesirable they are- tackle them first. This will at least save you the mental stress and guilt of not being able to complete it. So go for it, you know you have to do it, you don't have a choice, so get on it and give yourself the peach of mind.
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