A post to help you manage your time

Prelims are around the corner and you might not even know it, it is already midterms! This high alert scenario induced me to write this simple advice about one skill we all need in college – Time Management. I know a few notions and techniques about the art and science of it which I hope to share with you!

In almost four years of being in college, I have come to realize that the bedrock skill in any time management effort is Prioritizing. All else springs from this. You should prioritize. The accessory knowledge of this is understanding 2 very essential things: what is important and what is urgent. Important things are those that deal with values, missions, vision, relationships, principles (e.g. education, family, and friends). Urgent are things that require immediate attention or action (e.g. answering phones, replying to messages, harvesting your farm in farmsville). Here is the challenge. Work on Important things AND not urgent things because it is here where you can easily manage your engagements. This is where planning, prevention and relationship building happens. Imagine when you both work on important and urgent things, this is where crisis occurs like cramming for a project (both important and urgent). When you are working on urgent but not important things, this is where relationship breaks and values deteriorate.

Stemming from the Important and not urgent quadrant are the three basic steps in managing your time. First is having a term calendar (a handy planner) where you plot important dates such as deadlines of projects, exams, debuts, etc. Second, breakdown your term calendar into weekly plans, medium sized tasks with deadlines. These acts as the building blocks you’re building day by day to accomplish the seemingly gigantic cathedral of a major homework (for example in a term paper project, allocate the days where you need to finish the certain parts of the whole term paper). Ideally, you can review this every Saturday to check if the tasks are still on track. Third is to develop a daily to-do-list. This is essential and I am personally a religious follower of this practice. From the medium sized tasks you plotted for the week, develop a detailed set of doable daily tasks. In this process you get to fully monitor your progress and bit by bit accomplish the important big things.

Now, there are a couple of things you need to put into mind in a daily basis that complements your to-do-list. These are. . . Learn to say No/Delegate; this is an art of human relation, set deadlines; helps you have a time frame, jot down notes; don’t depend on memory too much, it is advisable to have a separate notebook for this, take advantage of natural cycles; know your high energy points and low energy points in a day and accomplish difficult tasks in your high energy point, Reward yourself; always have a break to enjoy yourself. These are the things I put into mind to have a sense of control of time but at the end, time management is really a misnomer, it is actually life management in its essence. So try to review your habits and routines. Identify time wasters (too much facebook, surfing), procrastinating moments and unhealthy habits that steal your time. It is not too late to change them for you to become more effective and efficient. Remember, the very reason why we manage our time is because it can never be regained - so use it wisely.