How to Plan for the Busy Weeks

Classes are slowly starting to pick up. Sometimes I find myself looking at my planner and thinking how the heck am I supposed to finish all of this? It just seems like sometimes there is not enough time in the day to complete everything that needs to get done. You know those weeks when you have some assignment due, some meeting scheduled, some practice to go to, on every day of the week? Yep, well that is how it has been here.
     Currently I am taking 16 credits of class (which is normal here), blogging, playing a sport, giving tours and maintaining a healthy social life. I guess what I am trying to say is that things get busy, but everything is manageable.

ONE// I know I say this a lot but, USE A PLANNER. If I did not have a planner I would probably die. Whether you use a paper planner or a planner on your iPhone, just make sure you have one. During really busy weeks, and I mean really busy weeks, I can even organize things down to the hour. This may sound weird, but I have two planners. One is my normal one that I use on a daily basis and the second one is one that I use primarily on Sundays. My Sunday Planner, as I call it, is a more broad planner. I write down all my assignments for the next week along with all meetings, practices and activities that I have to be at. This planner is organized into three categories:
     Could Do's- tasks that could get done if I had extra time, such as non-mandatory meetings and events and shopping.
     Should Do's- important things that I really should do, such as meetings or events. But these things can be rescheduled if need be.
     Must Do's- my non-negotiables such as assignments, studying, practice, mandatory meetings, class and keeping in touch with friends and family.
Upon breaking it all down into these three categories, it is also color coded. Each category has a color and then each day something is due has a different color. As you can probably tell, I am a very visual person.

My daily planner.

My list of things to accomplish for the week.

TWO// Make other lists. Along with my very intense planner, I also make lists for each day. These are often broken down by time segments (morning, afternoon and night). On this list I write down all the stuff that must get accomplished for the day.

I do this every day in a plain, spiral bound notebook. It just helps me to be a little bit more organized throughout the day. 

THREE//These weeks are the hardest time for me with social media. I get distracted so easily so once I open up Facebook it often sucks me in for a few hours. During my busy weeks, I often have to limit my social media usage.

FOUR// During busy weeks I often forget to take time to myself. Balance out your caffeine intake with water. Schedule when to sleep at night or when to take a quick nap (I love naps). Take breaks during the day to go for a walk, listen to some music or talk with some friends.

FIVE// Planning ahead is one of the things that I often forget to do. if you know that you have a busy week ahead of you, do your laundry before the week, get little assignments out of the way, or if you have meetings or appointments that can be rescheduled, do it to clear up sometime. Also, if I know that I have a busy week ahead I will clean up my room a bit so it makes me feel less cluttered.

Love,
Susanna

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