Manage your time to manage your stress.

While the saying is true: we all get the same 24 hours a day to work with, isn’t it interesting that some people manage time more effectively than others and what works for our friend or someone we admire online may not work at all for ourselves? The example that comes to mind for me are all of the awesome planners that are out there. I love the idea of a paper planner. In reality, any paper planner I have ever bought sits somewhere in my house collecting dust within weeks.

I have come to learn that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to time management, but I have also come to learn that managing our time is a fantastic way to manage our stress and completing the stress cycle. It’s probably not the only tool a person needs to use for stress management, but it’s an important one. Landing on a process for time management that works best for *you* is the key. Here are 3 ideas to consider:

Color coding schedule.

When I started graduate school, I found myself as a full time student, a part-time employee, a part-time volunteer, a full time wife and mom, and also trying like heck to create good sleep and exercise habits. While I use my Outlook and Google calendars, something - usually healthy living - would get pushed to the side to make room for other things. Out of sheer desperation, I opened a blank Google Sheet, labeled it accordingly, and began adding color blocks to represent what I was doing when. Within mintutes, using this simple visual tool made it clear to me that I had taken on way too much and I needed to make adjustments. Is making adjustments fun? No, because it usually involves saying no to something you originally said yes to. But that sting lasts for a minute and the feeling of “having time” and more importantly control over your time is lasting and can feel amazing. Here’s an example of what I use:

Please keep in mind you are seeing a 10th (ish) iteration of my use of this tool - I change it at least once a semester to match what’s going on in my life. The first time I color coded my time to match how my days were scheduled it was a hot. mess. However, seeing that was the motivation I needed to get realistic about my commitments and once I did that, I was much less “stressed out” each day.

Time blocking.

I have recently started doing this and I love it. I time block on my Outlook and Google calendars. It’s a north star to guide me through my day, and it helps guard my time from meeting takeover. Meetings have a place and are often a non-negotiable in the work environment, but so are the things that people count on you for to get done on time and on task throughout the day. Pro tip: It’s ok to block out 30 min every day to ensure you eat lunch! It’s ok to block out 5 min 3x a day to ensure you get up from your work space and move your body and use the bathroom! These things seem obvious as I write them and probably as you read them but think about how many time your schedule has been taken over and suddenly find yourself utterly stressed out (and REALLY needing to go potty!). Time blocking is a tool that can help with this.

Batching.

This is when you block out time to get ahead on something. A practical example is carving out a few hours every Sunday (or another day) and make and pack up grab and go lunches or just-put-in-the-oven-when-you-get-home dinners for the week. This will save you time during the busy week and help you make healthier choices. In my school world, I work ahead whenever I can so cranking out reading and writing and group work in a chunk of time each week helps me make that happen. With work, I will write 6-8 blog posts in a block of time and 30 days of social media posts in a block of time. That equates to 2 months of blog posts and 1 month of social media content.

Incorporating effective time management techniques into your daily routine can and be transformative, enabling you to navigate stress in healthier ways. By using strategies like making your commitments more visible to you by color coding, time blocking, and batching, you can not only enhance your productivity but also cultivate a more balanced, lower-stress life. The key to mastering time is not just in managing it but in making it work for you, so you can enjoy more of what truly matters.