I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but your friendly neighborhood Advice Nerd has been absent from the last two issues of The Skyline View. I have no excuses. I‘ve been preoccupied with an overwhelming work schedule, the woes of my home life, and the pressures of being a full time student and I just couldn‘t find the time to give you the advice you so well deserve. You all know how it is… you’ve got dogs to feed, bills to pay, loads of homework every night, etc. There are all sorts of things to keep you from the activities you’d rather be doing. This week’s Advice Nerd is going to focus on a few personal tips on how to manage your time… something I should have been doing all along. Maybe my mistakes can help you figure out how to manage your own hectic lives.
I’ve got a plan!
One of the best things a student can do to keep themselves on track in their busy lives is to keep a planner or calendar. Most cell phones are pre-programmed with some kind of day planner. Normally they’re easy to use and very convenient, considering they’re already in your phone. If you’re anything like myself, you carry your cell phone with you everywhere— it’s like an invisible leash. If you aren’t cellularly inclined, there are free planners made of good old paper in several campus locations. They’re small enough to fit in your bag and full of other nifty features, like a big portion of thestudent handbook. Did I mention they’re free?
If I could turn back time…
One thing I’ve been doing that really helps me is setting my alarm clock forward by about ten minutes. That way, I can set an alarm for whatever time I have to wake up and then have an extra ten minutes to sit there and whine about how early it is. Not to mention, whenever I have anyone at my house they get really confused and try to reset my clock… I always get a good chuckle out of that one. One might not think that the simple act of changing the clock ten minutes could alter the entire course of the day, but I am totally convinced I’m better for it. I’m late less often and sometimes (although rarely) I even manage to be a minute or two early. The only thing better than fooling yourself about what time it is would be to actually travel through it, and I have a suggestion for you. Invest in time travel now. When it finally is invented, people will go nuts over it. Trust me.
Triage your time
A simple yet mostly undesirable way to manage your time is to free some of it up. There are students at Skyline College who do way too much stuff with the little time they have, and yet they continue to stretch themselves thin. A friend of mine once told me that if you wanted a white picket fence, you have to paint each post first. The way I interpreted it, she meant that you have to focus on one thing at a time in life in order to get what you want. Students at Skyline College don’t want to be there forever… they want a good life with all the toppings, but they have to work for it. Eventually they want to be out doing what they want to do, and I understand that. If you do too much at once though, your whole life will suffer, and it will be harder to squeeze your way into the life you dream of. If you can handle a heavy load, go for it by all means, but if you find yourself folding under the pressure, don’t be afraid to put off some of your goals for a bit. Procrastination can be your friend.
These are my helpful hints, and may they help you in whatever way they might. I’ll be back next issue, and hopefully by then someone will have asked me a question. I’m going to go pick up one of those free Skyline College planners, and you should too. They’re free, why not? Until next time, Skyline College, this is goodbye.
