What I've been doing

[Jonathan Crane - Scarecrow]

Hey everyone! I didn't quite make post quota this month, working really hard on that right now actually. But I thought I'd fill you guys in on just a little bit of why my slow down has happened. I'm currently enrolled as a junior in college taking 17 credit hours and doing 3 IRB's. I'm also involved in multiple things that are scholarly and extra curricular for school so my life is quite busy. That beings said, I need to manage my time better. So I'm going to try very hard and keep commitments (Which I've had a lot of trouble doing lately across the board.) I really really want this to change. So I'm reaching out to you guys, those of you that I've promised threads and posts to saying that I'm trying to do better. I'm going to make time management commitments, right now I just need a little help with that.

So I'm taking suggestions.

Help the doctor out here.

How do you guys manage your time? Any tips to help me with such a busy schedule? Some of my biggest problems are having time but when I do have time I'm so dead tired I can't type.

Main questions *What commitment do you think would be reasonable as far as a posting schedule goes?*

Can't wait to hear from you guys

-Jon

[Avalikia]

Ah, time management! During school, no less! Well, I'm afraid that I can't give you too many specifics when it comes to balancing school and RP - I didn't RP at all while I was in college... But! I know that what helps me most with managing my time is planning and prioritization. You have 24 hours in a day, everyday - how are you spending that time?

Your first priority should be self-care - meaning enough time to sleep, eat, bathe on a regular basis, keep your place from being a sty, having groceries in your fridge, etc. Even so, it may be possible that you're doing these things inefficiently - a minute of time saved is a minute you can use to do something else. But I don't think self-care is likely to be the place where you're wasting time - if anything, it sounds like the opposite.

If you're exhausted that means that you're probably neglecting self-care - sleep if it's physical exhaustion, while mental exhaustion can happen due to any number of reasons. Not eating properly, not giving yourself enough time to do whatever it is that helps you most mentally, and a host of other things like that all contribute to your mental energy. I know that taking more time for self-care when you're really busy seems to be something that will make the problem worse, but actually it gives you the energy to do more so it will actually result in a net savings of time.

Since I know you're religious, that's probably high on the list of priorities too. School, including homework, is rightfully up there too - get that degree!

Now, all of the above combined is probably most of your time right there. And when you've done all those things - well, I don't know how you prioritize your life, but the above are probably non-negotiable. Anything else that you consider to be non-negotiable comes next, and then you get the stuff you can live without. Where you put the forum in all of that is frankly up to you.

I'm assuming you know how to plan out a week based on your list of priorities. As you know, you'll always have more that you want to do than you have time to do it - you're going to have to let something go. Yes, I know that you're superwoman, but you can't do everything even if you have the best self-care ever. The sooner you can face up to that fact and allow those lower priority things to go, the happier you'll be - you can stop worrying about those things, and focus on what is more important.

Now, as you're also aware, no matter how much you plan out your schedule, something will come up to get in the way. And it will either be your fault or someone else's fault. If it's your fault, try to be aware of what you're doing - see if you catch yourself doing something less important, do some self-examination about why, and exercise the self-discipline required to get yourself back on course. If it's someone else's fault - I don't care who they are or what they want, if it's not a priority for you then take control of your time. Say things like, "I'm sorry, but I really, really need to focus on my homework right now." And don't feel bad about it! It's your 24 hours, not theirs - plan to do something nice for them later, maybe.

And that's also why I have a hard time telling you how what sort of a commitment to make to the forum. I don't know how high it is on your list of priorities, and I'd never tell you where it should be. I can tell you, as a player, that my level of being pleased with other players increases as the time between their replies decreases and that this is per thread - not overall. This means that, for example, I'd be much more pleased with someone if they gave me four replies in one thread during a month than I would be if they gave me one reply in four different threads during a month, even though that's the same number of posts. What you do with that information is up to you.