I know from experience that balancing everything in your life can be difficult.
Since summer 2017, I have been gradually doing more and more. I currently go to school full-time, work and intern part-time, am involved in an on-campus organization all while trying to continue being devoted to growing in my faith, making time for my family and relationship, working out, reading, watching anime and playing Pokémon (yes, I’m a little nerdy but it’s okay). Making sure I find a way to make all this work hasn’t been a piece of cake, I’ve had many bumps in the road where I’ve fallen behind or failed to allocate my time wisely. However, I’ve viewed this as a learning process and now balancing my life is smooth and stress free, for the most part. To keep my life in order, I make sure to follow a few rules:
1. Praise God and pray to God.
I recognize that without God I wouldn’t be able to accomplish all that I’m doing, some of these doors that I’ve walked through probably would have never opened. Praising God and praying to God is the first step in all of this.
2. Wake up early.
Waking up early is the first thing within my control that I make sure I do. I start my day around 7 a.m. 6 days a week and 8 a.m. on the 7th (Sunday). Waking up early allows me to get a head start on my day and get things done early. The first thing I usually do in the morning is work out and then the rest of my priorities follow. The sooner I complete my daily tasks, the sooner I can unwind.
3. Know your priorities.
Prioritizing is incredibly important when you lead a busy lifestyle. I check to see if I have any obligations that need to be completed by a certain time or date and make sure to do those first. I tend to make a list of what needs to be done in order and then go down that list.
4. Create a routine.
Consistency is important to me, I try to keep a consistent schedule from week to week. Each day of the week I have certain things to do and they vary by very little from week to week. Sometimes a routine can bore and tire me out but it keeps me successful in all my roles.
5. Surround yourself with supportive people.
Seems obvious that you should surround yourself with supportive people, right? Yet sometimes we fail to see that the people around us aren’t as supportive as we thought. Make sure that people understand your time outside of your obligations is a privilege not a right. Your friends shouldn’t ask you to go out clubbing Thursday night until about 2 or 3 A.M. when they know you have a test Friday morning at 8 A.M. In fact, they should be encouraging you to study. The people in your life who know you’re busy shouldn’t complain that you’re doing what you need to do to better yourself — they should be happy for you.
6. Find ways to de-stress.
This is just as important as everything else I’ve mentioned. RELAX SIS, you deserve it. All work and no play can really tire you out, so make time for the things you enjoy. As I stated before I still make time for my family, relationship, anime, reading, Pokémon, all while being devoted to growing in my faith. These are all things I enjoy doing, they’re not obligations or to-do list that needs to be completed.
These are all things that make me incredibly happy and without doing them I’d probably burn out. Whether you choose to dedicate 30 minutes a day or 3 hours a day to doing what you enjoy, make sure you do it. Don’t let time pass you by as you’re building your resume or trying to work your way through college. Learning to balance all that I was doing took time. I failed miserably at times and had to play catch up with my work while other times I neglected my social life. By following these 6 rules I’ve found a healthier way to balance my life and I couldn’t be happier.