The Gift of Time
Let’s face it, we all stress out around the holidays. Whether it’s worrying over holiday plans, cooking the perfect meal, finishing up end of the year school-related tasks, or even buying the perfect gift, the holiday season brings with it plenty of extra tension to navigate. But as we consider all of these stressors from an executive function standpoint, what would be most beneficial to provide some relief? How about if we gift ourselves with extra time to manage all of these moving pieces?
Organization is the Key
Sadly, a time machine is not an option for gift-giving (at least, not yet). But there are real-life, everyday organizational strategies we can incorporate into our busy lives that might amount to the same thing.
Disorganization is a time suck. It can be chaotic just trying to tackle daily tasks without a plan, never mind the added responsibilities that come with the holidays. When it comes to organizing schoolwork, just about every IEP or 504 plan contains an accommodation related to breaking down long-term, multi-part assignments into manageable chunks with timelines. Thinking about the holiday season in the same way is a life skills application of this best practice in the academic world.
Work Smarter, Not Harder
There’s a reason why Santa makes a list and checks it twice! Working smarter (or rewriting smart, as we like to say here at EEG), saves time and reduces stress. Here are some tips to get you started:
Prioritize your activities/assignments. It’s not enough just to list all of the tasks you will be responsible for. You need to figure out which ones take priority so that you can tackle them first.
Get the timing right. How long will each item on your list take? (Approximations are fine). This can be a factor in your prioritization as well. If something is important, but will only take about 15 minutes to accomplish, you can get it out of the way first to clear time for other important tasks, or save it for the end since it shouldn’t be too much of a burden. Accounting for your preferences is another piece of effective organization.
Eat the frog. But when taking your preferences into consideration, don’t automatically put off non-preferred tasks – especially those that you dread. They may never get done, and that anxiety may stay with you and affect the rest of your work. Mark Twain is attributed with the adage, “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning, and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.”
Plan time to relax. Structuring in down time helps to ensure you can rest and recharge without feeling guilty that you’re not doing something on your list. It is on your list!
We hope these tips help to manage holiday stress, and wish you all the best of the season!