3 Keys Thursday: 3 Keys to Surviving a Six-Day Week

Photo: Dodgerton Skillhause via Morguefile

Last night, I crept up to bed after my husband was already asleep (the norm when a night owl marries a morning person). He stirred and, before rolling over again, wished me a happy November 1.

Suddenly, I was wide awake, and none too happy about it.

I am entering the month of six day weeks. I've got lots of good stuff going on, including spending this Saturday at the York Book Expo and going to a concert in New York City but, unless I make some adjustments, my writing time will take a beating (not to mention the stuff around the house I usually on Saturdays). The semester will be ramping up at the same time, too, and the holiday season is just around the corner. 

When it rains, it pours.

No matter how valuable or enjoyable the activity that leads us to "lose" one day out of the week, we can be left feeling behind schedule, and a tad stressed out in the week that follows as we try to "catch up."

When this happens, it's helpful to remember to do a few things as you tackle your "six-day week":

Breathe. Tension and stress do absolutely nothing to help us accomplish our tasks or reach our goals. In fact, they often do just the opposite. Breathe, try to relax, and tackle one thing at a time.

Triage. I'm not a medical professional, so my understanding of this term is limited to my extensive experience watching television medical dramas. Fortunately task triage is much less intense than triage in the emergency room, and boils down to three questions: Who matters most? What matters most? and What has a deadline?

I know, I know -- they all matter. It all matters. 

But you know what? It doesn't. Some tasks and some people take precedence. To quote Stephen Covey, "Put first things first."

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Stop worrying about what you can't control. This includes other people being miffed because you didn't do what they wanted you to do. It's hard enough to make decisions about what comes first without trying to second guess other people's interpretations of your choices. And often, they're trying to make the same hard choices you are...which means they aren't even thinking about what you're doing.

I know. Easier said than done. The ideal situation is to have just the right amount of stuff to do each day with none that carries over into the next day, the next week, the next month.

Wouldn't that be wonderful?

But we aren't robots, and there's much more to life than checking things off our lists. Luckily, breaking out of routine -- especially if it's to do something fun -- can recharge us. From a time management perspective, it can make us more efficient as we jettison the stuff that's not so necessary in order to get the important stuff done. 


So, this week, I'm ramping up my writing time during the week to make up for the time I'll miss on Saturday. If I weren't on deadline, I might just label the Expo "writing related" and worry less about "lost" writing time. Even better, since we turn the clocks back this weekend, I'm recapturing an hour.

It's not much, but I'll take it.