New List, New Look

Holgi via Pixabay

Last week, my husband and I went to visit my daughter, who is finishing up a semester in Ireland. I applied all of my organizational strategies to packing in a logical fashion, only to have to unload and reload as we went through security, who had no respect for my styles whatsoever. And, not knowing what to expect when it came to the weather, I seriously overpacked.

But none of that stood in the way of my fun.

Now I'm back, the fun is behind me and everything I left at home -- papers to grade, book tasks to manage, writing assignments to complete -- is tugging at me. Typically, I spend some time on Sunday night or Monday morning making lists and assigning tasks to times, using my "This Week" pad to create a lovely little I need to see it reference list. But this week, we were in Ireland on Sunday and spent most of Monday on a plane or en route to one. At one point during the journey home, my husband looked me at and asked me what I was thinking. I told him I was thinking I needed to make a list of everything I needed to do.

And I did. I could even see it in my head. Two neat columns, bearing no resemblance to the day-by-day format I cherished on a weekly basis.

When I got home, I grabbed a steno pad and set to work. Column 1: Work. Column 2: Not Work (a.k.a. everything else).

It's now Wednesday and I've supplemented that list with a Wednesday schedule. Have I dropped the ball? Abandoned my strategies? Gone over to the organizational dark side?

Pexels via Pixabay

Nope. I've merely responded to what I need at this moment. The end of the semester is less than a month away, the number of classes that remain to be planned and taught now in the single digits. As I try to shift gears out of vacation mode and into nose-to-the-grindstone mode, I need to see the big picture, which means I need to use a list strategy that gives me plenty of room to see all the stuff. Right now, that's my two-column format.

Next week, I'll return to my usual strategy. By then, I'll have crossed nuisance items off my list and the remaining items will earn their slots on the day-to-day schedule. But for now, as I transition back to the real world, I need something a little less structured.

How do you know when it's time to change up your strategy, whether temporarily or permanently? I'll take a look at some of those ways tomorrow. Meanwhile, I'd love to hear from you in the comments.