Friday Feature: Stress

With the start of a new semester, I'm back in my car again, consuming audio books in small snippets. Under the circumstances, picking up where I left off in Kelly McGonigal's, The Upside of Stress seemed like a good plan.

I've not been disappointed. 

McGonigal, a health psychologist, has a very positive outlook on stress. In fact, she shares research that stress, if we manage it right, can actually be a good thing. 

And that's very good news on a Friday or any other day. 

True Confessions Wednesday: Organizing is Fun

True Confession #12: Organizing makes my short list of fun things to do when I have a day off.

No, that's not sarcasm, which is probably why I spend so much time writing about this stuff. And, as I've said before, the organizing and the writing feed each other. When I write about my problem areas in a blog post here, I get motivated to wave my magic organizing wand and make them disappear.

Unfortunately, there is no magic organizing wand. It's all good ideas (and some bad ones) and elbow grease. And time -- the most elusive ingredient of all.

After last week's blog post, I made it a point to take the time to properly organize the student papers that were littering my dining room table. I had them stacked by class but, because of the way I'd collected the assignments, some of the piles had multiple assignments in them. Writing last week's post nudged me to grab three cardstock filing bins (green, blue and yellow, for those of you color-coding at home), separate the papers by assignment and turn the stacks and piles into neatly (color-coded) paper-clipped stacks all contained within one file per class. I'd been putting off doing this because I'd had my blinders on, careening forward and "accomplishing things" instead of stopping and taking the time to put things in an order that would reduce my stress.

Just me?

The thing is, I really enjoy organizing. I'm not wild about cleaning (unless it's cleaning a newly cleared space) or cooking, but organizing? Lemme at it!

Last Sunday, I had papers to grade so, of course, I cleared off the counter in my office. (Did I mention that organizing is also a procrastination technique of mine?) Since then, every time I walk into the office, my eyes light on that newly cleared space and I smile. There is still work to be done as well as projects I'm eyeing up in other parts of the house, but that space makes me happy and more likely to spend time in my office.

When we get busy, it's easy to put off organizing. We run from one thing on our to-do lists to the next, claiming we don't have time to stop and sort. But, if you're like me, when you finally make the time to do just that, the act of taking stock and putting things into order can be just the stress relief we need. Sorting all those papers on my dining room didn't reduce the number of papers I had to grade, but it allowed me to get a better idea of what was actually there and corral what looked like haphazard piles. Suddenly, I was in charge, running the task instead of the task running me.

hudsoncrafted via Pixabay

Over this Thanksgiving break, I hope to express my gratitude in multiple ways. One of them will be getting rid of outdated and excess things so I can truly enjoy what I have. I won't get rid of all of them, but I have a few spots I want to dig into. I gave my students the assignment of savoring something over their break and I can't think of a better way to savor what matters than to remove all the stuff that gets in the way of my enjoying it in the first place.

Happy Thanksgiving. I will be taking tomorrow off to savor time with my family. See you next week.

A Little Adjustment

Pixabay

Sometimes, we fall into patterns of behavior that seem perfectly logical. We continue with them almost mindlessly, until they become habits and before we know it, we're doing the same things in the same order without even considering whether or not there's a better way. 

I've been doing this with my class preparations. Then, each week, I chalk up the fact that I feel pressed for time to the usual problem: too much to do in too little time. That, and a healthy dose of procrastination atop the whole thing like some sort of wayward cherry.

Last week I decided to try changing the order of events a bit, and loosening up my self-imposed timelines.

What a difference. 

When I realized how much less stressed I was, I wondered why I'd continued to do things the same way for so long.

Habits are a funny thing. When they're good ones, they work in our favor, but when they're not so good, they drag us down. Unfortunately, it's sometimes hard to tell the difference between a good habit and a not-so-good one, and it's only when we make adjustments that we see how much better things could be.

I'm still adjusting a bit to my new way of looking at things, and arguing with myself about the looser time frames. Am I slacking off, or finally being realistic? Only time will tell. 

Luckily, whatever the answer turns out to be, I can always adjust.