by Markus Fortune
Before I attended university, I never waited until the last minute to complete assignments or tasks. After I began my third year of studies, I started putting things off. Once was fine; I was able to catch up right away. Before I knew it, crunch time became a regular occurrence in my life as a student. Starting assignments the night before and completing 30 page papers mere days before they were due became the norm. While the work that was required of me was getting done, it was taking a harmful toll on my overall well being. While tackling tasks late when the pressure is on is at times unavoidable, it can also be an easy pitfall to succumb to and even make routine. But for most of us, with a little planning it’s possible to complete the tasks we do every day and still have time to do the things that bring us joy in life.
Time management is an admirable skill to master. When we master time management to the degree that best benefits ourselves, we can effectively balance the tasks we need to do as well as the activities we want or like to do. Crunch time, being the opposite of effective time management, can be a troublesome barrier to our goals. However, it is never our intention to cause ourselves hardship by putting ourselves into a situation where we are feeling the pressures of crunch time. As I mentioned earlier, I often put myself into situations where I felt that time crunch. It felt like a debt that would take ages to repay; I was borrowing time that I was never going to have. Back then, I was prioritizing rest and recreation. Don’t get me wrong; rest and recreation are important. In my case, however, I was resting and relaxing a little too much. My schedule lacked moderation and structure. Everything became a problem for my future self to deal with. This habit of bad time management gave me all the usual negative side effects of working too often under pressure: anxiety, stress, lack of sleep, eating quick and unhealthy meals instead of well planned healthy ones, and so on.
Changing these habits and developing the time management skills that work for you takes, well, time. And practice. It took me about seven years before I developed the skills and practices that worked best for me. Reframing my thinking around deadlines and important tasks into a form that brought benefits instead of hindrances was a good first step. Saying “I need to do this to succeed, but I can take my time” was more helpful than saying “I need this and quick or else I will fail”.
All of this can sound great on paper, but making it a reality can be difficult. Implementing or even exploring new time management habits and skills can make us feel resistant to the change. It can even feel unnatural. Introducing these new time management habits can be helpful when we look at what we do in the run of the day. Roughly 8 hours sleeping and working adds up to about 16 hours right away (the average schedule for the average adult). That leaves 8 hours to complete the things we need to do as well as what we want to do. One helpful piece to keep in mind is finding that helpful balance between the things we want to do and the things we need to do.
In her TedTalk on Self-Care, Susannah Winters suggests that we have the time to do the things we want and need to, but sometimes we need to allot that time in different ways (2019). If we are looking at the remaining 8 hours of our day and we are spending 5 hours of that remaining 8 hours watching television, that is a large block of time where we can move hours/minutes around to complete other tasks (Winters, 2019). Playing devil’s advocate: do we really need to spend 5 hours each night? To adhere to each side of this argument, sometimes we do need that time. Sometimes wants become needs. On the other hand, 5 hours of television can be a bit of time that can be spent on other tasks. To make the transition to better time management habits easier, maybe giving up 1 hour of television to check off a “need” from your to-do list could be a positive start! Remember, these changes are suggestions that work for some. Additionally, these changes will not happen overnight. Habits take time to learn, form, and sink in.
These habits are already difficult to integrate into our everyday lives when we have relaxing time to work with. But for many folks, for example parents with small children, most hours of the day are already packed with caring for others needs, let alone their own. But there are some things parents can do to help build new time management habits for the whole family.
Inclusion can be an incredible tool when considering time management, especially when we are feeling that crunch time. Children usually show interest right away when it comes to anything that is going on within the home. Including kids in time management habits and planning can be a great way to keep everyone involved. This could also encourage the children to learn and adopt positive time management habits as well. There are several ways this could be accomplished. One way is by including everyone in creating a time management plan. This can also be a fun activity for everyone to take part in. For children, they are engaging and contributing to something that helps the entire family out. For parents, they can present ideas to children that are fun activities for them, but that are also cleverly disguised breaks for the parents. These could be activities that require a cost, but there are many free options as well. Children can also play a role here; asking them what activities they would like to do on a certain afternoon or entire day can be a great way to sneak those breaks in for parents. Let’s look at an example.
In a house with two working parents and two children (one 7 years old, the other 8 years old), everyone is sitting down to discuss a time management plan. All of the activities for the week (Monday to Friday) have been planned (after school care, grocery shopping times, etc.). The two days that are left are Saturday and Sunday. Providing a choice, the parents ask the children what they would like to do out of the following options: a free day camp with the city of Halifax where children can visit Citadel Hill, a day with uncle Jerry to explore the Halifax Waterfront, or joining a local kids soccer team. This way, the children feel they have a choice and hand in the planning of their weekends. Sunday has been decided as a family day doing an activity everyone can agree on. This way, everyone feels included with what is being planned for the family. If you are wondering what can be done at little or no cost, please check back soon to read my article about low cost activities you can take advantage of this summer!
Crunch time can be an overwhelming source of pressure, but only if we allow it to be. We have the power to reframe what crunch time means to us and how we can manipulate it to work for us rather than against us. Time pressures can be viewed as challenging encouragement. Planning, especially with children to consider, can be difficult but not impossible. Trying new ways to include everyone can be a great way to create time management habits for the whole household that will help everyone later in life. What it really comes down to examining and understanding the ways we’re spending our time so we can effectively plan out space for both our needs and wants. Managed properly, time, even crunch time, will soon be something you can bank on for your future goals.
