Be organized and plan your day ahead noting what to do, when and where to do it.
• Don’t procrastinate.
• Find out what is important to you and figure out how you can spend more of your time doing thosethings. Being time effective doesn’t mean trying to do everything in the least amount of time possible. It may be admirable but doing it all is stressful. Effective time management means spending more time on things that really matter to you and less time on things you don’t enjoy doing or things that can be delegated.
• Delegate some tasks and responsibilities and ensure effective monitoring
• Find out the time needed for each task and allocate a little more time than necessary. Allocate enough time to travel. This will help you to enjoy the trip rather than start the journey late and race through it, anxious and worried about getting to your destination late. If you are not affected by not building enough margin probably because nobody can challenge you if you go late for a programme; remember that other people you love or that love you might be frustrated by your actions. When you are in a hurry, you are likely to offend someone who crosses your path.
• Pray about everything no matter how small it is, rather than getting frustrated. One day I was helping my younger son to do a project and we needed a certain picture. I know we had had such a picture in the house in the past but I wasn’t quite sure if it had been thrown away or it was still somewhere in the house. The two boys were trying to talk me into searching for it but I just told them I don’t operate that way. I would rather pray first and get inspiration on what to do. We forgot about the matter until two days later, we were arranging their wardrobes and the maid was told to change the old calendars used to line the wardrobes, suddenly, she saw the particular picture we needed. No matter how hard we searched the house, we wouldn’t have found those particular calendars with the pictures needed.
• Utilize your waiting time very well: e.g. read a book, or a journal
• Spend less time with negative pessimistic people or people you don’t enjoy.
Focus on one major task at a time, finish it and move on to other things
Control interruptions that tend to put you on edge and worsen your stress.
• Group your tasks: Bundle your errands, pay bills at the same time, make phone calls and read messages in groups. It’s not worth feeling overwhelmed by phone calls or messages; while the senders are enjoying themselves.
• Buy some thingsin bulk and shop by mail
• Use internet for banking, make airplane, train, hotel and any other kind of reservation on the internet.
• Don’t stay on the internet surfing or playing computer games for too long. • Avoid the perils of perfectionism. (don’t spend more time on each task than is warranted)