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In a world where apathy is trendy, it can be hard to not feel a little guilty for appreciating yourself and your work out loud. The societal expectations of success are never ending, and it seems like you can’t get praise until you can prove you’re running yourself into the ground in attempts to meet your goals. It’s expected that we will get overwhelmed every now and again no matter how busy we are; But I mean, who can really live like that and function well?
One example of the toll this kind of pressure takes on us is the New Years Revolution phenomenon. You know what I’m talking about. The gym is PACKED the first few weeks of January with people who are suddenly pledging to live a better life and yet the gym is dead again by February. Chances are, you aren’t going to just jump into your perfect routine. It’s going to take a little bit of self love and confidence, whether you like that or not.
Whether you’re flaunting your accomplishments or trying to stay sane on the DL, it’s important to self reflect on your work to maintain a balance. No, I don’t mean criticize yourself until you reach perfection, I mean take a second to appreciate every task you already do every day. And, oh yeah. You bet this is going to sound like some hippie BS, but keep on reading. I bet that you can improve on at least one of these things.
Go into the day knowing what you need to get done and try to stick to it. If it doesn’t need to be done today then it shouldn’t be at the top of your to-do list. Try to plan for minimal procrastination and power through your list! You don’t have to plan for full days either. Maybe you have a set list of tasks for the morning, and then your afternoon is dedicated to other random jobs and free time.
Seeing how many things you’ve completed at the end of the day is almost as satisfying as crossing items off the list in the first place. Do you have too many things on your list to feel satisfied at the end of the day? Remember how big your projects are and cut yourself some slack if a few of your tasks were bigger than the rest. If you’re feeling especially motivated you can color code them by size. My large tasks are red and my small tasks are green; I may have only gotten 3 things done today but one of them was red so I’m feeling pretty good about it!
For example, I won’t have my afternoon coffee until I’ve crossed off half of my to-do list. Don’t over indulge yourself, but you definitely deserve credit where it’s due.
Conversely, if you need another cup of coffee to get through the day, treat yo’ self. Go into projects prepared so you can complete them and move on without backtracking. Avoiding revisiting tasks keeps you from moving forward, so go into a project knowing what you will need so you don’t have to write the script as you go. You’ll feel a little less frantic throughout the day and maybe you’ll stop constantly wondering if you’re forgetting anything.
Don’t waste your own time. You’re better than that and there’s people who are probably already doing that for you. Stick to your daily and long term goals and fight off those Facebook urges. If you need small brain-breaks, take 5 minutes after every completed task to walk around and stretch, brainstorm, or decompress on Instagram. Try to remember that it’s OKAY if everything didn’t get done today because you can only take this one day at a time. Take a second at the end of the day to remember all the things you’ve completed, even the small stuff (you rock!).
As long as you take a second at the end of your day to recognize your accomplishments, you should be alright in the end. You accomplish a lot more than you think every day. Never forget the small stuff, take a few deep breaths, and remember you can only take this one day at a time.