Life and Work… Approaching the Problem of Balancing your Busy Day

This is the third post here at HeadsOrATale. I’m both excited and nervous as I write this on the 8^th floor of our beautiful library here at the University of California at Santa Barbara. I’m going to get straight into the content of my article here, and ill briefly introduce myself at the end.

So, life is this myriad of activities, your days become a blend of responsibility, work, studying (if you’re a student), socializing, and every other action imaginable! You find yourself wondering (as I do, about 1 million times a day), “How can I possibly accomplish all of the things I want to do?!” We all wish there were a simple answer to this question. I’m here to propose one. Balance. Learn to balance the things that are going on in your life. This simple exercise should help you identify the areas of your life that require more control:

1. List all of your current activities (if you have a few DESIRED ACTIVITIES that you’d like to add, feel free. However this list can end up being nearly endless if you don’t have a good idea of what you want)- i.e. work, school, travel, dating, social life, relationships, responsibilities, etc.
2. Organize your list. Once that’s done, write down how you organized it? Was it by preference? Benefit gained from each activity? Time required for each activity? Was it simply by what you do most?
3. Ask yourself what your goal is. Are you interested in money? Sex? Helping people? School? A good way to determine your immediate goal is to ask yourself which activities are priorities and which are extra-curricular. Now, WRITE YOUR GOAL DOWN!!
4. Re-organize your list according to the goals you set in step 3. Try to be as objective as possible, and stick to the goals you set.
5. Make a plan to achieve your goal.

Interesting exercise right? You should have two lists of activities that you can now compare- one showing your disorganized chaotic life , and one that shows your balanced, organized life… Now, I know reorganizing and introducing balance into your life is not so easy that you can just list things, make a plan, and boom; your life is brand new. There are steps in the process to gaining control of your life. Now, allow me to introduce myself:

My name is Eric Amzalag. I’m a third year Business Economics and Accounting major at the University of California at Santa Barbara. I’m currently on the 8^th floor of the UCSB library trying to get work done, but even the library here is distracting. I’m looking out 6 foot tall glass windows that offer a 270 degree view of an ocean horizon. Life is tough . The reason I gave you that description was to illustrate life at Santa Barbara. If the library is that much of a distraction, you can imagine what life outside the library is like- a beach that is a 30 second walk from anywhere, parties, beautiful people. All of these things are a distraction; unless you are anti-social or extremely driven it’s very hard to maintain control of your life here. My life was a crazy whirlwind of desires for my freshman and sophomore year. I desired good grades, desired to implement my ideas, but amidst work, classes, the beach, people, parties, it was always difficult to maintain a firm grip on my goals. It wasn’t until the 3^rd quarter of my sophomore year that I was able to find techniques that would allow me to buckle down and implement my desires. I have spent the last 8 months searching for advice on how to organize my life, to manage my time. The goal of my next post here at HeadsOrATale will be to discuss those techniques and the people who taught me them.

Related posts:

1. Setting and Completing Goals Part 1
2. UCSB Student Entrepreneurs Association Website and Eric Amzalag’s Wacky Life