Famous Last Words: Syllabus Week

I am generally an incredibly organized person. I pride myself on my spreadsheets and my Google calendar and my well-labeled files.

Stock Calendar Photo
Source: Pixabay

You would think, then, that I would thrive during syllabus week, which is basically a gift given to University students that allows us to prepare for the storm to come. However, this specific syllabus week hit me particularly hard. For the most part, I highlighted and sorted and classified with my usual flair, but I made far more mistakes than I intended to. I submitted event reservation forms for the wrong day, ordered equipment for an event that didn't actually exist, and proceeded to repeat the process only to find out that I had, again, erred. This sequence of events took me the entirety of an hour, and then took me the entirety of a forty-eight hour period to fix. As the workload intensifies this semester, and as the systems that I put into place to make my life easier become more strained and burdened, I need to remember that efficiency involves speech AND accuracy. One without the other makes for an entirely ineffective process, and while I wish I had the time for ineffective processes, that is not the case.

On the other hand, I need to remember to take more time for myself. I need to take time to sing, write, eat bad food, and watch trashy television. To that end, I have reserved Saturday nights (and by reserved, I mean that from 7PM on Saturday to 8AM on Sunday my Google Calendar is marked with an event named "Don't Even Think About Scheduling Works Here Jake, You Need This Time". I also need to make sure to go to the gym at least once every few days. Working out makes me feel so much better, and combats the fact that, although I am constantly working, that working generally involves me being fairly physically inactive.

*takes a deep breath*

And those. I need to do more of those.