Our college years start the busiest years in our lives. Academics, extracurricular activities, Greek life, working, finding internships, having a social life and just growing up and learning to “adult” are what consumes our days. Personally, packing my schedule with multiple commitments is what keeps my time management skills refined so that I stay on top of everything. For others, it is more helpful to have their activities spread out so they have more blocks of time to work on homework or pick up a shift at work. Regardless of the kind of person you are, I have determined a few tips as to how to best manage your time.

Make a “To-Do” List

Making a to-do list is something I do on a daily basis to keep my thoughts and tasks organized. I figure out my schedule for the day and determine when I have free time between work, school, working as Editor in Chief of a publication and writing as an intern for another. I also try to make time for socializing with friends or having downtime for myself to binge Netflix series, take a nap or maybe go to the grocery store or do laundry.

Planning Ahead vs. Taking Each Day by Itself

While it is very important to prepare ahead of time and put effort into not procrastinating on assignments or other chores or errands that need to be done, it is also important to take each day as it comes. Having a monthly calendar in which your academic schedule/assignments, work schedule and other extracurricular events can all be coordinated is very useful. I have one hanging on my wall so that while I make my to-do list each day, I know what I have coming up that I may need to get a head start working on. However, it is also important to take each day as it is because there are things that come up throughout the day that cannot be controlled. These curve balls have to be taken into account as they come, and sometimes this causes our daily routine to change.

Stay Healthy

Believe it or not, staying healthy is very important to managing your time well. For example, eating a balanced diet, getting enough rest and working out can bring about many benefits to your daily life. Your energy will carry you throughout the day and will help keep you focused on the tasks you need to complete each day, and sometimes even make you think more creatively about each of these projects. Exercising is very important too because not only does this help keep people in physical shape, it helps with mental and emotional stability too.

Incorporating these behaviors into your daily routine will not change your time management skills over night, but they will naturally and gradually become second nature to you. Staying healthy is very important and doing things every now and again that just make you happy and make you feel like you still have a life and can do things you want to do while still remaining productive in learning to grow up.