Anyone who knows me knows that I am the epitome of a “busy body.” From classes to work to organizational involvement, and trying to be more involved, I am spread quite thin these days. Because of my busy schedule, I rarely get enough sleep and I’m pretty sure that I forgot what the word “break” even means. After a recent incident I had, I realized that it was indeed time for me to make a change.
About two weeks ago, I started drinking this energy supplement to try and maximize how many hours I was able to be alert and get work done. I drank the supplement for three days straight, and to be honest, I noticed that it was working quite well. However, on the third day, everything went downhill.
The night before, I was taking out my locs, so I was up pretty late, but I never really felt tired. Time passed, and all of a sudden, I noticed the sun had come up. I panicked, looked at my phone and saw that it was 6:35 a.m. I was completely astonished. I had never stayed up this late involuntarily before. The most peculiar thing was that I wasn’t even sleepy at this point in time.
I thought about possibly trying to take a nap, but I had a class in a couple hours, so that was out of the question. I decided to just continue with my day, hoping that I would eventually fall asleep later on. Unfortunately, my hope was severely misplaced. I went through my entire day, completely unfazed by my lack of slumber.
I was concerned at this point because I know how much I love sleeping, so it didn’t make sense that I was just going through the day with no hours of sleep under my belt. At this point, I had been up for over 24 hours straight. Thinking about it now, it still feels as insane as it did that day.
After my classes, I went back to my apartment with my best friend and tried to take a nap. Somebody got to go to sleep, and it wasn’t me. It wasn’t long after my best friend left that I finally took a nap. Before that nap, I had been awake for 36 hours straight. The nap lasted for at least 4 hours and it was so great.
While the nap was great, I actually missed two really important meetings that I had earlier in the day. At that moment, I realized that I needed to make a change in my time management and stress management. I went through my normal decompression methods, such as watching tv or reading on my Kindle, but I felt so guilty for being unproductive.
I tried getting recommendations from others and something that stuck out was a paint by numbers kit. I purchased one immediately, as I was eager to see if it would help me while not making me feel like I was just wasting time. I think I’ve only touched that thing about four to five times since I bought it, which was two weeks ago.
The next day, I had a meeting with my advisor for an organization I’m in and I confided in her about my issue with being able to make time for myself and my well being.
She told me about this technique called the Pomodoro technique. Essentially, the technique consists of these 25 and five minute intervals that are cycled.
During the 25 minute intervals, you’re supposed to focus on doing your main task, whether that be homework, studying or doing laundry. During the five minute interval, you’re supposed to rest, in whatever way you deem fit. I chose reading and social media scrolling as my two main rest activities.
I’ve been using the Pomodoro technique for a week or so now, and I can definitely say that it has been helpful. I feel like I’ve been able to rest a bit more, as well as get a lot more of my school work completed. Nevertheless, I’m really bad at forming new habits, so I have been sort of inconsistent with the application of the technique.
I think the most important thing that I’ve learned from this little experiment is that I need to put a larger emphasis on my personal wellbeing and make more time for myself. I have always been a person that is so quick to sacrifice themselves, so thinking of what’s best for me isn’t always the most natural thing.
Whether it’s the Pomodoro technique or maybe just cutting out some activities in my life, I plan to do whatever it takes to make sure that I’m happy and taking the best care of myself possible. I’m sure it’ll continue to be a bumpy road, but I’m also sure that I will figure out how to get it done.