In every day to day aspect of life there is something to be said about perseverance and commitment. Every individual has their own set of personal commitments such as work, school, and even kids. In any aspect to persevere over any unforeseen issues that may arise such as scheduling conflicts, production delays, medical issue, or even something more personal like a kid being suspended from class, is the most crucial goal to anyone’s daily life. To persevere is to maintain a steady course of action despite any major or minor issues that may present themselves during one’s usual routine. (Random House Unabridged, 2019)
In my personal day to day routine I am currently juggling the running of my own home-based business, as well as raising four young children, keeping up on any household and automotive needs all while attempting to return to the world of academia. In business as well as home life I am faced with many tasks that can at times get extremely taxing on the psyche. Making the notion of returning to a formal education setting seem almost insane, or even impossible to some. Therefore, I find keeping a well laid plan of execution of the utmost importance. One thing I prefer to do at the start of every week is make a complete list of all the primary and secondary tasks that need to be completed with in the course of the seven-day period. While making this list I try to establish a basic chain of priority for each individual task. To start off all primary tasks take preference over any secondary task. Think of it as the difference between a want and a need. The primary list is made up of the things that you absolutely must get accomplished before the weeks end. The secondary list would be the things that you would wish to accomplish before the weeks end but are not necessarily essential to calling the week successful. A great example of this would be I need to file all work-related invoices in order to receive payment for services at the end of the week verses wanting to build a new gazebo in the back yard. The invoices are something that would be my primary goal where-as building the gazebo would be my secondary goal.
Proper organization of tasks can go along way in making every week a success, but always be sure to keep what I call a “Plan B” situation available in the case any issues may arise. This way if there is a weekly task that is technically unmanageable for any certain reason there is a secondary solution to keep a proper order to things. For instance, my car needed to be taken to a mechanic because it wouldn’t start leaving me with no way to complete a good portion of my weekly tasks and the part needed wouldn’t arrive until next week. In this moment one could consider their week a bust, but a good plan B was instead of waiting for the mechanic to receive the part I opted to find the part myself locally in order to have the car fixed immediately. This is just one simple example of a possible issue that could arise. In any aspect it is always important to attempt to keep a steady pace and try not to over book the week. One thing to keep in mind when referring to the list of primary and secondary priorities is the average difficulty of the tasks presented in the week. I prefer to start with the more challenging things on my list giving a little extra breathing room for finishing out the remainder of the week.
References
Random House Unabridged Dictionary, Random House Inc. 2019. Perseverence
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/perseverance
