On Compartmentalizing

Photo credit: Alex Abian on Flickr

Like many writers, I juggle a lot of things at once.

Right now I have grad school. A part-time job. Freelance editing. And I'm an author with an active social media presence.

This month, alongside my regular responsibilities (the part time job, freelancing, social media things, everyday life stuff, etc.) I also had my third book due to my editor, as well as two essays. I tackled the book three revisions by doing what I know my brain does best: binge editing, in which I literally dedicated an entire day to revisions until it was done. That worked really well and allowed me to get that major responsibility out of the way so I could then focus on...everything else.

I won't pretend it's perfect—the stress has literally made my chronic illness flare up multiple times this month. But as I'm nearing the light at the end of the tunnel I'm feeling as though it might just be possible to do everything I need. Hopefully.

I still have all the other things due. But I've been realizing, as of late, the way I have to handle things is one at a time. I feel a little lighter knowing I got one major deadline down, and now I'm tackling the rest with new energy. And I'm thinking that maybe I should handle the some of my responsibilities the same way.

I compartmentalize a lot, but as I'm often juggling A Lot, I've found that it's really how my brain works best. If I can focus on one aspect at a time, and ignore the others while I'm getting one thing done, then I don't get overwhelmed with the mountain of things I need to tackle. And with each completed compartment, I feel even more prepared to handle the next.

This isn't going to work for everyone, obviously. But it's how I've been handling what is essentially four jobs, this semester, and I think I'm going to implement it even more as I go on. Because figuring out what strategies work best for your brain can go a long way toward not dropping all the balls at once.

Do you compartmentalize?

Twitter-sized bite:

How do you juggle multiple, major responsibilities while still meeting your deadlines? @Ava_Jae shares their experience. (Click to tweet)