Posts from — February 2013

Congratulations on making it to The Week That Is Supposed To Make Up For That Time We Were Forced Back To School The Day After New Years Day, Instead Of A Week Later Like Everyone Else! If you’re hoping to do at least one productive thing this coming week, this list is for you.

For your health:

• Regulate your sleep schedule.
  Take this time to start going to bed at a decent hour and catch up on those missed hours of sleep due to late night (or all night) exam cramming and paper writing.
• Start an exercise habit.
  If you’re anything like me, the biggest barriers to exercising regularly are not just a lack of time and energy, but also the fact that it isn’t a regular occurrence to begin with. Challenge yourself to exercise for at least 30 minutes every day this week and start a habit of exercise.

For your sanity:

• Do some pre-cooking.
  If you’re in the habit of bringing lunches to school, why not take this week to do some bulk cooking? You can separate your bulk cooking into meal-sized portions, pack them away in ziplock containers and freeze them until needed. Saves future time and money.
• Clean your bedroom/dorm/apartment/house.
  Because you know you probably won’t have the time or the motivation to do it once classes are back in session.
• Do one thing off your procrastination list every day.
  Maybe you have avoided updating your resume, looking for jobs, writing that email, paying those bills, bringing your car in for a tune up, clipping your dog’s nails, etc, etc. Whatever those things are, make a list to identify them, then do one item each day this week.

For your social life:

• Reconnect with friends and family.
  Take this time to catch up on quality time with the friends and family you haven’t seen in awhile. (Which is—let’s be honest—probably everyone who doesn’t go to UBC.)
• Try something new.
  Hot yoga. Painting. Bike the seawall on a sunny day. Paper journalling. Knitting. Peruse the street carts downtown. Drop-in pottery class. Visit Vancouver Island. Roadtrip to Whistler. Day trip to Washington state. Go the aquarium or science world. Be more bold and get out of your comfort zone. Bonus points if you try something new with a friend, or make a new friend while trying something new!

For your academic life:

• Get caught up on your readings.
  I don’t know a single person who isn’t behind on their readings going into reading week, so I guess they named this break well.
• Get ahead of your readings.
  Imagine how great it would feel to be sitting in class, already familiar with the material your prof is about to lecture on. How much more would you learn in that class if you did your readings before coming to class, instead of after? Remember that feeling and use it to motivate yourself to read ahead for the week following reading break.
• Do one thing that will set you ahead for next week.
  This can be anything from coming up with the thesis for your term paper or completing webwork that isn’t due until next Thursday. Whatever it is, getting a head start on future tasks will help ease your workload when you get there.

How are you planning to spend reading week?