Mike Abasov

If you were following any of my advices, you are probably struggling with finding time for everything like I do. I’ve never been so busy in my life, but, as time goes by, I find new ways to make the most out of every hour and not burn out. It gets easier with practice.

Here are a few things you can do to find time for everything and make your time constraint less binding.

Utilize

Look back at your days. You might find that you’re not utilizing a huge junk of time. You spend 2 hour a day commuting while doing nothing but mind wondering? You stay in lines for 10 minutes feeling bored? You wash your frying pan many times every day?

No wonder you feel like there is not enough time for anything! Try this.

Audiobooks for your commute time
I’ve been listening to one business book a week while driving for the last 3 weeks, and it’s an amazing time-saver! Try them at Audible and get a membership, if you find them awesome.

Multitask
Audiobooks is the first steps to multitasking. I also manage to check-in on Foursquare, while waiting for my tall no-whip mocha, or check email, if the line gets lengthy. How can you make the most of your wait time?

Group tasks
This one is about frying pans, for example. The problem with cooking every day is that you need to clean after yourself, heat the pan, etc. every day. Try cooking for a few days ahead in one session. This is also a great way to cut on sandwiches and chinese (nom-nom-nom!).

Utilizing sleep time is bull shit
Sleep is very important. It helps you learn and increases your productivity. You might want to cut on sleep to fit in more (I’m guilty of that), but it only results in low creativity. And low creativity stops you from finding easy and fast solutions (Rework). 

Speed up

You can do a lot of thing much faster.

Say showering. I got this advice from Men’s Health, and it really makes sense to spend under 10 (or even 5) minutes showering.

Or speed reading. As a student you are going to read a lot over a long period of your life. Why not learn to read fast? Try apps like EyeQ.

What else? You can do almost anything faster. For example, if you’re a blogger, check out these articles: “How to Write a Great Blog Post in Just 15 Minutes” or “HOW TO WRITE THREE BLOG POSTS A DAY.”

Hack It

You can be more productive by changing the way you do things, perceive them, or by using some tools. Research how other people make most out of their time. My favourite places are Lifehacker for recipes and Appstorm for apps.

Even such an incompetent source as myself can show you something cool, right? (Smile, you’re on camera ;-).

Classic Time Management

Use a calendar
I prefer iCal (Mac OS), but Google Calendar is pretty good too. Log everything to your calendar: birthdays, classes, regular workout times, etc. I believe that a perfect calendar has no empty spots.

Also, and this is a good one, set up automatic import of your events from websites like Facebook or Meetup.com. This is the most awesome thing that has ever happened to calendars. Ever!

I also use wall calendars to separate some specific categories of activities, like blogging.

To-Do lists
Gotta love them. I use Things (Mac OS, iPad, iPhone), combined with iCal and Highrise for my to-dos. I separate tasks by activities, such as “School” or “Shopping,” and by projects, such as “HootSuite Internationalization” or “Commerce 295.” 

The main reason to use these lists is pure simple—you forget less. The runner-up reason is also about memory. When you backup your memory in such a way, you can concentrate your thoughts on more important issues and be more efficient. 

That’s it

Sorry for taking so much of your time. But look, if you were reading this post at 1,000 words per minute, while on a bus taking a break from listening to “Crush It!”… you get the point!

How do you fit everything you need to do in you tight schedule? And, on another note, am I crazy?

All my life I’ve been fighting my nature.

You see, I’m much more productive at night than in the morning. Yet, due to the influence of my parents and many other people, I was forced to live the early-bird lifestyle.

Even though I’ve been living by myself for a long time now, I was still trying to go to bed not too late and wake up not too late either. Until lately, when I got into a 9 to 5 work and school schedule that leaves me, most of the time, exhausted (but happy) by the end of the day.

As I needed to study for midterms, I found a great way to cope with this. I would have an hour-long nap when I get home, which would reenergize me and shift my schedule by a few hours. Now I can tirelessly study and work through my most effective period — at night.

Listen to your clock

If you don’t know yet when you are most efficient, try different hours and see for yourself. Make sure you know if it’s early morning or late night, or afternoon, or some other time.

Any time that works for you is fine. There is nothing bad or wrong in being not willing to wake up at dawn or wanting to spend half of the night at a 24/7 coffee shop. 

Adjust your schedule

Now that you know your most productive time, adjust. Do the least brain-consuming tasks when your brain is not ready to be consumed. Use the most productive time to be, hm… productive.

I wouldn’t suggest spending your best hours in class. After all, taking notes and listening to someone speaking doesn’t need a lot of though, does it? On the other hand, your job and homework do.

Also, figure out a sleep pattern that works for you. I, for example, hate sleeping for 5, 7 or 11 hours, but can easily live with 4, 8, 9, or 10. I also would prefer going to bed at 4am and waking up at noon to going to bad at 10pm and waking up at 6am. I’m a weirdo, I know :).

Embrace your nature

Don’t hesitate. There is no reason to perform worse by following some useless norms. There is no reason to waste time either. Analyze yourself now and you’ll be much happier in the future.

So what’s your most productive time of the day?

So here we are. You already know that, in order to become really successful, you need to step up your game, which we will, from now on, call personal branding.

Sure, personal branding is not yet a must for becoming successful but only in cases where success is directly related to your achievements.

If being successful means to you being the best at doing what you love, then dive into the activities described below and start building your brand now!

Warning

I should warn you that taking these steps will make you forget 2 words from your vocabulary: boredom and free time.

Boredom. You will never be bored, if you are actively working on achieving success by doing something you like. You will be excited, full of passion, tired but fulfilled. Bored — never. 

Free time. You won’t have any free time, because you won’t need it. Don’t worry, you will still party and have fun, and date. But those days when you didn’t know how to entertain yourself are forever over. You can now find entertainment in work, and this is your first step to happiness.

Action Plan

Here are 5 simple activities that will help you start branding yourself.

1. Join student clubs.
Check out any student clubs you find interesting and get into a few! You’re not making any commitments, so don’t worry about joining too many — you can drop them along the way.

For every club you’ve joined, participate in their events. Try them out!

You will meet new people, and people = opportunities. Every job I had, I had got because of the people I knew. Networking is extremely important.

You will also figure out what you like, develop your palette of interests.

2. Become active online.
Yes, it’s time you get on Twitter. Start tweeting about the stuff you like, the books you read, the things you do to become successful. Tweet about this article, after all!

Putting yourself out there will help you show everyone who you are and what you do, leading to conclusions about why you are better than your competition, why you should be hired.

I don’t advise you get into blogging right away, but if you feel like it, go ahead!

3. Learn. More.
Curriculum is good. Extra-curriculum is extra-good. Start reading blogs and books about your profession, watching documentaries and going to conferences. Absorb avery bit of information and be hungry for more.

Then share your knowledge with your new friends from student clubs and followers on Twitter.

4. Increase productivity.
You might not feel this pain yet, but as you become more and more active with your life, you’ll understand how scarce the time is as a resource. So start early! Here’s a list to consider: speed reading, time management, life-hacking, utilizing commute time.

The more efficiently you can use time, the more you will be able to achieve before graduation.

5. Read this blog.
And subscribe to the “Awesome Sunday” newsletter, for god’s sake! :)

Summing up

Every point mentioned here, I will be discussing on the pages of this blog in detail. There is a lot more to learn about personal branding and other aspects of improving your college life. But these few tips will get you started.

Are you doing any of these already? What exactly? How is it working out for you?