After a stressful few months of work and study, I finally have some breathing room to pick up my blog again. During this period, I stuck to my workouts, but not the meal plan. Now that I’ve had a bit of time to rest and evaluate my progress so far, I’ve made a few observations that will hopefully help me as I progress with my health and fitness goals.
- Tackle one thing at a time. With a full work schedule, back-to-back exams, and a new workout program in the mix, I found myself completely exhausted at the end of the day. I decided to be patient and commit to meal planning when I had a little breathing room. I’ve finally started this week, using My Fitness Pal to log meals and try to eat as healthfully as possible. I’m pleased with my progress so far.
- Get enough sleep. I found it was much easier to tackle a full schedule when I’d had adequate rest. Granted, that can be difficult to achieve when you’ve got a million things running through your mind, but I tried to relax before bedtime with a book and a cup of tea. That seemed to help – I definitely had more restless nights when I was staring at a screen until late in the evening.
- Try not to get overwhelmed. This was the hardest lesson to learn. When deadlines are looming and you feel like you don’t have enough time to accomplish everything on your list, panic starts to set in. I especially found myself worrying about making mistakes, or not doing well in exams. Making mistakes is part of being human – don’t fear them before they happen!
- Connect with your support network. Dinner with friends and family, chatting on messenger, or calling your mom can help. I found my stress levels dropping dramatically when I connected with some of my favourite people.
I’m grateful that the last few months are finally over. From now on, I’m going to work on managing my stress so that I can better handle my busy (and sometimes hectic!) schedule.