My New Definition of Productivity

Author: Lucy Poole
Posted on January 21, 2021

Every January, we are flooded with messages of resolutions, healthy habits to start in the new year, and generally just a whole lot of (usually unsolicited) advice for how we could be doing so much better than we were the year before. I will admit that I am a sucker for believing in the fresh start that a new year brings (my history of spending an embarrassing amount of money on planners is a good example), but going into this winter semester I’m setting different types of goals for myself than I would have a year ago. 

In a small university community like we have here at MtA, it can be hard to feel like you have a life separate from school. I’ve talked about this a bit on the blog before, but especially living in residence, you can sometimes feel like your “school brain” needs to be switched on 100% of the time. For me, this idea made me feel guilty anytime I was “unproductive” - and for no reason! The feeling that you always need to be productive is something that plagues a lot of university students. It is easy to get stuck in this type of mindset and lose sight of some of the things that are more important than school.

The biggest change I’ve made in the last year to help fight these feelings of guilt was to change my own personal definition of what is productive. Once I was able to do this, my life stopped revolving around school, and it instead became just one of many parts of my everyday life. Cleaning your apartment, facetiming a friend for an hour, or cooking a good meal shouldn’t make you feel guilty about not doing schoolwork - these things are just as important! School can still be a priority without completely taking over your life.  

I could go on about this forever, but I’ll wrap up the post by telling you about one of my new favourite productive activities: baking cookies at 11pm on a Tuesday night (it’s happened more times than you’d think).

I don’t need to explain why cookies are good… but I’ve found lately that baking itself is one of my go-to activities when I’m stressed out. It’s the perfect distraction, but familiar enough to me that it doesn’t require a lot of brain power or extra stress (unless my unreliable oven burns the cookies... always the oven's fault, not mine). One of my best friends (you know who you are!) also has a tendency to be easily convinced to come over any time of day for some baked goods and a chat. It’s such a small thing, but an hour of conversation with a friend is sometimes just what you need to take your mind off whatever is stressing you out. 

As we wrap up the first week of the semester, don’t forget to take time for yourself and do things that will make you happy! The information overload of the first week always makes me feel like I need to sit down at my desk and do a million things at once, but taking a step back will help you gain some perspective and look at this semester in a positive way. Good luck!!!

Photo: Baking cookies while catching up with friends on Zoom = productive!