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A System to Step Back at Work Without Drowning
What having Covid taught me about prioritization
It’s already halfway through February, but on my desk, it may as well be January 1. I’m getting back into my normal rhythms after coming
down with Covid alongside several members of my family a couple months
ago. Thankfully, everyone is on their way back to health, but, wow, did it knock me out for a while. And leave me with a mountain of work to be done.
It’s not as bad as it could have been, though. I work for myself, which means that, for me, having some sort of maintenance mode in place was the least stressful way I could take the time I really needed to fully recover. To get through the last several weeks without my work life completely falling apart, I needed a strategy for prioritization.
Just to be clear: I’m not trying to spin a “silver lining of Covid” story or recommend that anyone try to work while they’re sick. If you’re down for the count, you’re down for the count. But the time constraints brought on by my illness — I only had about an hour or two of energy each day before I needed a nap — taught me some important lessons about how to prioritize. And I learned that to step back without drowning (in any context, not just Covid), it helps to have a system in place.
