Dear reader,

I call myself a planner. Do I write in my planner every single day? No, that requires too much work and I usually end up forgetting two weeks into the semester.

I’m a planner in the sense that I am always thinking ahead. I want to know exactly how my week is going to go. 

Every night in bed I run through the next day in my head until I feel comfortable with the idea of tomorrow. 

You would think this would give me anxiety, but knowing exactly how my day will go actually makes me less anxious.

I like to call myself a good planner, and I will admit that my ability to remember every part of my schedule without ever writing anything down has definitely boosted my ego and encouraged my laziness.

That being said, I am obviously not the perfect planner. I try to convince myself to get my stuff together, grab my pretty highlighters and start writing in my planner, but it’s so hard to get into that habit.

This brings me to the question of whether or not anyone is a perfect planner. Does any one person really have their life so perfectly lined up that they never sit around wondering what to do with their life?

Everyone has experienced a time when they had a heart-dropping, Earth-shattering realization they completely messed up their schedule.

I just experienced this the past few days. It was a whole debacle and I’m still recovering, to be completely honest with you.

I forgot about a mandatory meeting for Study Abroad I had this Tuesday (or I thought it was Tuesday), so I told one of my professors I couldn’t make it to this new meeting he set up for dance on that same day. I sent an email and everything.

On top of that, I told a girl I could come to a dance rehearsal this Tuesday at –– get this –– the same exact time.

I soon realized that this meeting my dance professor set up was actually on Thursday, and I had also agreed to a dance rehearsal during my other mandatory meeting.

Long story short, I told my dance teacher I could indeed come to the meeting, and I told that girl I could not come to rehearsal, all so I can go to my Study Abroad meeting.

I can blame this whole situation on the fact that I had a huge paper to write this whole past week, or the fact that I was out of town this weekend with my family, but the truth of the matter is that I used poor planning skills.

I could sit here beating myself up over this, which admittedly I did do for a teensy-tiny bit during the car ride back to my dorm, but I had a realization and decided to change my mindset.

We all have poor planning moments. We’re not always going to get every detail right. All we can do is learn from our mistakes and move forward.

I will improve on my planning with time and after this weekend I will most definitely be putting more things into my calendar from now on.

Perfect planning takes practice. It’s not something you just learn with the snap of your fingers. We’re at a point in our lives where we’re learning new skills and growing.

So if you get the time wrong for a meeting or forget you were supposed to submit an assignment, don’t beat yourself up over it. Move forward and know better for next time.

And if you are that rare case of a perfect planner, I’m jealous of you and I beg that you pass some of your skills to me. Please and thank you.

Lots of love and hugs of encouragement,

Skyler

P.S. Fun fact, I thought this story was due a day later than it actually was. Another great example of my occasional poor planning skills, but I’ll get over it.

Schad can be reached at [email protected].