Life Of E's

If you are like most teachers, you may have some clutter lurking in your classroom – and let’s start with your desk. Look at that big drawer in the lower right- or left-hand side of your desk – the one where files are supposed to go.  To use that drawer for its intended purpose, you will [...]

Tags: clutter, distractions, focus, Productivity, tips

Student evaluations are a part of every faculty member’s life. Some consider them to be a positive part of the academic life and others dismiss them as a meaningless exercise (or even worse, as a detriment to good teaching). You might as well know that I come down on the side of student evaluations being [...]

Tags: positive, Professors, students, teachers, teaching, tips, work

How can you stay in the present (mentally) – or get to the present? Here are 5 strategies: Breathe. The idea is that you breathe in. Then you breathe out. This helps you to get centered – and somewhere I read that the space between breathing in and breathing out – that’s the present. So [...]

Tags: distractions, energy, focus, positive, Productivity, success, tips

Human beings love to achieve…to set goals and to reach those goals. It’s motivating. Use that to your advantage when you are cleaning, clearing, decluttering – and of course, destressing. Make a VOW to rid yourself of a certain amount, number, or percentage of your ‘stuff,’ whether your stuff is books, papers, files, cans, emails, [...]

Tags: clutter, distractions, focus, Productivity, stress, tips

What if you want to eat and snack in a healthy manner? Does that mean no more good stuff? And why should you care about this? Snacking at work can be one of the biggest productivity downfalls for three reasons: We DON’T eat at all – and then because we’re starving, we eat half the [...]

Tags: energy, Productivity, tips

Let us say that you have decided to close the door to negative people (figuratively, of course). What is tough about this decision is that sometimes the negative people work in our offices (or live in our homes or are related to us in some way). Deciding to “close the door” on the people who [...]

Tags: focus, positive, Productivity, success, tips

“Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.” – William Jennings Bryan In life, “A door must either be shut or open.” (Anonymous); I think that means we need to determine which doors we [...]

Tags: distractions, focus, positive, Productivity, success, tips

It is not just the big things that need to be eliminated in order to reduce stress. You may need to get rid of those extra Cool Whip tubs that fall out of your cabinet every time you open the drawer. You will be surprised by what is on this list. How about starting to [...]

Tags: clutter, distractions, focus, just whelmed, Productivity, stress, tips

Are you an “I-can-do-it-all-myself” person? Do you have some tasks, responsibilities, or projects that you have been procrastinating? I will assume that since you are still reading that the answer is yes to both. If you have a mental list of items that you are procrastinating, I first recommend that you get them out of [...]

Tags: communication, energy, just whelmed, Productivity, stress, success, tips

“If I had to characterize one quality as the genius of female thought, culture, and action, it would be the connectivity.” ~Robin Morgan Here are some simple ways to make connections with others (and it is OK to read this even if you are a man). These are deceptively simple ideas. And, part of what [...]

Tags: communication, positive, Productivity, success, tips