Energy Conservation

Prioritize

#1 What is important?

Decide: What are you able to do based on how you currently feel?

Break daily activities into:

• Urgent: Must be done today.
• Important: Must be done in the next few days.
• For later: Must be done this week/month. Don’t need to/can’t do: Can it wait until a ‘good’ day?
• Help needed: Can someone do it for you?

Pace

#3 How are you going to do it?

• Take breaks before you feel unwell.
• Alternate thinking and doing tasks (e.g., banking vs. dishes)
• Give yourself extra time to complete tasks.
• Complete tasks over stages (you don’t have to finish everything all at once).
• Plan tasks throughout the day and week so you aren’t doing too much at one time.

Plan

#2 What are you going to do?

• Organize what you need to do.
• Do tasks that use more energy at times in the day when you feel best.
• Schedule rest breaks into your day. Planning saves mental energy and helps you avoid trying to remember what to do and when to do it during the day.
• Use an agenda to put your plan on paper and save mental energy.

Position

#4 Where are you going to do it?

• Noisy, busy and distracting environments make it hard to concentrate and use up more energy.
• Minimize visual stimulation (i.e., at a restaurant choose a seat facing the wall)
• Think about your environment and how you stand/sit in it. Standing uses more energy, try to sit when possible.
• Your environment can make a difference in how you feel. Keeping it tidy and free of distractions saves energy.
• Minimize distractions when you need to do focused work (i.e., turn off cell phone notifications).