Keep breathing room in your schedule

When scheduling events, it’s important to give yourself a bit of buffer time.  If something takes only 20 minutes, why do you need to schedule 30 minutes for it?  Use that extra ten minutes for yourself.  Take a break, have a snack, stretch a bit, practice mindfulness, or visit the restroom.  Anything.  If you don’t take a moment to relax, everything else will suffer.  If you really need to keep going, just start the next thing a little earlier.

Also, when deciding how long to schedule something, plan for the worst case scenario.  Traffic jams, computer problems, or other unexpected delays can throw everything else off.  If something usually takes only 30 minutes, but can rarely take 45, then it will take longer on the exact days that you are busiest.  Murphy’s Law applies to your calendar, so it’s better to be safe than sorry!