Sometimes life can catch you off guard and you are just trying to hang on for dear life. Other times, you can see the ramp up coming and prepare for the onslaught.

When things get busy, I still feel that it is important for me to not lose my momentum in the learning I am currently doing. I experienced this first hand recently as I got married. A wedding is a big deal and can be very time consuming…there is a constant amount of things to accomplish and tasks to get done. I found that there was always more to do and other things to think about.

I have set up a couple strategies for myself so that when these busy times come along, I am still able to continue learning. I generally rely on 3 different things track my learning and these habits continue when I am busy.

1) Accountibility with my ToDos

I keep the items I am working on in my github repo. This makes it open source and even though I doubt anyone else looks at it, there is an accountibility this has added. When an item is on my list for too long, I feel the need to either focus on it or move off that item for the time.

2) Accountibility with Another Person

I believe that finding someone else to collaborate with, bounce ideas off of, and stay accountable to, is extremely important. This allows both of you to decide on a track and keep moving forward on it as you learn and there is a commitment to accomplish the goals you set each time you meet.

3) Guided Learning

Finding a course or book can allow you to keep focused as you learn. There is a time for googling and working through a problem on your own, but when you are learning basics, I don’t think this is that time to go it alone as you can be distracted. After the basics are under the belt, then you can move into learning on your own and connecting the dots that have not been filled.

Not losing track of learning is important when you are busy and these principles have helped keep me on track.