How to Stay Productive During Quarantine
By: Ashlyn Olson
Tags: 2020, Productivity, Quarantine, Covid 19

During this global pandemic, we have all been through phases of quarantine at one time or another. Being confined to just the space in your house, you can experience feelings of boredom and loss of motivation. I like to view quarantine as a time to grow and improve. This article is my small list of activities and habits that you can start while at home, to improve your physical and mental health aswell as avoiding boredom.

From my personal experience, one of my biggest obstacles that I faced during quarantine was becoming unmotivated. With no plans and nowhere to go, it is very easy to just lay around and avoid being productive. This can lead to mental health problems as well as problems with your physical health. One of my biggest tips to stay motivated at home is to create a schedule. You might be wondering,”If I have nothing to do why would I create a schedule?”. Well, a good idea would be to start focusing on things around your house that you have been needing to get done. Such as cleaning certain areas, organizing, or finishing any projects that you had put aside. Completing two or more of these tasks a week can really help boost your motivation and productivity. There are multiple other things that you could put on your schedule, such as meditation, yoga, or physical activity which can help you stay active and relive stress.

At the beginning of quarantine, I started to get in the habit of waking up at 8am every morning and doing a small workout, even on days where I felt extreemely unmotivated. I also started focusing on my mental health, and started journaling. I even began doing yoga, which I would have never shown interest in before. These all seem like very useless things, but once you create those strong habits and routines, you will be surprised at how much your overall health improves. You start to feel stronger, more motivated and confident, and more awake. Those are just some small habits that become very benefitial to you in the long run.

Spending time with, or reaching out to your loved ones and family members is another idea of something to do while you are at home. Feelings of lonliness are common while quarantining, and reaching out to family members and loved ones can boost your mood and the mood of others. It is very important to keep your relationships strong between family aswell. Especially through hard times such as these when some people tend to drift apart.

One concept that I also tried while in quarantine was to find new hobbies and interests. If you try something new and end up enjoying it, you will always have something to do when you are bored or not busy. A couple things that I started doing suring quarantine include, reading, painting, collecting vinyls, collecting plants, writing, working out, cooking and baking. There is an endless list of activities and hobbies that you could get into. Finding something valuable to do with your time really helps to boost your mood and can also help get you out of a slump. I would reccomend that anyone quarantining tries at lest one new hobby while at home, just to see if it can be helpful to you in any way.

That somewhat concludes my list of ways to stay productive during quarantine. There are of course also many ther things that you can do to stay productive but these were just a few of my favourites from personal experience. I wanted to remind anyone who is stuck at home right now that it is very important to take care of and love yourself. It is very important to keep yourself happy and healthy, as your body is currently helping you to survive a global pandemic. I hope that these tips are helpful :)