 Hi guys, welcome back to the channel. In today's episode of the TMJ show and the Doc Talk series, we are talking about managing your time. And basically, if you feel like you're on your medical journey and not having time for you, this is a video to watch this episode or listen to, let's get into it. Today we have Jasmine with us. Jasmine, how are you doing? I'm good. How are you? I'm doing well. Thanks for asking. So what can we help you with? What's your question? I'm having trouble with time management. I don't want to know if you can give me any advice on time management. I know that's been asked before, but until you get in it, you don't understand. Totally. Well, luckily for you, I'm a total geek about it. So tell me where the issue with time management is going for you. What's the biggest time block? I don't have enough hours in the day. Preach. That makes all of us, huh? So what would be your ultimate goal? Picture yourself in like a month if you had your ideal day, ideal week. How many hours would you want to have for yourself? What would you want to fit into that time? I'd like to fit in some exercise, some type of self-care, something I'd like to do, to be out. I've been inside for a very long time and to be able to go outside, not necessarily to the bar or anything, but just, you know, have time to be out. Yeah. And you're in your first year of med school, right? So that's definitely going to be time intensive. So talk to me right now of what your time schedule looks like. When does your day start? When does it end? What are you typically doing throughout the day? My day starts at 7 a.m. You know, wake up, do my little wake-up routine. Normally, it depends on what time class starts, you know, every day is a different schedule. So sometimes class starts at 7 30, sometimes 9 30, sometimes 11 or 12, sometimes 12. But if it's, let's say a 9 30 class, I'm usually reading, pre-reading or before the lab that I have or the small group that I have, or I'm going over a lecture trying to figure out, you know, the part that confused me. If I didn't get through it the day before, what else am I doing? Yeah, that's mostly it. Just reviewing. The morning starts with review. What does the evening afternoon look like? More reviewing, reviewing the lecture that we just went over, you know, post-read of it. I try to get some practice questions in. I have a study group about two to three days a week, so I might have study group time. We have a lot of, they call them open learning groups, so like peer study groups. Sure. And so some of those, or I have other obligatory meetings from the school. Got it. So are you studying all the way to, I don't know, the end of your day? Like seven? What time does your day typically end in terms of school stuff? My day, if there are no distractions in the middle of it, it can end at about eight 30. With distractions, it ends much later. Got it. So here is a question for you, a thought exercise. If I ask you, you have 30 minutes left tomorrow to do the exact same stuff that you're trying to fit in. Is that doable? Like, could you, could you? It would have to be. Right? Okay, perfect. So that's the whole idea of time management, right? Because no one wants to manage time just to have extra time without a goal. We all want to obviously sit around and sleep more. But your ultimate goal, like you said, is you want to work out. You want to have time for yourself, your hobbies, your friends, find new friends, you know, go out, eat, whatever it may be. So the first thing, this is the biggest lesson I learned my first year is that med school can encompass all of those hours that go from seven to eight 30 or 10, if you allow it to. But if you can say 30 minutes is absolutely non-negotiable for me to have for myself. And if you clearly can say that, yeah, it has to be, right? So if you flip your schedule on the back burner and you say, okay, what do I want to get done every single day? You mentioned working out. So let's use that example, right? If you can look at your schedule and first take out all of your kind of discretionary scheduling time in terms of studying. So your class stuff, that's not, you can't change it, right? Your class shows up at whatever time it does. But the rest of the time and how you spend it is kind of up to you, you decide that schedule. So before you get to that part where you say, let me like plug in one hour, I'm going to study and do my group sessions, etc. If you really want to work out and make that the first thing you schedule, okay? So you want to study or work out for 30 minutes, cool. Your workout is going to take an hour. It's fine. But it's important to you and you really wish that that was part of it. Make that the first thing you do. Because the last thing your body wants to do, the last thing your mind wants to do, the last thing your future self four years from now wants to do is remember all the time you spend studying. But if working out is important to you, put that hour in and saying, well, can I get all of this done with an hour less a day? Just like you said, you have to, right? Yeah. And then what you realized is like, okay, if I was studying eight hours a day, that eight hours wasn't 100% effective. Now I have seven hours. What can I do faster? What can I do less of? What do I need to do more of to make up for that hour that's gone? And then you get really good at this because eventually you'll be like, okay, this hour I was spending doing this is total crap. Like it wasn't helpful. My retention wasn't there. Even if I asked myself like, how much I remember learning from that hour, answer is not very much. If I take that away, I'm not going to lose very much. If anything, I'm going to gain more by being able to get that workout in. Does that make sense? Yeah. So that's this whole idea of time management is that right now you're spending an X amount of time and feeling like you're trapped. But instead of you say, I need to get this done. And that means I only have this much time to plug in everything else. You get really created with like, okay, what really needs to be here? It's the same way when we used to cram in college or high school or even in med school, you stop doing the stuff that, you know, it doesn't work for you because you know, test tomorrow, right? And so same thing. If you want to, if you want to work out, I had this too. I was an early bird. So personally for me, it made more sense for me to wake up. And the first thing I would do is not focus on med school setting, but to go get that workout in. And so an hour of whatever time I woke up, whether it be like five or six or seven, first thing was to go to the gym every day from seven or eight or six to seven. And that meant I couldn't study during that time. But that was worth it for me because I knew that less hour that was spending studying would make me more efficient. And what I was using that time for, it would make it more difficult for me to have the opportunity to get distracted because now I have a less hour. And I also got the benefit of getting that workout and I felt great. Yeah, true. I mean, also because where I am, the gyms are closed. So it's even, getting that workout home at home. I could be doing work here. Exactly. And I mean, it's kind of like a, you pick what's important to you. Like if working out has that kind of like resistance where you're like, oh, I could be doing X, Y and Z. You have to ask yourself, is this something I truly would want to spend this time with? I would love to read more. But if I ask myself, oh, but I want to read for 30 minutes or like spend time with my wife, my puppy, you're like do stuff for them, do journey or like go get a workout in. All of those things fall higher priority than like reading a book. So I'm not going to go out of my way to fit 30 minutes of reading because that's like, not correlates to my list of priorities. But if working out at home is important, then that should be it. This is important. Like sure, I could study, but how much more value would I get out of 30 minutes of extra studying versus at home workout? All right. So it's about, it's about you now. It's about you in a week. It's about you in the future. And you want to pick what kind of habits you pick. This first year of med school is tough. Absolutely. Second year of med school is tough. Same way. Third year of med school gets busier because you're now in the hospital, right? And you have less time to study, but they're still expecting you to note stuff for the shelves and exams. Then you go into residency. So you want to build the right habits of saying these things are important to me. I'm going to build a habits now where there's still parts of my life that they truly are important. That way, when I get busier, I'm not looking back and saying, oh man, I had so much free time back then. Doesn't feel like a now. But you, you truly will realize that the building those habits now really forces you to always keep those priorities first before you get into like the obligatory, oh, I need to study X amount of hours a day. All right, guys. Hopefully you guys are enjoying this conversation about time management with Jasmine. Now, if you're watching this on YouTube and you're joining us, go ahead and support this video by hitting that thumbs up button down below. Truly appreciate it, but let's get back to the video. I enjoyed doing this visually. Like if you use, do you use Google Calendar like a planner for your stuff a week or what do you do? Um, yes and no. So I write a lot of stuff down so I can write it, see it. Cool. So not much on the phone. Gotcha. So I like Google Calendar, but like a planner, it still works. But just having that visual of saying like each day of the week, like everything in orange is like my personal obligations. I would schedule those first. So I would see my workouts. I would see like, for, you know, once you get better at this, you have, you could have two things or two blocks of a day that are important to you and just like you time. That's Jasmine time. So for me, it was my workout in the morning and then I knew Tuesday nights. My favorite TV show would come out. I don't even feel guilty about watching my TV show. You know, I just need to make sure that that time is there. So then everything else I just have to be more effective on. Um, Sundays, I would completely block off. You know, if there was, if there was a basketball game on a specific day, I'd block it off and then adjust accordingly. But then I could look at my schedule and say, there's a part of me in my schedule every single day. And I'm not losing my part of me because med school is also a part of it. You know, yeah. Completely makes complete sense. Yeah. So having that visual representation really keeps you accountable. Because if you start saying week after week, where it's like med school filling up your schedule and you're like, where the hell is any part of what I want to do? Then you got to, you got to take a step back. Okay. Yeah. Is that helpful? Yes. Very much so. So it's, it's a tinkering game. I feel like I'm, I feel like I'm losing myself and that's not what I want to do. And unfortunately, right? Like that's the part is that it's, it's not uncommon to have that feeling as just, but you do have to make it a priority because it feels like, you know, especially most of us don't start as like an amazing A student when we start at med school, or we don't always get the grades, the retention. We feel like we can always do better. Most of us struggle at some component. So that's why we prioritize first and we should. But you lose a part of yourself because you feel like the answer is more hours or being more effective in the same amount of hours you're using. But like I said, you only get busier. So losing yourself now kind of sucks. When you know you have four years of med school left for residency left, this doesn't end. So you rather make it fun and enjoyable when parts of you are still there than the other way around where you like lose a part of yourself. I've had third and fourth year classmates, you know, end of med school and like, man, I don't know if I would do this again. And it's not because they don't like being a doctor. It's just that they don't remember any part of the last two years that actually enjoyed themselves. They just remember the test. They just remember the hustle. And that's going to be part of it. But if you can truly find the opportunities to like still have you be a part of you, these four years, that's when it's really good fun. So, and it's a tinkering thing too, right? So you may find like perfect. I was able to get a workout in three times this week and that was my goal. Now, I also realized that my studying was a little inefficient when I look back at it because I'm studying less every day than I was a month ago. So then you can ask yourself, what am I doing now in my studying that or my classwork or my group lectures, whatever you're doing, what can be taken out immediately because they're not helping me, what can be sped up, what can I spend more time to do? Because this strategy is more efficient than this strategy. And then you go from like, oh, I'm studying eight hours a day. Now let's bring it down to seven. Mentally, how would I bring it down to seven and a half? How would I bring it down to seven and a half to seven? You start quizzing yourself essentially like, what really matters for me to get the grade and retention that I want? And eventually you're like, man, if the test was tomorrow, this is exactly what I would do. I wouldn't spend eight hours doing all of this. I would spend five hours doing just this one or two things. And then you really get to evaluate your study day and saying, all of this is just fluff. Like I should only be doing this because for me, this is what works. And then you find so much more free time. That's when you find free time to take a nap, go for a workout, go to the bars, whatever it may be for you. No. Yeah. So it's a process. But the first part of it is just committing that your personal priorities are going to be a part of it from the very start. Cool. Is that helpful? Thank you. Very much so. Awesome. Do you have any other questions? Just like a little side note. What was your best method for studying for anatomy? Are you studying for practicals or are you studying for the lecture? I'm assuming both. Yeah, both. Yeah. More so the lecture right now, practical is kind of at the end. Sure. So anatomy, I feel like is one of those classes that's like a two-tiered learning process. So the first part is obviously no one in the world you're looking at or what those structures are. The second part is getting that second order knowledge in, right? Like what happens if this gets affected or if like you have an injury here, what's going to happen or how is this related to this, right? Like those are second order questions. So essentially what I would do, I recommend people do is to get that first phase done where you can really get decent identifying structures, maybe create a list. Excel sheets are great for this. Of all the things that you need to know for that upcoming lab exam, upcoming lecture exam. So the first part, again, is knowing structures and how they're related to each other. Second pass is, okay, you know, can I answer second order questions to this? And you'll know what those mean because as you go through the lecture, you'll hear your lecturers say, oh, injury to this would cause this kind of policy or these four muscles are a part of like your, you know, your rotator cuff. Those kinds of patterns, you'll say, okay, like these are second order questions that I need to do. So my approach to anatomy is to get that first pass in because you can't really start doing second order questions in anatomy until you kind of get a good grasp on the basics of that first. Like, can I identify it? Do I know what I'm talking about? Do I know where it is in the body, roughly? And there's plenty of tools on YouTube. People use Kenhub. People use like anatomy zone. People use netters, you know, but just knowing what the structures are is like how you do better for the labs. And in terms of preparing for the labs, I would use those resources after I read the text or something and have a mental representation of like, oh, when I see that cadaver, if you truly do still do dissections, this is where I expect things to roughly be. And then you would go into lab and saying, oh, shoot, that's like not how it looks at all. This is actually wrong. You fix that in your head. And then ideally you can go look at another cadaver and be like, okay, this is now my new mental representation of where these structures are to each other. And you keep doing that over time. You're like, can I identify all these things on this list on multiple cadavers? You'll be solid for your lab thing. I think there's a video on the YouTube channel too, because I was an anatomy TA my last fourth year and that's how I told all my students to do this. But then that lecture component is like once you have that mental representation, you'd be like, okay, what questions have I seen from lectures that the professors brought up? Usually it's like relationships of structures to each other, the function of a specific muscle, as well as like the interventions, like what would happen if something got broken down. Those are good questions to like practice asking yourself based off the experiences you've had in lecture, or do you practice questions based off of anything your class and you know, school gives you or question banks through anatomy specific things that are like step one related, because that's how all their questions for anatomy will be second order questions. So you got the first pass done and the second pass, and that's usually kind of how I would recommend preparing. Sure. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, but hopefully these tips and advice help and hopefully you can find some more time for you. Yeah. That sound good? Yeah, it did. All right, Jasmine. Well, we'll be sure to link, you know, your social media handle down below in the description. But thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you. Of course. Have a good day. You too. Take care. All right, guys. Hope you guys enjoyed this interview on time management, studying for anatomy and a bunch of other things that we talked about with Jasmine. Her social media link will be linked down below for you guys to check out to go ahead and show her support and love. I also commented down below what other advice that you would give her to me on time management, other questions you have. And if you're similar boat to Jasmine, where you feel like your time management is not quite there and you're missing a part of yourself through your medical journey, then one of the resources that I recommend checking out is the Med School Domination Bundle. Now, the Domination Bundle is filled with books and courses, specifically with step-by-step advice and blueprints for everything on how to succeed on your medical journey, specifically in medical school. In regards to time management, one of the things I included for you guys in that bundle is our time mastery course, which helps you essentially 10 extra productivity in simply two days. Course is designed where you can simply go through it through a weekend and completely revamp your productivity system, make sure you have time for yourself and also are doing the most effective things to help you on your medical journey today. So if you guys are interested, I'll be linked down below. And as I'm making this video, it's only $37 because I'm trying to make it a no-brainer in case you really want to help on all the different things in medical school, including time management, but also other things like how to study. And if you are just a little bit curious and interested, I do recommend you check out the reviews and feedback that we've gotten from past students who've gone through the bundle, checked out the books and the courses, truly found a transformative change by watching them. If you did feel that this video gave you some value, maybe there's somebody who's just hoping that this video shows up in front of them to also get those time management tips as well. So go ahead and hit that thumbs up and like button down below. And if you haven't hit that subscribe button, also go ahead and do so for two episodes, just like this on a weekly basis. And if you're listening to this on a podcast, then go ahead and subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast platform and consider living an honest review on iTunes. But with that being said, guys, thank you so much for always being a part of my journey. Hopefully I've been a little helped to you on yours. And if you did enjoy this video, then you may enjoy this video on simply how I use Notion to help simplify my entire life and help me on my time management, as well as this video to talk about one tip that can help you improve your grades today. Thank you guys so much for watching. I'll see you guys in the next one, my friends. Peace.