Editor’s Note: Looking for creative ways to improve your days when you work from home? This post, originally published in September of 2020, is full of helpful tips that are still just as relevant today.
Work styles are a very personal thing. What works for one person may be an absolute nightmare for the next.
I’ve worked in advertising for a decade now, and if you’d asked me a year ago I would have told you I pretty much had things figured out. I’m a morning person (a five-thirty meeting? No thank you!). My brain can only be in one place at a time (no podcasts for me, please!). And I work best in the office or a coffee shop with lots of people buzzing around.
Then, COVID-19 hit. I was working from home with only my husband. My anxiety skyrocketed, and my regular 6 a.m. alarm slowly crept to 7, and then 8. My productivity tanked. I was back to square one.
I’ve completely transformed everything I ever knew about work. I have been forced to examine my faults, find new routines, and learn ways to cope and grow as a professional.
Over the last six months, I’ve completely transformed everything I ever knew about work. I have been forced to examine my faults, find new routines, and learn ways to cope and grow as a professional.
Someday, I’ll look back to 2020 and remember a lot of anger, a lot of stress, and a lot of sadness. But I’ll also see a lot of personal growth. I hope you can do the same.
While some businesses continue to dispute whether their employees should work remotely or in a hybrid environment, others are adopting a more flexible work-from-anywhere strategy.
For decades, working parents — and mothers in particular — have been calling for more flexibility to juggle their personal and professional responsibilities. Finally, a global pandemic forced many employers to give it to them. Office workers were sent home en masse to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, along the way testing out their companies’ capacity to maintain operations with a dispersed workforce — and challenging some long-held notions about how productivity is best achieved.
Working while traveling
For others, the biggest challenge to work-from-anywhere has little to do with the work itself. Helen Xue, 30, a communications lead, was living in San Francisco when the pandemic hit and relocated to Portland to be near her partner’s family. With the permanent policy in place, they recently moved again to Seattle. Being a digital nomad may be the dream job for those who love to travel. However, finding (and managing!) a job that fits your personality, goals, and adventurous lifestyle is no easy feat. This is how I balance working and traveling around the world. Remote work trips clearly are not the same as a vacation, but they are a great way to hack around your normal holiday limitations and to enjoy a bit more freedom.
Here are eight tips to improve your days when you work from home.
When you walk into any local running store, you’ll be greeted with a brightly colored wall displaying hundreds of shoes. It goes without saying that selecting the best-fitting shoe among a plethora of options is a difficult task. To add to the confusion, not every shoe is suitable for you. Regardless of the pair you pick, it must fit properly from heel to toe and feel comfortable throughout your normal running stride.
Most of us prefer to purchase online these days, but there is a higher danger of purchasing something you haven’t tried on
How Your Shoes Should Fit
Each component of the running shoe has a distinct role and is tailored to suit the foot in a certain way. Even the tiniest difference can have an impact on your experience. We’ve broken down the essential components of a running shoe, so you can easily identify them and make sure they’re all the right size for your foot. (If you want to understand more about the anatomy of a running shoe, go here.)
