15 ways you can tackle busy-ness

There is an epidemic of busy-ness. Oliver Burkeman has been exploring why we all feel so busy nowadays. We have pulled together Oliver's essential guide on how you can rethink 'busy'. Here are 15 steps towards living a happier and less stressful existence...

1. Live in the moment. Don't turn up for life but be absent because you're so preoccupied. Try not to think about what needs to be done, or what could have been done better.

2. Let's correct a common misconception. Do you think you're busier now than people who lived 100 years ago? You're wrong. None of us are busier today than our ancestors were.

3. Busy-ness is a choice. You choose to be busy. That means you can choose to be less busy. You have the power.

4. Remember: busy-ness is NOT a competition. Sometimes we all treat it as it were. Try and stop that call and response we all go through when you ask a friend or a colleague how they're doing.

5. Confront your work routine. What are you trying to prove? Don't try and demonstrate how strong, capable and hard-working you are every day - it may backfire as people give you more to do.

6. Focusing too much on time is making things worse. The reality is we're often not giving ourselves enough time. Try to ensure you book two or three chunks of dedicated free time into your day.

7. Doing more than one thing at a time is actually a very bad idea. The truth about multitasking is that you're making yourself both slower and dumber.

8. Are you still thinking about work or what you need to do an hour after you have finished for the day? Switch off. Here are some tips on how you can switch off from thinking about that to-do list.

9. Stay mindful of the dangers of compulsive working. Watch out you don't become a workaholic. It is easy to become addicted to the adrenaline that comes with stress.

10. Try not to get sidetracked by the smaller or shorter items you think you can quickly tick off your list. This is procrastination and it will slow your progress down in the long-term.

11. You don't have to fill your calendar! Don't panic if there's nothing booked in. Don't see it as a challenge to fill every day with tasks. Be bold and leave spaces. You'll thank yourself for it later.

12. Machine-like behaviour and constant stress is bad for your brain and body. Occasional short bursts of stress, however, is quite a healthy process. Ideally you should aim for a structure of 'do' and then 'recover'.

13. Don't think about what stress you could do without or which items you could potentially lose from your to-do list. Think about what it is that you really want to do. Let that drive your decisions and forget about the rest. We often get in a pickle when we try to do everything to the best of our capabilities.

14. Make some time to daydream every day. Schedule it in if you have to. Your brain needs to have a good ponder. Let your mind wander and don't focus on the negatives or what you haven't yet achieved.

15. Learn to be more idle. It's good for you. Take up some relaxing pastimes that give you a good chance to think (remember point 14). Here are some tips to get you started.