Vetnews | Mei 2026 40 « BACK TO CONTENTS Influential Life Coaching IS TIME SPEEDING UP? Dr Mats Abatzidis B.Sc. B.V.Sc. New Insights Certified VIP Life Coach mats.abatzidis@yahoo.co.za Founder of Influential Life Coaching http://www.matsaba.wix.com/drmatscoach Author of the published book “Life outside your comfort zone. Better and beyond all expectations”. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=searchalias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Abatzidis http://www.life-coach-directory.co.za/mats-abatzidis Vet's Health I Life Coaching Greetings, everyone. I hope that it has been a wonderful and reenergising first quarter of 2026! Time can feel like it’s speeding up— clinic days blur together, textbooks and emails pile up, and that long list of professional goals seems to recede into the distance. For veterinary professionals, the pressure is real: patient care, client communication, continuing education, practice management tasks, and personal life all compete for attention. It’s easy to feel behind when milestones slip and distractions multiply. The good news is that there are practical, compassionate strategies to help you pace yourself, reduce overwhelm, and—importantly— recognise and celebrate the progress you make. Recognise the reality: speed is not the same as progress. First, it helps to reframe how you define success. Speed and busyness are not the same as meaningful progress. In a clinic setting, quality of care, client relationships, and professional development matter more than how many items you check off in a day. A quick triage that prevented deterioration is a success even if your planned paperwork didn’t get done. A calm, clear consultation that leaves a worried owner reassured is progress even if you missed a webinar. Reframing success away from a rigid milestone list helps reduce the guilt that comes with being diverted by urgent, useful work. Structure the day around energy, not only time: veterinary work is unpredictable—emergencies, phone calls, and unexpected reactions can derail the best-laid plans. A practical way to cope is to schedule tasks based on your personal energy rhythm rather than purely on clock times. Identify when you’re sharpest for demanding tasks—reading radiographs, doing complex cases, or studying new protocols—and protect those blocks. Save lower-energy tasks like routine charting, inventory checks, or quick emails for natural lulls. This approach increases the likelihood that essential work is done well and reduces frustration when interruptions occur. Use “microgoals” to reclaim momentum: large goals can feel insurmountable when time is scarce. Break them into bite-size steps or milestones —small, specific, and achievable tasks that require short bursts of focused effort (e.g., “review three cases from last week” or “draft one paragraph for a quality-improvement plan”). Microgoals fit into the gaps between appointments and are easier to resume after interruptions. Each completed microgoal provides a psychological boost and creates tangible progress toward the bigger objective. Adopt a flexible planning system: rigid to-do lists can amplify stress when items roll over day after day. Instead, try a flexible planning system: maintain a prioritized list, but pair it with an “adaptive daily plan.” Start each day by identifying three must-do items (one clinical, one administrative/learning, one personal). If unexpected events consume your day, focus on achieving at least one. This reduces the sense of failure while keeping you moving forward. Consider a weekly review as well: a short 15–20-minute check-in to reassess priorities, celebrate wins, and reallocate unfinished items. Create interruption-tolerant workflows: since interruptions are inevitable, create workflows that tolerate them. Use standardized templates for common notes and communications so you can finish documentation faster after a case; have checklists for procedures to reduce cognitive load; batch similar tasks (e.g., phone call followups or prescriptions) to reduce context switching. These strategies minimize the cumulative time lost to switching tasks and allow you to pick up work where you left off. Protect “deep work” with gentle boundaries: deep, focused work—learning a new surgical technique, analysing complex cases, writing a paper—requires protected time. Communicate these needs with your team and designate quiet blocks for focused tasks, while letting colleagues know how to handle urgent issues during these windows. Use signal tools (a sign on the door, a shared calendar block) to reduce avoidable interruptions. The goal is not perfect isolation but reasonable, respected boundaries that allow for meaningful progress. Practice active acceptance and reprioritisation: when unplanned tasks arise, practice active acceptance by acknowledging that the diversion was legitimate (e.g., an emergency or an opportunity to help a colleague), then consciously reprioritise. Ask: “What can I de-scope or postpone while maintaining safety and quality?” Reprioritisation is a skill that keeps you responsive without losing sight of essential goals.
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