How to Work (and What Tasks to Do) When You Are Sleep Deprived

In an ideal world, one or two things would happen:

We wouldn’t be sleep-deprived.
We wouldn’t have to work when we were sleep-deprived.

But it isn’t an ideal world, alas both situations occur quite often. If you don’t have anything urgent, it’s best putting off urgent tasks until you are rested. If you do, it might be better to try and take a nap first.

Not possible? Pour some coffee (or tea, your choice) and get to it.

Also, think of activities that make you happy, alert, and energetic. Different activities have different effects on people. Showers wake some people up while making others sleepier. (I’m in the second group.)

Blog maintenance. Updating plugins and themes don’t require much attention and energy. Get this sucker off your plate.
Marie Kondo-ing your office space. While I like Marie Kondo, I don’t recommend trying to catch the feeling of joy when it comes to organizing important stuff. Instead, go for the thought of useful and/or new information. I don’t want you to end up fileless and freaking about not being able to find important story drafts or reference books!
Marie Kondo-ing your desktop files. See the point above about joy.
Email checking and cleaning: unsubscribing from people you don’t like. Sometimes, I go on a binge email unsubscribing spree. I might even unsubscribe if I am a huge fan of the person. Because I am a huge fan, I don’t need a daily or weekly reminder to check out their new post or product. I already have. So I remain subscribed to newsletters that share stuff that is not on their website, or newsletters that are so useful that I cannot afford not being updated. And sometimes, I remain subscribed because while I am a fan, I often forget to check out their latest work because I’m only human and I don’t remember to regularly read every blog I enjoy. What makes a newsletter worth subscribing to and remain on their email list? Check out my article Newsletter Writing 101: The Dos and Don’ts.
Drafting posts. Funnily enough, you can actually write even if you are tired. It might not be a masterpiece, and you probably shouldn’t be working on the polished version your editor will read. Drooping eyes miss more errors. But if you are in the zone, you are in the zone. If your health allows it, don’t let your energy level trick you into not writing.
Noting down ideas. Your brain might be too tired to do certain things, but ideas also don’t give two hoots about how you feel. If they want to arrive, they will. So you better not let them go. You might not remember them later.
Free-writing. What better excuse to write without limits and rules? Just let your subconscious take over.
Collecting scattered ideas in two places: one digital and one physical – and then backing them up. Be honest with me. How many idea files and notebooks do you have? Even the most organized of us can fall prey to buying too many notebooks or creating too many files to save our ideas. It doesn’t take too much mental effort to copy paste with your mouse or with your hand, so take advantage of these “tired” times to gather your ideas in one place. Then make several copies. You can never be too careful or safe when you are saving and recording your ideas. The idea is to have all the ideas in one place, and copies of the big list. Not 500 different files with different ideas. Think about your scattered notes the next time you think you don’t have something to pitch or write about. You should do the same with the writing markets, while you are at it.
Going over your to-do lists and goal sheets. If you’ve been meaning to do something for months, just go ahead and do it. It is okay to change your mind and delete the task if you feel it was unnecessary. But if you neglected something essential, it is time you prioritize it.
Responding to emails. Try not to make too many typos, especially if you are corresponding with editors and clients. But let’s face it, most email communication is about you confirming things or following up on them. Do those.
Backing-up your work and research. All you need to do is to get them on to Cloud, a hard drive, a USB or emailing them to yourself. Better to be safe than sorry.
Social media posting. Afraid people forgot who you are? Start reminding them. Hanging out at social media is a better way to spend your time when you are tired. Just don’t post something embarrassing you can’t take back. Unless embarrassing is your brand. Then by all means, go all for it!
Profile updates. You have a new book out? Published on some amazing pubs? Time to polish those clips and social media profiles.
Bookmark and reading list cleaning. No need to keep useless stuff around. Read and decide what to discard.
Reading stuff that doesn’t hurt your brain. It can be reading for fun – since you are a writer, reading is always a part of your job. I know, we are so lucky! But we’ve all been there. Sometimes we can’t just bare to process overly technical stuff or brand new information. Ignore those and come back when you are feeling alert and capable.
Watching things that are necessary for your idea-collecting, craft-building and relaxing. Bonus points if they help with all three. Watching Netflix is a part of my job. So no one pays me just to watch something, but a lot of my ideas and stories have ties to pop culture. So watching movies and series help me grow as a writer, while also fueling my creative juices. So when in doubt and too tired to do anything else, go watch something.