Procrastinators Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from chronic procrastination.

Thursday November 17, 2011

HAPPY THURSDAY, EVERYBODY!

Have a great proactive day!

Peace

Smile Laughing Smile Laughing

tracy-la check in 11-17-11

READING #1

 

Grief and Action

Trust in God and do something.
  —Mary Lyon

It's important to let ourselves grieve as a passage between yesterday and tomorrow. But we do not have to be controlled unduly by our grief, or our pain.

There are times when we have grieved, surrendered to the heaviness, tiredness, and weariness of a circumstance long enough. It becomes time to break out. It comes time to take action.

We will know when it's time to break the routine of grieving. There will be signs within and around us. We will become tired of the heaviness. An idea will occur; an opportunity will present itself. We may think: No. Too much effort... Do it anyway. Try something. Reach out. Stretch. Do something unusual, something different, and something special.

A new activity may help trigger the transformation process. Stay up two hours later than usual! Make an appointment to do something for yourself that is different from what you usually do. Visit someone you haven't seen in years. Do something to encourage and help the new energy coming your way.

We may not feel like breaking out of grief. It may feel safer, easier, to remain in our cocoon. Begin pushing out anyway. 

Test the walls of your cocoon. Push. Push a little harder. It may be time to emerge.

Today, I will trust God and the process, but I will also take action to help myself feel better.

From The Language of Letting Go 

 

READING #2

Escape into Sleep

As we work on how to stop procrastinating compulsively, we may be tempted to use sleep as a form of escape. Though not as detrimental as excess procrastination, too much sleep can also make us lethargic and dull. The danger lies in allowing ourselves to escape the realities of living, rather than coping with them.

We all need adequate rest in order to feel good and function efficiently. Sleep becomes an escape, however, if we take long daytime naps instead of finding worthwhile and enjoyable activities. Just as we may have procrastinated because of anxiety, we may oversleep because we are avoiding getting started with our day.

Our Higher Power has a plan for the time and talents He gives us. It is our job to discover how and where we can best serve God and each other. With the new life we are given in PA goes the responsibility to use it productively. Since this is the only life we have, we do not choose to sleep it away. By facing our problems with the help of this program, we learn how to deal with them.

Deliver me from indolence.

Adapted From Food for Thought: Daily Meditations  

 

tracy-la

movingalong November 17th

Today's goals:
Breathe through the fear.
Begin anywhere.
Keep an open heart.

wrkinprogrss: 11/1/11

Hi and good wishes, everyone. Here's my list for today:

x post at P.A.
x email check-in buddy
wip D guide rct wk:touch all open r2 feats (made significant progress)

prioritize job work A and D guide leftovers
x update and upload spreadsheet before noon
x shower, etc

wip unld/load dishwasher
submit timecard
x~ weekly status report + wiki updates by 17:00 (late but done)

use balancer
dance class at 19:45
15+min. Qi Gong

Journey 9:30 good news and bad news

The good news is that I'm taking a vacation day today.   The bad news is that it is the only day I can take off between now and Thanksgiving which is at MY HOUSE.   Not too bad, I'm hosting but not cooking, everyone is bringing food.   All I have to make is iced tea.  I do have to provide some clean dishes and a clean place to sit down and eat lol, so I'm going to do some preparation today and just try to keep everything clean and in order between now and then.   Hubby will mop and vacuum Thursday morning early, so I don't have to worry about that.  I can straighten and dust the living room Thursday morning too.

MITs:

  • Planning 
  • Out of office message for work
  • Exercise
  • Call D.(left msg)
  • Call Comcast
  • Dining Room table
  • Dining Room hutch
  • Dining Room window
  • kitchen counter
  • guest bathroom
  • time sheet for work
  • vacuum living room walls and windowsills
  • prepare for work and gym for tomorrow
  • dinner
  • dishes


NON MITS, do these if time  - but don't get bogged down in doing these lesser tasks and ignore the MITS!

  • order a's christmas present
  • Upload cd
  • 5 min each on closet and file cabinet
  • errands (lib, walgreens, gas station, gamestop)
  • sew loose button on new skirt
  • 1 load of laundry
  • read a chapter in the RH book for work
  • do a bit of certification planning for work
  • find the email about TM plan, also for work

Jo 

I value my time and use it wisely - Journey

considerations for today

Thank you so much for creating this site and these tools. Even the thought of putting down something to do makes me do it, and writing it down works even better. I still find it difficult to start writing and do publishing tasks, I am so much afraid of writing official stuff. Don't know why, actually........ And I want to do it so much.... Just everything I write seems so stupid to me... Anyway I did many little important tasks today, the great proactive tasks are still to be done- hm, maybe I find it difficult to split them, to manage them.... Will I ever be able to publish, to write articles, to do research, to live up to the PhD if I ever write my theses?

Kamila

kromer 9:15 CI

Today my big task is to do some long-term planning (including note-taking from relevant mtgs)(working on this now)

I also want to do some microscope work...start looking at EA's slides, and look at my own slide. (have started this, will do more soon)

I want to do colony mgmt for my own experiments as well.

I need to get stamps and mail a letter, call a friend about dinner, and invite some other friends to thanksgiving potluck

If I get a chance, I will either do some cleaning/organizing, or some computational work, whichever I feel like more. (will do a little computational work soon)

And I'm having lunch with one friend and dinner with another. yay!

Rexroth Check In 14.20

Done:
Up prayer and reflection
Spent time sitting frozen and doing nothing for a long time
Checked and dealt with emails, posting and later post
Out to buy fruit and veg
Out to photocopy friend's papers and to buy meat
Worked on friend's file
Spoke on phone to friend
Emailed professional association and later spoke to them on the phone

Todo:
Some admin work on sorting images
Wash up and clean up
See friend when/if he comes round
A little rest

Regards Rexroth

Rexroth Check Out 22.33

Done:
Sorted a load of images
Friend comes round and I sort his stuff and he organises my images which I now can't find which irritates me a little

Todo:
Prayer and reflection
Bed and sleep

Night Folks

Rexroth

Pyrotecher CI (and Insight) 17Nov2011

Check-In 1:30 am PT

Once again I'm starting the day as an appendage of the last one, that is I'm finding myself up past midnight trying to finish chores and get to bed after staying up too late on tasks/timewasting/dozing (usually mostly in front of PC).

One thing that I did accomplish tonight was an exercise that I found illuminating. I sat down and quickly wrote a list of "big things out of control" in my life. Not the little tasks nagging at me (though I'm sure the bigger piles of to-do's influenced my thinking); but rather the big things in my life that I care about that need more of my attention. I then did a quick sort on the list to group the issues into about six major categories). I made myself do it quickly, probably less then 15 minutes overall. Naturally almost every part of my life seems to need more than I'm giving it but when I forced myself to write it down as big categories I realized that the time I'm devoting to these issues is totally out of proportion with their importance. I'm familiar with prioritizing techniques like Stephen Covey's (7 Habits of Successful People) 4 Quadrant (High/Low Importance/Urgency) but it was instructive seeing my prioritization issues revealed in a way that I easily miss when I'm focusing on whatever catches my attention at the moment (which encorages short-sighted behavior).

Definitely something to think about; I'm considering starting a new topic thread to discuss this furher. But right now I really do need to take care of immediate chores and literally sleep on it. What is truly telling is what I do about it in the morning.

Check-In 11:45pm PST

Checking back before bed the following night.

Not an astoundingly productive day, not surprising since I'm short on sleep about 3 days straight. Fortunately, I've learned that such days best lend them selves to simple tasks that don't demand a lot of exertion or creative thinking, and I take advantage of it to tackle necessary but tedious tasks that I normally tend to put off. I kept last night's exercise in mind and tried to take some organizational baby steps as I went, modest but better than sitting in a funk and obsessing about where to start (which I've been doing way too much lately).

So I'll count it as a good day and now treat myself to something resembling a normal night's sleep. yay!

Plan for Thursday

Work for today. Check-in at 2 pm, 5pm, 8pm 

4:00 pm check-in  Next check-in at 7 pm - Must do before 7 pm highlighted in blue

Things done not on "to do" list took about 2 hours

  • test client work, email client's supplier
  • edit email blast
  • talk to city about room
  • talk to headhunter to see whether he's heard if I got the job
  • attempted to get name of person who interviewed me on Monday 

 To do list

  • Up at 6:45 am (7:15 am)
  • Phone sister's office 
  • 6:45 to 8:00 - get dressed, have breakfast and go to passport office (take too long getting ready not at passport office until 9 pm
  • 8 - 8:30 - passport office
  • 8:30 - 9 - travel to new employer
  • 9 - 9:30 - give documents to new employer (The person who was supposed to tak my documents was off for the day. I left a message for her. I was furious for the waste of money and time so I'll have to go back tomorrow 
  • 9:30 - 10:00 - transit, read newsletter
  • 10 -11 - misc banking
  • 11 - 12 -fix newsletter, phone client
  • noon - 12:30 - lunch
  • 12:30 pm to 2 pm -apply to 3 jobs
  • 2 to 5 pm - make 5 phone calls, research network for LI contacts
  • 5 - 7 - do Monday & Tuesday clean-up
  • 7 - 7:30 - dinner 
  • 7:30 - 9:30 - Monday & Tuesday clean-up
  • 9:30 - to do list
  • 10 - TV
  • 11 - bed

My Day Today

I want to thank my Higher Power for this program, this website, the telephone and online meetings, and my life.

Things I will do today

1. Go to the 5:45 a.m. telephone ACA meeting

2. Go to the 7 a.m. telephone DA meeting

3. Take shower

4. Get dressed

5. Cook and eat  brunch

6. Go to group therapy at 9 a.m.

7. Go to individual therapy at 10:15

8. Go to the grocery store

9. Go to the bus station

10. Put away groceries

11. Go to the 12 noon telephone ACA meeting

12. Go to the 1 p.m. telephone CLA meeting

13. Go to the 3 p.m. telephone NA meeting

14. Do numbers

15. Cook and eat dinner

18. Clear chair

19. Go to the 8 p.m. telephone CLA meeting

20. Go to the 9 p.m. online EA meeting

Thanks for letting me share