Thursday November 17, 2011

From The Language of Letting Go 

Adapted From Food for Thought: Daily Meditations  

tracy-la

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

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

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

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!