The Pause I Keep Forgetting

There are some days where you just need to stop.

And breathe.

Just one breath and then another. No matter what is going on, there is always a moment to just stop, and breathe.

I forget this. Often. I get carried away in my head and my thoughts and forget that I can stop it all and just breathe. That little pause is sometimes all that I need to regroup. Refocus. Come back to me.

I wish I could remember it more often. And more quickly. It's just one little breath and yet it can make all the difference.

I suppose it is just a matter of practice. The more I stop and breathe... the more I will remember to do it. But my system is really much better at tearing off trying to fix this, solve this, complete this, do this... Stopping to breathe seems rather counterproductive. Nothing gets done if one is doing nothing!! And breathing, to my mind, is most definitely "nothing". I mean, yes... breathing keeps us all alive but... other than that... nothing really gets accomplished when you breathe. Errands don't get done. Emails don't get written. Stuff just doesn't get done!

And yet, what am I slowly being remind of is this... sometimes you need to stop in order to get things done. When I am swept up in an efficiency, productivity tear... I can be like one of those hamsters in their little wheel. I get going faster and faster and faster and then a tiny mis-step and "fling"... the spinning wheel spins me off into the dust. Kind of an abrupt reminder that I need to slow-down, stop... and breathe.

But even when I do stop, and retire to Starbucks to "regroup". I often sit here and just scroll mindlessly on Facebook, or the news, or my emails, or Facebook, or the news, or... and on it goes. I get my to-do list organized. I answer emails. But I don't actually stop and... breathe.

For me, writing a blog like this is a way to stop... and breathe. Journaling can be the same. A walk. Sitting on a bench. Looking out a window.

Maybe that is all I am doing here. Not solving anything. Not fixing anything. Not checking something off a list.

Just stopping.

And breathing.

Embracing Procrastination: Why It's Not Always a Bad Thing

Zen Garden (Image by 18121281 from Pixabay

"Hello, my name's Gigi and I'm a Procrasinator".

Seriously... if there was a PA group (Procrastinator's Anonymous), I'd be a card-carrying member for life. I have always held procrastination as a bad thing... or BAD thing.

So much to do, so little time... and I'm scrolling the news on my phone avoiding my to-do list. WTH??? Why am I procrastinating again?? I should have this handled by now?

But I procrastinate. All the time.

And then it came to me... procrastination is NOT a bad thing. It is necessary. We can' escape it. We need to embrace it. We need to make friends with procrastination and see it as a valuable tool in our Life Toolbox.

Ready? Ok... here we go. Let me lay it out.

Time is a Limited Resource

We only have 24 hours in a day. Every single one of us. And out of that, we need to sleep 8 hours (give or take). Which leaves 16 hours to do everything that we need to do in life. That is not a lot of time. So we need to make choices on what we are going to do in any given day. We can't make more time. The only thing we have control over is what we try to squeeze in a day.

We Can't Do it ALL

We can't. Given that time is limited, and energy as well, we can't do it all. It is Impossible. It is physically impossible to go to work for 8 hrs, walk the dog for 2 hrs, watch the kids in the school play for 2 hrs, cook meals for 2 hrs, work on taxes for 2 hrs, clean the Airbnb for 3 hrs, run errands for 2 hrs and work in the garden for 2 hrs... all in the same day. Do the math. It's not possible. Oh sure, you can burn the sleep candle at both ends but for how long?

On some days, my Amazing Marvin to-do system tells me I have 25 hours of tasks scheduled for that day. Um. Let's talk about overwhelm!

Work Faster, Longer, Better is Not a Solution

I think that if I could just work faster, work longer, or work better, more efficiently, that I can get everything done on my to-do list. Society is speeding up, everything is getting faster and faster. There is always more to do. How come everybody else seems able to do more with the same amount of time? What are their secrets? I need to find out! Surely there is a key somewhere that if I just new what it was and where it fit... my life would magically clear up and all would be ease and flow.

More is not always Better. Sometimes Less is More

We can have too much of a good thing. We can volunteer too much. We can take on too much. We can think that we can do more, and more and more but... always we run up against time and energy constraints and the Rule of Life... We can't do it All. Sometimes doing less is... more. 

Procrastination is the Solution

As I said... I have always seen procrastination as a bad thing. But like all things in life, it has a good side and a bad side. Procrastination is not necessarily good or bad, rather it is how we use it. An ax is not good or bad... it's how we use it. Procrastination is just a tool...

And if I use it carelessly, without thought or focus or attention, then I just drift through life, scrolling the news sites and avoiding the problems in my life that just seem too overwhelming. Not today. Tomorrow. I can't deal with this right now. I need chocolate. I need a movie.

But procrastination used mindfully, strategically, can be a very good thing. I only have 8 hours to get stuff done today. What are my priorities. What tasks am I going to focus on. What do I need to defer? Oooohhh... see... good procrastination has a new name... Defer. Or maybe Postpone. A rose by any other name...

I can't get everything I want to get done.... done in one day. I have to defer things, postpone, procrastinate. I have to choose what I am going to work on and say... these things are a "yes" and these things are a "no". For now. For today.

Rather than fighting procrastination, what if I embraced it and used it wisely? Might change things... dramatically.

Confessions of a Productivity Junkie: My Latest Obsession with the 1-3-5 Method!

It's been a while since I wrote a productivity post. Lest you think that I have given up on my productivity junkie ways... nope. That was just the last 4 months of pre-posted blogs! But now... under the gun from having frittered away my 4 month blog buffer... productivity is front and centre again. Which means, of course, that I am re-evaluating my time/energy usage and looking for something that can keep me focused and efficient. Enter... the 1-3-5 Rule!

What the Heck is the 1-3-5 Rule?

A very good question. At it's essence, it's really very simple... in any given day, I should be able to accomplish:

• 1 Big Task
• 3 Medium Tasks
• 5 Small Tasks

Simple, no? But... what does big, medium and small really mean?

1 Big Task

This is the most important and impactful task I need to complete. It could be a major project, an important meeting or something else that requires a good 1.5 to 3 hours to complete. Lately... Tax Preparation has been my Big Task on some days. On other days it's "Clean the Airbnb". 

3 Medium Tasks

These are tasks of moderate importance that still need to get done. They are essential for keeping things moving forward and keeping me on track. They aren't as big as the Big Task. I sort of ballpark them as 30 min to 90 min. Things like writing a blog post, running a daisy chain of errands, posting to our Airbnb's social media stream, mowing the hay field... errrr... back and front lawns.

5 Small Tasks

These are the little things that need to get done but often get overlooked. For me, they take between 5 and 15 min. Things like phone calls, sending emails, cleaning the heat pump filter. Writing or responding to guest reviews.

The thing with the 1-3-5 Rule is... there is only space for 9 (NINE!) things on my daily to-do list. Saayyyyy WHAT? Exactly. Before... I could have dozens of things on my daily to-do list. Talk about overwhelming. And I'd end up snacking on junk food tasks (the little ones) and never getting around to the bigger ones. BTW... updating my to-do list can seem uber important and urgent when there are dozens of things on my to-do list! And that can suck up hours of prime energy time. Sigh.

Anyhow... the 1-3-5 Rule puts an end to an Over-Ambitious To-Do List... there's only space for 9 things... and that's why it works so well...

The Beauty of the 1-3-5 Rule

The 1-3-5 Rule is simple and it's effective. It forces me to have:

Focus

I have to review my tasks and figure out... what's the big thing I need to get done today. Not "want" to get done... but "need" to... like spending a couple of hours on tax prep. Or cleaning the Airbnb because a guest checked out. I can only choose 1 (one!) Big Task so the 1-3-5 Rule forces me to look at my day and go... "OK... what's Priority #1 today).

Clarity

Oh, I get really clear on my priorities very quickly. In the past, I would think I could do 2 hours of tax prep and 3 hours of Airbnb cleaning and write 3 blogs... all in one day. Yeah. No. That doesn't work. I get really clear on what my big task is and I can let go of the other big tasks... for today.

Balance

My day is more balanced... there's room for a Big Task and a bunch of medium tasks and then the smaller stuff too. In the past, I might spend 8 hours of my day beavering away on some big research blog and... neglect everything else. That's a pretty quick road to exhaustion and overwhelm. I might "want" to do more but... there are only so many hours (and energy bursts) in a day so this helps me balance my day.

Achievement

There's nothing better than looking at my 1-3-5 list and going... Done and done and done and done!!! Looking at a list with several dozen items and seeing that I've only marked off 1 or 2... meh. Not very inspiring. While I might not get all of the Smaller Tasks done (they are easier to boot into tomorrow)... the Big Task generally does get Done!

But What About the 1-3-5-7 Rule?

But... true to form... there's a part of me that wants to add "more" to the 1-3-5 Rule. What about adding 7 Tiny Tasks? Things that take less than 5 minutes? Huh? What about that? What if I have a couple of calls to make or a few emails to write and they won't take 5 minutes each? What then?

Sigh. Rather than adding 7 Tiny Tasks to the 1-3-5 Rule... I've started bundling things. So one of my Small Tasks might be "Process Emails" and another might be "Call X and Call Y". But I do spend a moment on assessing if the Calls, for example, are going to be quick and short or if they might need to bounce up to a Medium Task.

Conclusion

So far, after a couple of weeks of this, I'm really liking the 1-3-5 Rule. My online to-do list program (Amazing Marvin) has a 1-3-5 integration. It automatically assigns things to the Big, Medium and Small lists based on the time duration I have assigned to tasks.

I tend to look at my 1-3-5 list for the next day on the previous evening. I assess my upcoming day and go "OK... no cleaning of the suite... tax prep is front and centre... and then writing a blog and then...". The next day, when I look at my list, it's all laid out. I might not "want" to do tax prep but... the list reminds me that this is important... it might not be as exciting as blog writing... but it's more important right now. And I focus and get down to it.

And it works. And that gives me a boost to do more!

Beyond the Clock: My Evolution from 4-Hour Dependency

When I first started this blog, I knew that I wanted it to focus on small steps - for healthy living, for the environment, for anything really. And several years into this, I am reminded daily that no great thing gets done without these small steps. Everything is made up of small steps.

The thing is... we don't see some of those small steps. We see a singer blaze into stardom and forget that this singer spent hours, days, months, years, practicing their craft, one small step at a time. We see new buildings pop up in our neighbourhood. We don't see the myriad small steps that go into constructing the building. We hear of a friend of a friend retiring at age 40 with millions in the bank. We are jealous and wonder what they did to hit the jackpot? Win the lottery? Sell a start-up? We don't believe it can be done one frugal penny-pinching step at a time.

And we know this... deep down, we know this... but still... we think that we there might be a shortcut to fame or fortune.

How Much Time is "Enough" Time?

A friend of my is producing two books a year (more or less). These are not fiction books, but heavily researched non-fiction espionage books. I don't know how he does it! He must have oodles and oodles of time! Like, open vistas of whole days that are just devoted to writing. Right? Maybe. Maybe not. Perhaps he just has a different view of time.

I still think that I need several blissfully empty hours in front of me before I can work on the next book, or start a new project. I don't believe that I can write a book one small step at a time. I think 30 minutes is too short. I think the smallest step I need is 2 hours. Maybe more. Like 4 hours!

Perhaps that is the key. I have an image in my mind of the size/length/duration of the "smallest step". For writing... realistically... I think I need 2 hours... and ideally 4 hours. I mean, I "need" that time to get back into it... to pick up where I left off... to gather my research notes and recall where I was in the project. And maybe I do need an hour to do that... but if I were to work on the project every day... I wouldn't need so much time to "get back in the groove".

When it comes to yard maintenance... it's the same... I think I need a good hour to get anything useful done. I mean, there is soooo much to do out there... I believe that I need at least an hour to make a meaningful dent in things. Or do I? My partner and I went out there this past spring, on a sunny afternoon, and decided to spend 15 minutes decluttering the shed. We made a sizable dent in the chaos in the shed. Just 15 minutes.

Same with house cleaning... my default seems to be an hour. Even though I know, from experience, that I can get a tonne of cleaning done in 15 minutes. My brain seems to have a default setting of one hour.

So if there is less than an hour of time in my day... I fill it with smaller, less important tasks that I know I can complete, rather than working on a larger project which I know will not be complete... even though it is moved further along to completion.

I know that completing a task gives a dopamine hit... so maybe I'm just a dopamine addict... wanting the hit after completing a task. If I know that a task can't be completed in 15 minutes or an hour... there is no dopamine carrot dangling ahead of me. And so I default to easier, simpler, shorter tasks.

The question then becomes... can I alter that 1 hour default? I did use the Pomodoro technique successfully a few times for projects that were seriously stuck. Work for just 25 minutes and then take a 5 minute break. It seems awfully rigid though. Or could I create an artificial dopamine carrot for working on something for 15-30 minutes?  And what would that look like?

Peak Alertness

Or... perhaps my sense that an hour is required in order for me to do productive project work isn't actually that far off. Studies have shown that our ultradian rhythm (cycles repeated multiple times in a 24 hour period) might have a role to play. Based on studies of our natural energy and alertness cycle... we can maintain peak alertness for 90 to 120 minutes before we need a break. On top of that... studies have also shown that it takes about 23 minutes to get into a deep work zone.

Sooo... if I really want to do some deep work... then the Pomodoro technique isn't going to work. I legitimately need about 30 minutes to get into a work zone. And I can maintain that for up to 2 hours. So the sweet spot for working on a complex project (like writing a blog or working on another book) is going to be somewhere in the 60-120 minute zone.

This actually makes me feel a bit better. I'm not mucked up! My sense that I can't get anything useful done on a blog or a book in less than an hour is probably not that far off. I need to be able to work on it for at least 30 minutes to get into a flow zone... but can only maintain that for another hour or so.

30 Minutes is Enough?

But here's where I can marry these two bits of information. All I really need is a 30 minute chunk of time. That's a small enough segment that it doesn't feel impossible or overwhelming. I also know that once I've been working on something for 30 minutes... odds are I will continue for a bit longer. And yes, ideally I would have a one hour chunk to devote to my writing.

On the other hand... for other things... like decluttering the garden shed, or updating our finances... I can drop that down to 15 minutes. I can get a lot of decluttering done in 15 minutes.

Now... the trick is... to actually follow through on this. An hour seems like a fairly large step to me... although 30 minutes is a bit more doable... cuts that hour in half. But even those 30 minutes are broken up into countless small steps... the first one being... to just start! Getting started seems to be 80% of the battle. If I can just get started, I know that everything else falls into place.

Next Small Step

So much of my to-do list is made up of things like "write blog about ____". That isn't, actually, a small step. That's like saying "land a man on the moon". Well... let's just give up right now because that is a huge mountain of a task! It's no wonder I get stuck and just skip over that item in my to-do list... it's much more doable to "screw fire extinguisher to the wall"... a very concrete, small step task. And it gives me a quick dopamine hit. Whereas "write blog" is so amorphous and nebulous that my dopamine addict looks at it and goes... "nope... too hard... I need a quick fix". And so I spend my time completing small tasks rather than focusing my precious time on larger, complex tasks.

Sigh... I'm back to looking at my productivity system! Surely there is something out there... something better than what I am doing. Something that will actually help me focus and get things done?

Productivity Systems

What about the Getting Things Done (GTD) system... where you identify the next actionable step? "Write blog" is not an actionable step. Even "research blog" is not an actionable step. Maybe "open blogger web app"... "open current blog post"... "review material written to-date"... "identify next steps"... Those are small steps. But do I really want to spend time adding them to my to-do list? Not really. I think I should be able to identify these when I see "write blog post"... but clearly that is NOT working!

There's also time-blocking... where you look at the week ahead and map things out ahead of time. What appointments do I have? What are the self-care things that need to go in there - walk, eating, etc. What work time do I need to factor into the schedule. Then... look at the remaining time and figure out... what can I do in that block of time... write a blog? answer emails and make phone calls? research Airbnb tips and tricks? The idea with time-blocking is that you group things together. So I am not answering emails and making phone calls throughout the day, when I should really be working on a blog or something else. I have tried it in the past and found it far too rigid... but perhaps I wasn't using it correctly because it is supposed to flex and flow with the unexpected.

I've also come across another idea... about working on one thing... without distraction. So the question to ask is... "Did I do what I said I'm going to do for as long as I said I would, without distraction?". Even if I didn't finish it... I can still get a dopamine hit because I did what I said I would do... without getting distracted. That's a win!

I'm going to have to let all of these percolate for a while... and see what I can come up with that might actually work for me

Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay