Word of the Year: Disciplines 7: A Work Schedule

 

My corner office. Opelousas, Louisiana. March 2015. Credit: Mzuriana.

 

I have created a work schedule for myself that is completely new to my experience. 

It is new in that I have redefined "work."

"Work" now includes, in addition to income-producing activities, the creative actions I want to complete, such as:

• Twice-weekly posts in my blogs
• A written and pictorial narrative for my descendants, to tie them to our preceding generations
• That bucket list item I wrote at age 27, during a major turning point in my life: Write a book and have it published
  

Until my illuminating flash about this some weeks ago, I had viewed gaps in my income-producing activities as random free time, which my brain interpreted as sort of vacation time. Undisciplined time. Which led, too often, to wasteful, non-directed screen time. 

My windowsill office. Old Rustavi, Caucasus Georgia. September 2011. Credit: Mzuriana.

 

But recently, as I have grown older, my thoughts have gone here, and I feel a sense of urgency that is new to me. 

The past 12 years, since going rootless, have zoomed by! The next 20 years are likely to do the same. 

I don't want to waste them. I don't have time to waste. 

 

My office in Las Cruces, New Mexico. February 2019. Credit: Mzuriana.

My new work schedule (with a noon-2pm break): 

• Monday through Friday: 8:30am - 5pm
• Flex time: "Work" on Mondays and Fridays includes tourist / travel adventures 
• Flex time: Some income-producing work falls before or after these work hours
  

My office on the far left. El Paso, Texas. September 2016. Credit: Mzuriana.

Structure. Structure is good. 

 

Related posts

Word of the Year 2022: Disciplines 1: Introduction

Word of the Year 2022: Disciplines 2: Showers

Word of the Year 2022: Disciplines 6: Daily Walks

Word of the Year 2022: Disciplines 2: Showers

 

Space capsule shower, Motel 6, Tucumcari, New Mexico. July 2017.

 

Beginning some time in December 2021, I implemented a discipline: 

Take a shower every other day. 

 In years past, when I worked in an office, I showered every morning. 

Once I began working remotely, which has now been for some 10 years, I routinely showered every other morning. 

But then COVID came, and I had nowhere to go, much.

So the time lapse between showers stretched to three days, often. Sometimes four. 

I cleansed my face and lady bits every day, of course, but a full-on shower, no.

A couple of months ago, I determined to move back toward normalcy and to a regimen. 

A couple of times, when shower day fell on a cold and rainy Sunday, I've engaged in lawyerly arguments against showering. Why shower today? You're going to stay home, anyway, right? Stay in your pajamas! Be warm and cozy! Take your shower tomorrow instead!

But thus far, I've responded thusly: 

1. You wanted a discipline, a regimen. 
2. Small maintenance routines matter. They are things you can control in an uncontrollable world.
   
3. They are a return to normalcy. 
4. Besides, if you wait til tomorrow, you'll just have to take that shower tomorrow. Instead, you can take it today and have tomorrow off! 

Speaking of showers .... 

August 2017: Missouri Flash Trip, Part 2: The Space Capsule Shower

November 2017: Ferguson, Missouri: My Shower

April 2013: Cuba, New Mexico: Shower Moon

March 2011: Harar, Ethiopia: Camels and Osama in Babile, Harar, Day 7, Thursday

August 2011: An excerpt from Me Ver Gavige [I Don't Understand] about a not-quite-shower in Rustavi, Caucasus Georgia, and the challenges of language: 

I was taking my customary bucket bath this morning, enjoying the pleasure of hot water. I turned on the water, wetted my washcloth, turned off the tap, did my thing, then turned on the tap to soap up the cloth, turned off the tap ... etc. 

Presently Nino [my hostess] starts talking to me outside the bathroom. It was kind of early in the morning, which meant my brain wasn't completely engaged anyway. Nino seemed to require some sort of response from me. I said, "Me ver gavige. (I don't understand)" More talk. I said, "Budishi (I'm sorry), me ver gavige." Nino said more, adding a sound that was similar to a hoarse dog barking. And I'm thinking, "I don't understand what you're saying or what you want. And I'm naked here, OK? Why are you making me talk to you while I'm standing naked in a wash basin with three inches of water in it? What do you want me to do in this moment?" But I say, "Budishi, me ver gavige. I don't understand." Eventually, my brain plucks out the word "gasi" from Nino's statements, which it puts together with the hoarse-dog-barking sound effect, and I realize Nino is talking about the gas water heater, which evidently she wants me to stop engaging when I use the hot water for my bath. So I switch to cold water only, feeling very grumpy indeed.

Once I'm out of the bathroom and getting dressed, we revisit this issue, and I come to understand that Nino didn't want me to turn the water on/off, as it kicked on the gas pilot each time, which might wake up Giorgi. Instead, I can just leave the water run. OK, now I've got it.

Language lesson learned: Sometimes a hoarse-dog-barking sound means gas, and sometimes, as it did a week or so ago, it means the sound of a hoarse dog barking, which kept Nino awake one night. It's all in the context.  

Thank God Nino doesn't seem to hold a grudge.

Bathroom in New Rustavi, Caucasus Georgia. July 2011.

 

 

Word of the Year 2022: Disciplines 1: Introduction

 

 

Tai chi lesson in Upper Tom Lea Park, El Paso, Texas. April 2017.

There are:

1. Skills I want to master, 
2. Creative works I want to produce,
3. Fitness levels I want to sustain or achieve, 
4. Financial goals I want to meet before I retire, 
5. Relationships I want to nurture,
   
6. "Greater societal goods" to which I wish to contribute, and
7. Serenity I want to achieve and sustain notwithstanding storms that might pass through and around me. 

 

Tai chi lesson in Upper Tom Lea Park, El Paso, Texas. April 2017.

 

All of the above require a discipline. 

A intentional regular daily, weekly, or monthly practice - in other words, an action - designed to achieve or sustain a goal, whether that goal is physical, emotional, intellectual, or spiritual.

If I compare a discipline to a bank account, it's about me depositing money into an account every day, even if the amount is small. The more reserves I build over time, the more money I have to work with to meet my needs and desires.

2022 is to be about practicing regular disciplines that will transform my wanna-do's to my doing. 

 

My barriers to discipline practice

1. Too much screen time. Doesn't matter if I spend squander my time reading serious news or fluff - it's time I will never get back. It's time I could use to create, learn, practice, produce. 
2. Too many distractions. Like writing this post, for instance. I look out the window. Make lunch. Watch a brainless youtube about babies' reactions to seeing their dads without a beard for the first time. Sweep a floor.
   
3. I tend to do not-urgent/not-important things in my daily life before (or instead of) the not-urgent-but-important things. My daily to-do list is helpful, but it's just an unweighted list of tasks. In other words, visually, sweeping a floor carries the same weight as completing this post. Pennies equal dollars.

 

7 Habits of Highly Effective People time matrix. Source: Franklin Planner.

 

These barriers are not new for me, of course. Hey, look at this vintage post that I forgot I wrote until now: Getting Things Done (September 2012). And this one, Portable Tai Chi, in 20 fucking 10.

Building a new skill is uncomfortable. I am averse to discomfort. I feel a little distressed. I feel awkward. Annoyed. Frustrated. I feel like I'm just not going to get it. I have the desire to flee. And it takes so. much. fucking. time. The hours it takes to reach even the beginner stage. The hours it takes to move past the discomfort phase into the I-think-I'm-getting-it phase, when it becomes more satisfying. 

Hope

Although I've had certain goals on my "I want to do...." list for years - without putting in the requisite labor hours to get me there - I do have the ability to get them in my Ongoing or Completed columns.

Because I have, in fact, knocked a number of items off the bucket list that I wrote in my early 30s, at a time when I was a single parent of a very young child, with very few financial resources. 

I've also realized a number of adolescent dreams, albeit in ways I did not anticipate back then. 

And I learned to dance, didn't I? Who would have ever thought that could happen? Not me! 

But a hard home truth: I ain't getting any younger, so I better get crack-a-lackin'.

Getting Things Done

Getting things done

There's a whole industry out there focused on the art and science of GTD - getting things done, sometimes referred to as "life hacks" or more prosaically, "productivity." 

Laying street tile, Tbilisi, Georgia.

As my interregnum between teaching English in Rustavi and relocating to New Mexico begins to close, I sometimes fret about my pace at getting things done. The truth is, though, I've put one GTD step in front of the other pretty well in regard to transitioning from one rootless chapter to the next. So I'll give myself a good grade on that.

Working the farm, Holstein, Missouri

In other ways, though, I struggle with GTD. It'd be easy to point to the usual suspect, procrastination, but that's just the external behavior that arises from the true culprits:

• Fear
• Discipline
• Process design (knowing the goals, whether you've got the *right* goals, efficiency, correct priorities, capacity) 

Putting up plums, Gurjaani, Georgia

GTD porn

There's no shortage of books, websites, consultants, apps, motivational speakers, life coaches (or GMAFB, "life design" coaches) out there devoted to helping us get things done. Some of it is good and some of it is schlock.

Unfortunately, if you're like me, sometimes you can be so entranced by the life hack literature out there, it keeps you from getting things done. A good summary here:

Joining a Facebook group about creative productivity is like buying a chair about jogging. 

Merlin Mann

Carrying hay, Ethiopia

Here are some resources I like:



A worthwhile investment of two hours of your life is to watch Randy Pausch's lecture on Achieving Your Childhood Dreams, and his lecture on Time Management.  You may already be familiar with Randy Pausch. He was a professor of computer science (virtual reality and other cool stuff) at Carnegie Mellon University. He died of pancreatic cancer in 2008. If your internet connection isn't up to watching the video on Youtube, you can download a copy of the lectures here.

Making apple butter, Holstein, Missouri

Stepcase Lifehack. From the site: ... dedicated to lifehacks, which is a phrase that describes any advice, resource, tip or trick that will help you get things done more efficiently and effectively.

43 Folders, specifically: Getting Started With "Getting Things Done. I first cited 43 Folders when I talked about going paperless.

It can be a dry read and it's more than 20 years old, but: 7 Habits of Highly Successful People. The ideas in the book can be life-changing, although they're super-hard to practice.

Old Missouri State Penitentiary, Art in the Park, Jefferson City

 

So, back to me:

Even though I feel good about some of the things I'm doing to reach goals, I've got stuff out there awaiting my attention. These range from tedious maintenance tasks that mitigate system failure (the not if, but when, remember?), to a long-deferred overhaul of a website I have, and so on.

As a former colleague liked to say, I need to get crack-a-lackin'.