This is part two of a blog I did earlier about my perception of time and how I struggle with feeling like I'm wasting it or that things/tasks will "take too long." Even now, I am at my day job office without my computer so I'm redeeming the time by blogging on my ipad.
So I surprised myself yesterday. I put on music and did some chores. I did dishes, swept floor in kitchen and hall. It was only 3 songs. So figure an average song is around 3 minutes. In 9 minutes, I did much more than I would have thought would occur in that amount of time.
On the other hand, I tried to quickly go through my email. It took me 5.5 songs to deal with email, not actually do it but disband it to the "to do" "to read" and then a few things I could dispatch instantly. More time than dishes and sweeping and feels maybe like less done.
I did a seminar on writing once and I did an exercise with the class. Something I stole from a class I had been in previously. You take a theme and write on it for 3 minutes and then count the words. You'd be amazed how much of a rough draft you can do and how many words appear on paper. It's so much about just sticking to it or squeeking out some time here and there.
I've been having trouble getting back into a couple writing projects because I feel I'll be interrupted or it's not enough time. It's true that when you've been away from a project for a while it takes a bit longer to find your grove again, but maybe I need to use the small bits of time despite the fact they feel insufficient. I need to write anyway whatever the time frame, but that doesn't come easily to me.
It is amazing how seriously your efficiency can fluctuate based on how many distractions there are and how focused you can be on the task at hand.
ReplyDeleteI've been noticing this at work in that having a lot of little things to do that normally would take no time at all literally fills all of the time I have available. If I have just one thing to do in a day, though, I can make serious headway.