On Letter Memes

[danieldwilliam]

F4f3 gave me the letter P.

Something I hate:  Procrastination.  It is the bane of my life.  I would be far more effective as a human being if I could find some way of managing it. So far, the most effective way I’ve found of forcing me to do things is to paint myself in to some sort of corner with a public obligation. This works fine a motivating tool but because I’m working against myself, putting myself under pressure and not managing my workload very well I can end up feeling anxious and then often down. This occasionally leads to depression.

I think procrastination is the mental health thing I need to work on this year.

Something I love: Passion.  I love passion in myself. I love it when I’m inspired and driven and made joyful by the doing and the achieving of something. I love it when other people are too. But, it’s a secret love. I’m a bit embarrassed by passion, in myself and in other people. Perhaps because if we admitted that we had passion or could have passion we would have to examine the way we live our lives and the way we structure our politics and ask ourselves why only a few people get to act on their passions as fully as they would wish?

Somewhere I have been: Portland, Oregon. MLW’s bestest and oldest friend and her husband, my spiritual twin currently live in Portland. We will be visiting them in a few months’ time. Portland seems like a nice, relaxed sort of a place with lovely beer. If ever I win the lottery I’m setting up a brewpub like they have in Portland. 

Somewhere I would like to go: Pompey. One of the things I love is archaeology. Another is Classical Rome. I’m particularly interested in how ordinary people lived their lives. I’d love to go to Pompey and Herculaneum and explore the past as people experienced it.

Someone I know: Pete, my friend Pete, my “friend” Pete. Pete is perhaps the most unreliable friend someone could have. I first met him when I moved back to Aberdeen at the age of 15. We were at Uni together, in the same halls, in the same course. We even mooted together. He was an usher at my wedding. Every so often he just disappears, often for years at a time. He’s erratic, prone to outburst of intemperate anger, often irrational. I’ve no idea what is going on in his head but I wish I did.

Best Movie: Platoon. When I was a young teenager one group of my friends were fascinated by the Vietnam war. It was the decade after the tenth anniversary of the Vietnam war. I was living in Australia at the time. A few of my friends’ dads or uncles had been involved in the war.  My friends and I would devour Vietnam war films in a great film fest of jungle green savagery. Platoon, Hamburger Hill, Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket and perhaps, most disturbing of all for me Good Morning Vietnam. Platoon was the first film I saw  where I was aware of the authorial position sitting underneath the story.

It is well that war is so terrible, else we should become too fond of it.

Comments

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

On procrastination, did you see this post about why people procrastinate which was doing the rounds yesterday? That post itself is good, but perhaps even better is the second post, linked from the bottom of it, about how to stop yourself from doing it. I certainly found it helpful.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I have, thank you, and I found it very useful. In fact it's the pair of articles that got me thinking about procastination as a problem in my life.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Anything in particular that you found helpful?

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

The stuff on writing realistic to-do lists and prioritising appropriately, I think. It's stuff I already knew and am doing to a large extent, but it helped me firm up some details.

[alitheapipkin.livejournal.com]

I feel similarly about the first 2 bits of this. Did you read the procrastination links Andrew posted yesterday? The advice in the second post is excellent - I've beaten mine mostly into submission at work thro meticulous planning.

Pompeii is a fantastic place to visit, I highly recommend it. Go on the train rather than a guided tour (you can buy excellent guide books) so you can spend all day there, and do the bits closest to the car park really early or late in the day because they will be utterly packed from late morning to early afternoon with all the people who go on coach tours and only see a fraction of it. Herculaneum is a much smaller site that you can do in an afternoon but you could spend 2 days at Pompeii easily.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I've read the first half and am looking forward to the second when I'm in the right frame of mind to get my head round it.

It was your response, in part, to the articles that prompted me to read them seriously.

I'd be interested in hearing about what worked for you to reduce the effect of procrastination.

[alitheapipkin.livejournal.com]

To be fair, it's the system they use here at work that works so well for me. Tasks are all split up into realistic chunks and prioritised, and we have a meeting every morning where people are assigned stuff to do. Plus a weekly meeting for longer term planning.

It combines having everything divided up into individual tasks which I can accomplish without getting bogged down and get a sense of achievement and confidence from completing each day, with also having what I'm supposed to be doing exposed to other people so I can't hide away and store up things to stress about at the last minute.

I find completing a small bunch of tasks each day is great for my mental health - my to do list in this job is somewhat endless, but committing to achieving a bunch of measurable things each day means I focus on doing stuff, rather than worrying about all the stuff I still need to do.

I also make sure I do the things that require the most brain power first thing in the morning after the meeting, and don't log in to any procrastination tools (like LJ) until I've ticked at least one task off my list for the day.

I have also accepted that some procrastination is just the way I am, so I don't beat myself for doing it as long as I get a set of tasks done each day too.

It's probably much easier with a team around you working the same way, but you could try writing yourself a to do list each morning which has a small number of tasks, broken up into what you can achieve in say 30 mins to an hour, and posting it here (even if it ends up being private) and see if it helps. I think not setting yourself up for failure by challenging yourself to do too much is also very important.

(I'll stop here because I'm rambling but happy to chat some more about it if it will be helpful for you)

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

That set up sounds like it would suit me very well.

And I hear you about recognising that procastinating is just part of the way I am. I think what I need to do is make sure that I'm procastinating at the right time and in the right way.

Well structured to do lists will help.

Thanks for the offer of more chat - I suspect I'll take you up on that once I've thought a little more about it.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Helpful advice on Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Cheers.