I'm only one month into the year, and I've already got a resolution done. It's great to start the year out with success! Especially because I foresee this streak ending very soon. :)
What about February? Ohhh, February.
So, I was looking over my resolutions lists of DO MORE and DO LESS, and I have come to a conclusion. I am in trouble. The Do LESS's on my list are good to work on, but they are SO MUCH HARDER. I don't have many habits, but the ones I do have are REALLY INGRAINED. Easier to make than to break, I guess.
I believe, with the DO LESS resolutions, I will most definitely fail. But I am going to try them anyway. It's not like I haven't failed before.
Then again, it depends on how I define failure. To succeed, I just need to be real. What am I really after with this goal? I want to IMPROVE myself, not PERFECT myself during the course of the month. . I want better, and I want sustainable. That's really what I'm after.
So, to set myself up so that I can succeedl, it's all about semantics, parameters, and definitions. How much less do I want to do? How much less can I realistically manage? How do I define failure? How do I know if I've succeeded? This is really just like January's goal of exercising 3x/wk. It would be wonderful if I exercised 6x/wk in theory. But it does not make my happy & healthy, and it's really too big a leap from how my life runs right now.
Resolution for February: Get on the internet LESS while I'm at work.
Possible Strategies:
1) have a timer so I can track how much time has passed when I DO get on the internet.
2) set an amount of time I have to work before I allow myself to check anything online.
3) provide myself with a short list of easy ways to get engaged with work when I am finding it hard to concentrate
4) set a max amount of time to be online each work day.
5) set a minimum amount of time to be engaged in work projects each day.
6) start my day differently than I normally do, just to mark the change in behavior and trigger a different approach
To help me set parameters:
1) I am going to track my productivity and time usage for 3 days (not a long time sample, but it's all the workdays I have left before February), and then pick a percentage of improvement for the 1st week. Based on how it goes that week, I will decide if week #2 parameters need adjustment or if I should stick to week #1 levels.
2) I have a log that I have been keeping for the past 7 months where I actually have rated myself on a scale of 1-5 in my ability to focus on work. I may be able to incorporate this as an evaluative tool, to see if I have improved.
Are there any tips or tricks you guys use to keep the ADD part of you on-task and away from your favorite websites? It can be hard for me. It comes a little bit with the territory of endlessly having new kinds of projects that don't have obvious next steps. That, and the fact that I'm me. But I know I'll feel better when I don't get distracted and just dig in and tackle them. And I think my boss feels better too. :)
Here's to trying. Here's to almost certain failure. Here's to hopes of a little bit of win.
Go Team Me!
No comments:
Post a Comment