I want more Alive Time and less Dead Time; b. To facilitate that, I will no longer allow myself to use the internet for any purpose that is not expressly related to what I’m specifically focusing on accomplishing at that moment, prior to 5pm each day except Sunday.
Unfortunately, I waste a lot of time browsing many different sites, watching YouTube, watching Netflix, scrolling through Discord servers, and so on, during any and all times of the day. Thus I’ll try living under the above self-imposed restriction and see how that helps. The vast majority of my time wasting happens on the internet, so that’s why I’m singling out my use of the internet as an intervention point and will change my habits therein during the aforementioned times.
I will not be using any blocking software because those are not effective for me, I either follow the restriction voluntarily to change my habits, or I don’t. I’ll include comments about this intervention’s efficacy in my daily shortforms over the next week or two so that I gain useful information to use for tweaking or improving the intervention, if necessary.
Specific things I can use the internet for prior to 5pm tomorrow:
solving a project ticket assigned to me on github
transferring money from savings to checking and paying all my monthly bills
logistics, communication, organizing, research, and purchases for currently-secret-project
playing music via YouTube, Spotify, or whatever internet music provider, but no exploration that takes conscious effort.
reply to DP’s email
health insurance, AWS, and other billing related concerns
I’m sure there are other things, for now this is a good list though.
I suspect you will be most successful at this if you get in the habit of taking breaks away from your computer when you inevitably start to flag mentally. Some that have worked for me include: going for a walk, talking to friends, taking a nap, reading a magazine, juggling, noodling on a guitar, or just daydreaming.
Thanks for sharing your experiences and recommendations :)
Going for a walk usually helps me out, and today was no exception (I walked almost 20,000 steps today split between two main walking sessions and misc daily tasks). I talked with friends while walking most of the time, that was a nice bonus. Right now I don’t have access to my desktop (it is packed for moving) so have been working primarily off of my laptop: being able to simply close the lid and walk away when flagging or otherwise needing a break helps a lot and feels much more satisfying in the moment than clicking a few buttons to put my desktop to sleep.
Shortform #44 Only Kill Time After 5pm
I want more Alive Time and less Dead Time; b. To facilitate that, I will no longer allow myself to use the internet for any purpose that is not expressly related to what I’m specifically focusing on accomplishing at that moment, prior to 5pm each day except Sunday.
Unfortunately, I waste a lot of time browsing many different sites, watching YouTube, watching Netflix, scrolling through Discord servers, and so on, during any and all times of the day. Thus I’ll try living under the above self-imposed restriction and see how that helps. The vast majority of my time wasting happens on the internet, so that’s why I’m singling out my use of the internet as an intervention point and will change my habits therein during the aforementioned times.
I will not be using any blocking software because those are not effective for me, I either follow the restriction voluntarily to change my habits, or I don’t. I’ll include comments about this intervention’s efficacy in my daily shortforms over the next week or two so that I gain useful information to use for tweaking or improving the intervention, if necessary.
Specific things I can use the internet for prior to 5pm tomorrow:
solving a project ticket assigned to me on github
transferring money from savings to checking and paying all my monthly bills
logistics, communication, organizing, research, and purchases for currently-secret-project
playing music via YouTube, Spotify, or whatever internet music provider, but no exploration that takes conscious effort.
reply to DP’s email
health insurance, AWS, and other billing related concerns
I’m sure there are other things, for now this is a good list though.
It’s time to get stronger!
Cheers,
Willa
I suspect you will be most successful at this if you get in the habit of taking breaks away from your computer when you inevitably start to flag mentally. Some that have worked for me include: going for a walk, talking to friends, taking a nap, reading a magazine, juggling, noodling on a guitar, or just daydreaming.
Thanks for sharing your experiences and recommendations :)
Going for a walk usually helps me out, and today was no exception (I walked almost 20,000 steps today split between two main walking sessions and misc daily tasks). I talked with friends while walking most of the time, that was a nice bonus. Right now I don’t have access to my desktop (it is packed for moving) so have been working primarily off of my laptop: being able to simply close the lid and walk away when flagging or otherwise needing a break helps a lot and feels much more satisfying in the moment than clicking a few buttons to put my desktop to sleep.