Discipline and Functionality

Any tips on becoming a more functional individual?

I've just finished a 'daily planner' which i'm going to start using.

My attention span is short yet i have desire (which has gotten me this far).

But i just feel i don't use my time well (easily distracted)

Anyway i thought i would ask. I know some of you are older than I and thus wiser via life experience.

set yourself a goal and do a little bit towards it each day

Thats a really good question. If there is an universal solution for that problem, i wanna know it

Personally i should be learning for school as we have exam next year,
but currently it looks like I'm only sitting at my computer every day and almost doing nothing
I already tried to have some plugin for my firefox that shuts Firefox down as soon as a certain time length has reached, but that didnt help much, I deinstalled it.

It just has to come from within that you wanna change something, depends on the circumstances too. I think a daily time plan rather doesn't help. Just do what you think is alright to do, but don't overact with it and keep discipline!

just read this

whenever I'm about to start doing something I know I shouldn't be (say, watching tv or having a beer and doing jack shit the whole day or evening) instead of studying/ working on an assignment I try to think of how guilty and stupid I felt the last time I was almost late with handing in my work/ not knowing stuff during an exam - this usually helps

I'm having to do this a lot going from PhD to an actual job.

Two things I find helpful are
1) having a 'things to do list' (I use outlook draft emails as a jotter for this sort of stuff at work...) Really helps to keep me focused and stop me titting around wasting time.
2) Estimate how long something should take, then keep checking whether you're on target to get there. At work I try to spend five minutes when I get in deciding what I'm going to try to get done that day, and then at lunchtime see if I'm halfway through it and if not whether I can get back on track. Likewise (to some extent) on any given project. If something should take a week, you've spent two days on it and you're 10% of the way through then you're doing something wrong - and it's worth figuring out what before you waste more time.

That's the theory, at least...

1 lists.
2 lists.
3 lists.
4 lists.

just to add

- have an alarm go off every whenever to keep you tracking time. i say every hour.
- have the to-do-list with so you can add more when you think of them (ive got mine built into the Windows Mobile, task program). you might forget by the time you get back to your computer.

what distracts you the most?

what distracts you the most?

Wait what were we just talking about?

Thanks guys. Great advice here.

Today is the first day with my 'planner'. Going well, i have 9 mins till my tea break ends.

Will try all advice (+books). Thanks.

good luck dionysus. you learn about yourself undertaking these things, for example, i tried all sorts of list technologies from an iPod to iCal to my phone to list programs with all the bells and whistles and gizmos and wasnt any more productive. what I realised in the end was that I need to physically write things down, just an idiosyncracy of mine i guess, but all I needed was a good calendar and a notebook system I came up with and things didnt seem so overwhelming after that.

Yeah the planner is pretty good. Its nice to have set times for everything (even tea breaks!) and stick to them. Gives me a good sense of what i've accomplished for the day. Which i think is very important as it is very easy to solely think about the ton of work that you have to do.

Tired now though...

...all this bloody hard work is nackering! :teeth:

True.

Beware working to the schedule, though. I've had days at work when I've spent the whole day feeling like I've been doing pretty well and it's only at the end of the day that I've realized I've not actually made significant progress - that working for a day doesn't neccessarily produce a day's work...

Any tips on becoming a more functional individual?

Would this make you happier? Or is it a script you have absorbed from parents/family/teachers/peers.

all I needed was a good calendar and a notebook system I came up with and things didnt seem so overwhelming after that.

Same here, writing it out works for me much more than any technology.

Its great to make like lists for day whatever, but to have a journal of bigger or more difficult tasks, goals and when you look back you can cross em off.

Any tips on becoming a more functional individual?

Would this make you happier? Or is it a script you have absorbed from parents/family/teachers/peers.

I was thinking the same. I don't see anything wrong with being easily distracted, it means your brain is active and alert. I'm not sure if working against it is going to do any good.

Any tips on becoming a more functional individual?

Would this make you happier? Or is it a script you have absorbed from parents/family/teachers/peers.

I was thinking the same. I don't see anything wrong with being easily distracted, it means your brain is active and alert. I'm not sure if working against it is going to do any good.

What makes me happy is doing the right thing...

Who determines the "right thing"? Culture? A percentage. My genes? A percentage. My soul? My soul?

Bottom line is, i love what i do but its hard. That is why i do what i do. Why i love what i do is a question for other people.

you could work on this chair, it would certainly dispel any notions of being too pedantic.

By the way, does anyone else keep seeing the thread title and expecting it to be about a Gang of Four rarities compilation or a mid nineties Jeff Mills album or something?

I like to use Tada lists, simple and effective!

http://tadalist.com/

Im mostly rubbish at this sort of thing though

you could work on this chair, it would certainly dispel any notions of being too pedantic.

so dionysus, how's the daily planner going

good question, id like to know which one is working.


:voyeur: