It feels like a drop in the ocean, but ...

... one day I made a bargain with my inner child, Ingenua. She didn't see the point of doing ... well ... anything. It wasn't fun any more, and there were too many scary thoughts going around. So I said, "How about, for every little thing we do that is good for me, we'll give five cents to charity:water? How does that sound?"

And she smiled.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

The daily grind: Starting again

It's been a while since my last post.  I had a string of bad days ... Well, good and bad things happened, but I didn't write anything down.  I guess that's one of the problems with depression - it makes you unreliable about regular things.  Like habits, as well, I suppose.  But today was definitely a good day.

Here's the list:
Rising before midday: 5c.  I had an alarm clock to help me.
Getting dressed to shoes: 5c.
Leaving the house: 5c.  By myself!  Smith wasn't feeling well, so he went back to bed.
Completing at least one planned task: 5c.
Staying focussed at least once: 5c.  I successfully avoided a distraction by deferring it until later.  And then I remembered to do it.
Eating lunch: 5c.
Studying: 5c.  More on that later, I guess...
Preparing dinner: 5c.
Lifting my own mood: 5c.  I blabbed to Smith for a bit about my study, just to talk to him, and it made me happy.  And then he was able to help me.
Cleaning a hot spot! 5c.  This is a FlyLady thing.  More below...
Preparing and planning study: 5c.  I downloaded a lecture so I can listen to it in the morning, when I'm most alert.

Total: 55c

And the analysis:
Well, there are a lot more items on the list than I thought there would be.  Even if I had to make some of them up!  And not everything I did today is part of this list ... I guess that's because it's not your normal to-do list, it's a list of the little things that I'm trying to remember to accomplish.

If I listed the things I planned for today that people would normally put on their to-do lists, it would look something like this:
Psychiatrist's appointment
Tutorial
Shopping
Study
Pilates class
Research for my essay
Blogging

According to that list, my day was pretty successful.  The only thing I missed was my Pilates class, while on the plus side I also fitted in an emergency visit to the bank.  (I can't believe I let my bank balance get so low...) And I did get a bit distracted during the research ... but it was midnight ... :P

I was also going to reassign the points for different things according to priority, but I haven't decided whether to do that yet.  Things like, more points for having a shower, brushing my teeth, going to Pilates, and less points for stretching in bed, swiping the bathroom vanity, etc.  I'd rate different tasks depending on what habits I was trying to focus on at the time, starting with the "essentials" and then moving on to other habits.  If I rated today according to that "essentials" list, I didn't do that well.  Didn't have enough breakfast, didn't exercise when I had the chance, and it's a bit late for a shower.  Oh well, I'll just try not to dwell on the negatives...

I'm pretty proud of starting on my hot spot, though.  The Hot Spot Fire Drill is an exercise from the FlyLady website.  The idea is to focus on one area for a short period of time, so you at least get something done.  You work as quickly as you can, as if you had to put out a fire on that spot.  And then you go and put away all the things that you took out of the spot.  I managed to clear a workable space on my desk, and not just by stashing things - they actually got put away in their proper places.  Maybe I'll be able to keep it clear this time ... Or at least clean it regularly.

Anyway, it's way past midnight ... Time to sleep before I get distracted again.

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