Can I Focus?

This lady Dana K. White started blogging about her messiness as a starter blog. She believes her clutter is the worst thing about her. And she ended up improving that thing a lot. And made a business out of it, which I don’t have time for or want to make time for. I have a job. Which I’m often not doing. Can I lean in to the worst thing about myself and end up improving it? I mean the thing I get the most frustrated with myself about, or that I don’t think about anymore because I can’t be frustrated and stressed all the time. It’s healthier than hating myself, and I probably get the same amount of work done as when I stayed late at work all the time and developed migraines.

So what if I try writing about it? With no audience so it’s not scary. But there could be an audience, and maybe that will hold me accountable? I’ll start by writing what I want to accomplish each day. On day 2 I’ll start writing what I accomplished yesterday. Right now I’m thinking just in terms of my actual job. Important details redacted. My ex-therapist would be proud if I kept track of my moods too. I did acquire some good habits from my recent visit to my cousin. Will they stick better if I write about them? Will I change myself into someone so successful that I acquire my favorite habit of hers, making oodles of money? Maybe!

Ok what am I trying to get done today? Find a photo, do the rest of the tasks J and I assigned me. That’s about all I have time for in the work day. Then I want to walk P to the pharmacy and pick up the prescription Walgreens has been bugging me about. Maybe I can put a load in the washer before I leave. I will need to eat somewhere in there or I’ll be super hungry before I start making dinner. There are snacks in the cabinet for this very reason.

Ok so.

Find that photo.

Go through the rest of the list. It’s not that long or hard.

TIMESHEET

Put the dog blanket in the washer. Eat a snack.

Take P to Walgreens. He’ll love it.

Make my red cabbage situation.

This whole thing is like a glorified timesheet? Which I have hated since the dawn of my career? But I do like writing my little jokes. Maybe I can take hold of my timesheet finally and make it something a little bit fun.

Ok now where would we have put that nice photo that J took? Or maybe it was M. Maybe just look at D’s last few photo folders. Found a photo that is good enough! Boom, emailed T. Now on to the rest of the to do list, which is in the margin comments in the document.

I like to listen to podcasts all the time. I know it distracts me from my work. Because my work is actually hard and requires thought. That’s why my brain wants a distraction. What do I do about this? I also use other distractions that I find really embarrassing. Like “expert killer sudoku”. Seriously?? Over and over again the same crap. It’s always something. I got bored of paint by numbers on my phone and started something else and something else and now we’re here.

Writing this seems like a slightly healthier distraction than the above. I’m less embarrassed about it anyway. I just got my first comment done. Or two if we count the photo. I’m doing amazing.

Ok now this excavator business is mine to figure out. They never had 3 doing the main work I don’t think. First of all, one was always broken. Second of all, they only barely had two operators capable of doing that. Ok where will I find this information? Maybe I can change it so it says what was on site during the work rather than what they used for what because who really cares???

Ok now the parts of an excavator. I guess I’ll look up a diagram of one. Cool, boom and arm. Another one done.

Next one need to ask J. And the next. And the next.

The next one I can do. Ok where did D put the logs? Nowhere, I put them somewhere and recently sent them to him.

I wonder where the phrase “as it were” comes from. Not where it comes from. I’m really wondering how it works grammatically. Ok back to “easily” finding my logs. Aaaand back again. Sent emails. Monday mornings I will go through my emails and unfinished tasks. Ok found my log. Have to actually look at it now. Why is this one harder? Maybe I only have the stamina for 3 easy little things at a time? Is my attention span that bad? Quite possibly.

Generated another question for J. Now was the clay placed in multiple lifts? Probably. When was this? During D’s time. Maybe in April.

Dana prides herself on living intentionally, and her clutter clashes with that value. I also pride myself on something like that. I face my feelings – except when the feeling is “work is so haaard”. K would say that’s not a feeling. What is the feeling? Fear, anxiety? Discomfort? What is the need underneath the fear? I want to be productive. I want to be comfortable. I want to be smart. I want to keep my job.

I’m doing pretty good already. I have a wonderful life. If this one thing could be under control, it would be even better I think. Many things are under better control than they used to be. My inner life, for one. My job. My home. My love life. My health. I’ve come so far. This is just the next thing I want to make major progress on. It’s not that I am not good enough until I fix this horrible thing about myself. But it will benefit me if I can improve this.

Dana still thinks of herself as someone who lives intentionally. I can still think of myself as someone who faces my feelings.

Is there something about work that makes my feelings there harder to face? Probably!

Is my worth tied to being smart? Being fast and efficient (NOT FAT)? Not in reality but in my lizard brain.

Ok the obstructions were super hard and the historical drawings showed they were concrete so it’s fine. They’re probably harder than the other material. Good enough. What else went wrong? Something was different about the materials they used.

HEY I’M DONE. Now the timesheet, which isn’t that bad this week because I was pretty organized and productive. It’ll at least feel better doing it than it sometimes does. Or feed the dog first? Nah timesheet SHOULD only take 5 minutes. Starting at 5:15.

It’s 6:24 and I have peed, fed the dog, walked the dog, gotten my prescription while walking the dog, and done like half a step of my timesheet. Try try again!

7:42. I have made progress but omg. This should take 10 minutes max.

8:09 I have made marginally more progress. If I finish my timesheet, I can do all kinds of things. I can ride my bike tomorrow. I can do laundry. I can go the fuck to bed.

8:31 I’m almost done going through my sent emails. No, I am fully done. Cool.

8:38 I’m done!!! And hungry.

What did I learn from this? Keep up with that spreadsheet during the week. Just a little misery each day. And does it have to be miserable? What is the big deal? I used to keep track of that all the time. Ok I think one thing is that my work has changed. The nature of the tasks I do has changed. It used to be all getting tasks done. Now a lot of my value comes from sitting on the phone. My ideas.

Can I make my red cabbage pasta by a reasonable time? Not really. I would be better served by going to bed. I could cut up the cabbage. But I could also do that while the pasta boils. Tonight I could still do the litter boxes. Ooh I could go to the DMV tomorrow. Could also take P to pack walk. Could possibly do both if I really focus and get to bed. Nah, the DMV is more important. Let’s do that.

Could get rid of some clutter for sure. Maybe I’ll box up stuff for donation tonight. And prep for the DMV.