Things I'd like to do daily

[randomling]

This is not a thing I'm going to attempt to stick to just yet. It's a list of all the things I'd like to be able to do daily, so it's not necessarily in achievable form yet. It is however an essential first step to finding the list of things I will be able to do every day.


* Find and apply for at least two jobs a day (more on days when I'm not out of the house for other reasons for long periods of time). This is going to be facilitated by various other preparation activities, like figuring out if the library is a useful place to work, and if not setting aside some money to sit in a coffee shop.
* Practise the piano for around 15 minutes a day. I'm not doing this at all right now, and it's a nice thing that I'd like to be able to do.
* Some kind of exercise. It can be a handful of push-ups, or a little bit of walk, or some stretches. And start using Fitocracy again (maybe I should try and figure out a way to filter a lot of the social stuff and/or disable comments or something, 'cause that community is Somewhat Gung-Ho).
* Something with SuperBetter, it's a cool site that I should use more.
* Test my blood sugar. I've never really figured out about testing before/after meals and I should have some better idea where my sugar is at. (Please, don't have a go at me for this, it's already a source of enough brainweasels, and I am pretty familiar with the difference between where I am and where I should be.)
* Shower. This might be impractical while I'm depressed, but it's something I can at least try for.
* Tidying. This room is a tip and it could be improved. There's loads of stuff in the Project Space list about what specific stuff I can work on.
* Writing for at least a little while. Even if it's like, a few sentences a day, that's something. I have so much writing on my plate.
* Coding. This is something I've really let go the past few months, and I really want to pick it up again, because I love the challenge, and I have lots to do.
* Other creative stuff! Like knitting, for example, or learning to vid, or working on meta, or other things that I haven't thought of.
* Chilling - hanging out with my lovelies in IRC, playing stupid games of various varieties, watching silly TV.
* Housework. At least a little bit around the house every day, because I should be better at helping my parents out with that stuff.
* Cleaning my teeth
* Take medicine

Wow, that's quite a few things. It sounds like I could be busy, but busy is not necessarily bad. I wonder if I can put some of these things into separate lists, like types of activity. That might be helpful. Let's try it.

Work / chores
* Find and apply for jobs
* Tidying
* Housework
Creative / Fun
* Piano practice
* Writing
* Coding
* Other creative stuff
Self-care
* Exercise
* SuperBetter
* Test blood sugar
* Shower
* Chilling
* Clean teeth
* Take meds

Of course, there's a part of me that wants to do these things as effectively as possible, and at some later point I can look up on the internet how to do various things on this list - the internet's full of how tos!

There's other things I want to do less frequently. Like shaving (which probably doesn't have to happen more than a couple of times a week), cleaning my razor (once a week or so), cutting my nails (every couple of weeks), changing my sheets (also every couple of weeks), laundry (at least once a week, probably more often for a bit as I still have some backlog). Getting control of this stuff is important, too.

So there is some macro stuff going on here. Like, part of this is about figuring out a routine and finding a way to stick to it. This is a pretty good list that might help me shape that. Like, what happens if I do something like:

Get up
Test blood sugar
Some kind of morning exercise (short walk, stretching, push-ups, whatever I decide), test blood sugar again post-exercise, log activity on Fitocracy
Breakfast, morning meds
Shower, clean teeth, get dressed
Go out - either to whatever's going on that morning or to the library/Costa for jobsearch stuff
Test blood sugar at some point during the morning (should be about 2hours after breakfast)
If I come home for lunch, test blood sugar before & after, otherwise just deal with lunch
Then it diverges somewhat, so
* If I'm out through the afternoon, do some tidying/housework and applying for jobs, evening exercise before dinner, practise piano after dinner, chill or do some writing/coding before bed
* If I'm home in the afternoon but have been doing other stuff in the morning, apply for jobs, then follow up with tidying/housework, writing/coding, evening exercise before dinner, piano practice after dinner, chill before bed
* If I've been applying for jobs all morning, write or code in the afternoon, do some tidying/housework, evening exercise, piano practice, chill before bed
Then bed

Hrm that sounds kind of stressful. Maybe what I can do is, instead of imagining I'll do tidying AND housework, or writing AND coding, do one or the other? Applying for jobs after a mostly-full day (I'm thinking of course days) out is probably quite a lot to ask of myself, too. So perhaps those days I can give myself a pass on the job applications, if only 'cause I'll be exhausted.

I wonder if I can give the blood sugar testing a pass too when it's going to be falling at awkward times like while travelling. I don't know how important it is.

Either way I can make these days relatively chill by having music happening through the day and stuff. That might be reasonably helpful.

Hm, this is certainly a few steps towards something sort of useful. What I need to do now is follow through and not just leave this hanging.

So let's make a plan for tomorrow. This is probably sensible because then I can just get started. So. Sunday:

8am-ish: Get up, test blood sugar
Short walk, test blood sugar after exercise, put activity on Fitocracy
Breakfast, morning meds
Go up to library with computer. Check out whether they have Wi-Fi, whether I'm allowed to have a bottle of water. If not, check price of water in Costa. Apply for jobs.
At some point during the morning test blood sugar again
1pm-ish: Come home for lunch. Test blood sugar before lunch.
Devote afternoon to coding. Work on bug 2277.
Do some tidying.
Piano practice after dinner, then wash up dinner.
Watch an episode of something after washing up.
Bed by 11pm.

That sounds quite possible.

I'm also tempted to start a handwritten journal (again!) so that I can make notes of what happens for my own edification.

(It's really frustrating not knowing how much of my energy fail is in my head and how much is real. I guess this is one way to test my limits.)


That seems like too many things, in fact.

I'm eliminating piano practice for now - that can be picked up later when I'm more settled into my new routine. I think I'm also just letting the blood sugar testing go for now. I might also allow myself to do some chilling in the afternoon, as well as after dinner, and ease up a bit on the coding. I'll still do something, but I won't force myself to do all the things.

I'm still gonna go for a short walk before breakfast, and try to shower.

Comments

[momijizukamori]

I'm going to sit here and cheer you on because I would really like to do something similar - work more little useful organizational things into my day, particularly right now while I have more free time to do things.

My cool psych gave me a book rec for organizing when you fail at focus so I can let you know if it ends up being useful if you'd like!

[randomling]

Thanks for the cheering, I appreciate it! And yeah, this is an ongoing project, we will see how it turns out long-term.

I would be very interested to hear whether that book turns out to be useful!

[momijizukamori]

Sure thing! I need to sit down and actually read it instead of getting sucked in by The Internet.

[lilysea]

Good luck! ^_^

[randomling]

Thank you!