Pomodoro

Like others coping with adult ADHD (see also Leigh’s post and this article) I find it exceptionally hard to manage time. I’ve tried so many systems, and I have piles of lists and bullet journals that I’ve abandoned. But one thing I keep coming back to is “the pomodoro method“.

Super simply, it goes like this: Set a time for 25 minutes. During which, do the thing. When the timer dings, stop.

There’s a super-system where you take 5-minute breaks between repeated sessions and a longer break after four or something, but who has that kind of time?

Screenshot of google calendar for this week; almost entirely meetings.

I think there are a few reasons that this works for me. One – at any given time, I’m usually stressed about 3-7 large-scale items that need deep, creative attention, which could each eat up as much time as I can give them, all must get done but not super urgently, and are most likely to get pushed to the side in favour of answering random emails. I get stuck, because no matter what I choose, I can argue that I’m making the wrong choice. But 20 minutes won’t hurt anyone, so I can take that time and focus on something that I want to give my full attention to, stress-free.

Second – It’s long enough that I can actually focus and do the thing. And it seems to be about the right time where after the 25 minutes, a break actually helps because it lets me step back right before I get stuck down a rabbit hole, see the big picture, and often reframe my goals.

Third – and this is the most important, it does not require constant compliance. So many systems promise to organize your life – but you have to stick with them religiously. Some day I’ll write about my relationship with my bullet journal (and how it became abusive). I could go into how productivity methods echo Foucauldian disciplinary penal structures, with regimes that require you to always be producing! Highly structured! Schedules! But the pomodoro doesn’t care. You can come back to the pomodoro whenever you want, without punishment. It’s a good friend like that. It’s also indifferent to whether you actually “finished the thing” or how many things got finished. Who does the cult of productivity really serve? (Our capitalist masters is who.) And regardless, it gives a reasonably attainable feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction.

Speaking of capitalism (and hah I am in no way sponsored by this but)… I want to voice my appreciation for OXO Good Grips and their accessible design. I have a few of their kitchen gadgets, and they’re easy on the hands. I’m not sure if their “Triple Timer” was intended for physical ease of use, or for the time-blind like me, but having three pre-set countdowns, plus a desk clock is a huge help. Sometimes it’s worth having a dedicated device, because I can never find the beeping tab among my 48 open, and I can’t start a timer on my phone without answering 3 different messages and checking social apps.

 

Things On A Screen

1. A quip from Dominic Pettman on Twitter that almost became a tattoo: “Approximately half of media studies is just reminding people – over and over – that a screen is not a window.” (tweet embedded below).

2. When I was looking for that, came across his tweet of Kate Tempest’s Tunnel Vision. Including the line “staring at the screen so we don’t have to see the planet die.” (0:55)

Watch to the end, she gets to the concept of Kinship.

3. Chelsea Vowel gifted us with this thread. It’s a presentation, formatted for twitter. “Law for the Apocalypse: Kinship out of Fracture.” Long read, worth it.

4. Which all tied into this morning’s meditation from Richard Wagamese’s Embers:

Me: Why am I alive?

Old Woman: Because everything else is.

Me: No. I mean the purpose.

Old Woman: That is the purpose. To learn about your relatives.

Me: My family?

Old Woman: Yes. The moon, stars, rocks, trees, plants, water, insects, birds, mammals. Your whole family. Learn about that relationship. How you’re moving through time and space together. That is why you’re alive.

5.  A recommendation to look at things off the screen. The way the trees rustled today as the rain started to fall.

What do I want this blog to be?

Hey, so, like, I’ve stopped posting here frequently. And when I do, I’m suuuuuuper cautious/self-critical. Maybe I should reconsider what this has become, vs. what I meant for it to be, vs. what I now want it to be.

What I had wanted: to think and write about technology, and how digital networks change the way we interact with other humans. I thought there could be interesting patterns to explore… but let’s be real. It was coming from a place of nostalgic yearning for ‘good old days’ when human connection was a chance to really connect, whereas now interactions are like our attention spans: fleeting, ephemeral, and mostly meaningless.

What it is: a place to hash out wokescolding. (If you are the kind of person who sincerely uses that term and would not apply it to me then I am not doing my job right.)

What I want it to be: Writing practice. A place to serialize thoughts that I want to share. Eventually, to take shape as a philosophical “project.” A place to learn how to share my thoughts, and use my power, in a way that can really make a difference. Or, I dunno, a cat blog?

Cat + log.
cat log

 

Liked SpinTime DJ on CBC by Steven Garrity (Acts of Volition)

I got to join Matt Rainnie this week on the CBC Radio Mainstreet program for the SpinTime DJ segment. I got to choose three songs, which is harder than it sounds. First, I had to get over myself and realize I didn’t have to take it as seriously as those who assembled the Voyager Golden …

The Past is a Foreign Country

Every single post on my facebook feed right now is about Trudeau in blackface and brownface. I am appalled, it is disgusting.

I came across this passage, while reading something else, and want to discuss and challenge it:

Understanding people in the past by their own standards means that we need to contextualize the information and try to shift perspectives. 1Thomas Nygren, “Teaching and Learning the Mindset of the Digital Historian and More: Scaffolding Students’ Critical Skills in the Digital Humanities.” 2017. DHN 2017.

and,

There is a challenge to understand the past as a “foreign country,” a place where language and concepts as well as context differ in fundamental ways from our contemporary world.2Nygren, citing Lowenthal.

I’ve heard folks use the phrase “it was 2001.” Meaning, the past is a foreign country. Meaning, you know, what happens in The Past, stays in The Past. Or, c’mon man, we had a different culture, we did some things then that wouldn’t fly now.

You’re only halfway there.

I’ve heard “woke” culture described as: it’s no longer silencing the voices of the less-powerful. It’s listening when people say “no, it’s not okay”. They’ve been saying this all along. These things have never been okay. We’ve just not been listening, and creating spaces where there are no consequences, so that we can continue to not listen.

But what happened in the past has lasting consequences. It can’t just “stay in the past.” If the consequences haven’t been apparent to you, that’s the problem. To say it “was okay at the time” is missing the point. It was not okay then, but you were able to ignore anyone who said it wasn’t.

If you really think “it was okay back then” and “I guess it’s not okay now,” can you see the shape formed by these two facets?

Did you really think it was okay at the time? Why? Whose opinions were you listening to? Whose views didn’t factor in? Why? What have you internalized? Whose admiration were you after? Why was that important to you? How were certain acts enabled by white supremacy? How did you enable white supremacy? What does complicity feel like?

FUN! (no, actually, it’s painful and fucking hurts, and explains to me why so many folks are conservative. It’s less painful to perpetuate a delusion.)

We Live In A Society!

 

Go follow Rachel Cargle‘s work, and do Layla Saad’s Workbook.

Liked The gift of story by an author (infullflow.net)

It’s my birthday and I love getting gifts, but I love it even more to give gifts. So today I give you, dear reader, the gift of a new story: The Oodlanders.
It’s the story that I wrote during Crafting {:} a Life, so for some of my readers it is not new. It is however more polished and shareable …