The Daily - Thursday, September 27, 2018

Writing Challenge- Day #29

A very productive day as I prepare for a weekend in the mountains of Tennessee and 12 hours of incredible Contra dancing on Saturday. I will be wearing a kilt for the first time in more than a year. Part of the weekend's adventures include dong some car camping and I worked most of the day cleaning the garage and gathering and organizing items for the weekend adventure.

With me being on the road, my daily posts will change somewhat. Internet access where I will staying is sporadic, and my tablet is not happy with the connection there. However, I will be posting "dispatches" to the blog throughout the day via email and, if possible, I will condense them to the regular "The Daily" in the evening or whenever I get a chance to. I will call these "The (On the Road) Daily".

HEALTH & FITNESS

I jogged for 2.1 miles in 37 minutes to the "143 BPM - Best Foot Forward" Podrunner mix.

Blood pressure steady at 118/75.

PERSONAL GROWTH

One of the benefits of becoming more organized is the realization that we have so much. Specifically, I have been asking myself "How many of these (insert item name) do you need?" For example, I currently own eight pairs of dress shorts. These are the eight dress shorts that made the first and second cut during the purge a few days ago. I already donated all the shorts I did not like, could not fit into, or had no room for. But still, do I need eight dress shorts? Would I be OK with just six? Four? Considering I wear dress shorts perhaps once a week for a day or two, that means I could wear different shorts for two months without repeating. Sadly, I tend to gravitate toward the one or two pairs that are my favorite, and the others just sit there. Fortunately, purging and organizing has made me aware of this excessive abundance and now I can make decisions on what to keep and what to wear with awareness. Perhaps, most likely, there will be additional liberation of clothes in the not-so-distant future.

As I was working in the garage, I came across an insane number of cleaning towels. As it is often the case, the quantity has a logical explanation: every time our kitchen towels are replaced, they become garage cleaning towels. The problem, of course, is that the previous generations of kitchen-towels-turned-into-garage-towels linger on in the garage for years and years. Of course, they are not all in one place, where it would be obvious that there was an issue. No, they take shelter and hide from view until one fine day we discover they had taken over the garage. Or something like that. So how many of these towels do we need? Many (for now). Granted, these are often used to wipe oil and grease, etc., and they are truly not worth washing, so now that awareness has set in, like a beacon in the night to guide me, I will be able to keep the numbers to a reasonable level.

STREAKS - For the record

Current list of streaks:

• Writing: day 29
• Blood Pressure Readings: day 16
• Logging to SparkPeople: day 19
• Daily Exercise Routine: not counting for now
• Cardio: Yes (2.1 miles 37 minutes)
• Yoga: No
• Strength Training: No
• Stretching: Yes
• Meditation: Yes
  
• Meditation: day 16
• Number of tabs open: day 12

The Daily - Monday, September 24, 2018

Writing Challenge- Day #26

HEALTH & FITNESS

A nice jog this morning (albeit later than normal) for 2.26 miles in 40 minutes to the great Podrunner track called "137 BPM - Paced Out." For the record, I do not profit from any of you using Podrunner's mixes; I donate to Podrunner on a monthly basis and I hope others will enjoy the tracks and also help Steve continue offering these great workout mixes.

My blood pressure was amazing again today. I pulled 109/68 this evening. Jogging, meditation and Yoga are working!

Today was a better day for nutrition.

GOALS, DREAMS, HABITS, RITUALS

During Saturday and Sunday I navigated the days without a to-do list. That was frustrating because I know I can accomplish so much more when I do have a list to help me along my crazy days. In reflecting on this, I realized that the biggest stumbling block was to create the initial list with all the daily items in it. Last night I decided to create a list for each day of this week. That should help me get over that roadblock. Indeed, it worked quite well this morning and I feel much better about all the things I can accomplish today.

The one drawback of creating future to-do lists is that if something drastic changes in your "master list" then you either have to update a bunch of daily lists or re-do them from scratch. However, that is a small price to pay for being organized and more in control of your day. I suggest limiting the list creation to one week at a time. This would also allow us to apply Dr. Covey's planning strategies and put first things first and start with the end in mind. What do we want to accomplish in the week ahead? Let's plan those "big rocks" before all the smaller rocks take space in our mind and schedule.

PERSONAL GROWTH

Enjoy this video on the "AMRAP Mentality." I think there is much value in what the video advocates (warning: there is a commercial for "Chegg" studying services near the end of the video.)

TIPS & TRICKS

If you need some help implementing the AMRAP strategy detailed above, consider using the Pomodoro Technique (and, yes, there is an app for that). The Pomodoro Technique helps you focus for 25 minutes on one task, and then nudges you to take breaks at regular intervals. This time management approach instills the AMRAP philosophy because during the work periods you go all out at whatever the task is, avoiding all distractions (telephone, email, etc.). I have successfully used this technique for decades.

STREAKS - For the record

Current list of streaks:

• Writing: day 26
• Blood Pressure Readings: day 13 (amazingly nice numbers: 109/68)
• Logging to SparkPeople: day 16
• Daily Exercise Routine: not counting for now
• Cardio: Yes, nice 2.2.6 miles in 40 minutes
• Yoga: short routine in the morning
• Strength Training: No
• Stretching: Yes
• Meditation: Yes
  
• Meditation: day 13
• Number of tabs open: day 9

The Daily - Thursday, September 20, 2018

Writing Challenge- Day #22

Today's post will be short. It was a busy, long day that started when I went to bed too late last night which meant I got up late this morning … and it has been one of those days. It was a good day overall. No, really, it was a great day. I got a lot of things done. I had a great experience with our internet provider technician troubleshooting what I thought was slow speeds. Actually, it is old equipment inside the house: need a new router, new network cards, etc. I bought the new router this evening and will install it tomorrow after I get home.

A SIGN

This is my daily mantra as I drive to and from work:

Source: https://www.facebook.com/IndianHillsCommunitySign/

HEALTH & FITNESS

I came across this funny video on quitting sugar for a month; it is worth watching.

GOALS, DREAMS, HABITS, RITUALS

Today was the start of something I had wanted to do for years: a regular, daily Yoga practice. It took me a few minutes to get things set-up, but it was so worth it. I will do the same routine for the next few days and then try something different. Tomorrow, with a little more time, I will learn and do an evening Yoga routine; just a 10-minute sequence to end the day on a high note.

PERSONAL GROWTH

As I suspected, going to a digital things-to-do list made it easier not to look at it throughout the day. Fortunately, I was able to check off all the important items on the list anyway, but I could have missed something important by not looking at the list at least 2-3 times during the day. Something to work on.

FINANCES

Not logging in your expenses daily is a bad sign that your financial management efforts are about to collapse; that is what has happened to me in the past, and that is what is happening to me right now. Tomorrow evening I will play catch-up with "EveryDollar" until all transactions have been entered. Fortunately, I have been using my debit card for the most part this month, so it will be fairly easy to get caught up. Unfortunately, using the debit card as the main form of transactions tends to quickly escalate and leads to over spending. The flags are at yellow right now, but the flag person is pulling up the red flags; time to get back on track.

STREAKS - For the record

Current list of streaks:

• Writing: day 22
• Blood Pressure Readings: day 9 (a little higher today at 128/78; it was a stressful day at work)
• Logging to SparkPeople: day 12
• Daily Exercise Routine: not counting for now
• Cardio: Yes: 1.78 miles for 32 minutes
• Yoga: Yes!  A nice 10 minute workout in the morning. Mostly stretching and great to do.
• Strength Training: No
• Stretching: Yes (in addition to Yoga, I did some stretches first thing after getting up)
• Meditation: Yes, 10 minute meditation first thing in the morning, another 10 minutes in the afternoon.
  
• Meditation: day 9
• Number of tabs open: day 5 (despite a crazy day at work, I managed to keep the number of tabs and windows to a minimum. I have become very aware of this aspect of computing and how quickly things can get out of hand).

Just five minutes

Do you ever find yourself stuck with a task that you just do not want to do? The thing sits there, festering away, undone and mocking you for your procrastination!

The folks at AE (Asian Efficiency) recently mentioned a nice strategy that my kids and I have used for years: the five minute rule. Pick your most dreaded task (for example, folding laundry) and determine that you will do that for no more than five minutes. Set a timer for five minutes and then do that dreaded task until the timer goes off. At the very least you would have made some serious progress on that to-do; and most times you know you are so much closer to finishing it that you just keep going.

The trick is to just get started!

We have used this idea for cleaning our house, doing dishes, etc. Try making it fun by doing a 5-minute relay game: one person starts and does the task for just five minutes, then the next person takes over for five minutes, etc. Great team work and a nice way to share the load.

Some tasks may need a 10-minute lapse instead of just five. The nice thing is that you (and your team) can set the work time to whatever you want. The important thing is to get started and make as much progress as possible.

And this idea lends itself nicely for competitions. For example, who can clean the most windows in five minutes? The winner gets a reward. :-)

In the end, what is important is that progress is made, even if it is in five-minute chunks.