Postby Kathryn-in-Canada » Tue Jan 01, 2019 11:35 am
I'm up but certainly not physically or mentally ready for a fresh start. Emotionally, I'd love one, but the mind and body are too exhausted to follow the heart!
Just remembered I put off the clean sheets until today. Ugh, no going back to bed.
It was a very busy day yesterday but very good. I felt literally sick at times from so much laughing (combined with too much food!) We play a game called Code Names and it brings the silliness we have with dd's godfamily to a whole new level.
Ds's girlfriend held her own through the game playing which was wonderful considering she's considerably younger than the other young adults. She's in pre-med (struggling but at least she had the marks and interest to get in.)
We were in bed shortly after 2, after a harrowing drive home (freezing rain on top of snow and rain.) But I didn't get to sleep until after 4 and ended up getting out of bed at 8:30.
I've just managed tea and chocolate, light therapy and emptying the dishwasher.
Skippable reflection
I am thinking about setting a theme for the year (this is something that is discussed on the Cortex podcast) and also thinking about downloading a list/task manager but I don't know what I hope to accomplish with it.
Dd is about to move to Omnifocus but she's on iOS so has the Workflow options as well.
My current to-do method is a mixture of Google Calendar (I have my SHE cards entered in there, plus one-time things like babysitting) and my Bullet Journal (which covers scheduled events and one-time unscheduled tasks like taking down Christmas Decorations.) But I don't have a project manager (something that allows me to break a larger project into smaller steps), for the few times I need one (like prepping an annual report.) I just write out the steps on a piece of paper or in my bullet journal.
The hand copying of tasks from the Google calendar to my bullet journal each new month and each week, allows me to reflect on my time and how busy certain times will be. That planning takes place away from a computer, just my phone for the calendar and the journal. So it can be done during light therapy or in the car, or any time I need to pause and regroup.
I think the pause and regroup feature of the bullet journal is the most valuable to me. I barely journal with it unless something important is happening, like keeping a daily log of my concussion experience, plus a full account of the accident, or tracking the back/fever/shingles/depression episode.
There's room in my life for me to focus on writing out reflections as well as just thinking them as I work on my journal. Maybe that could be a yearly theme for me, "Year of Reflections." My first thought was "Year of Healing." Basically, one tries to make sure one's focus returns to the yearly theme as one works through the year.
The questions I have to ask myself are:
"Will learning and implementing a software solution to task and project management save me time compared to, or be more effective than, my current system?"
"Will having a new task and project management system actually get me to do the tasks?"
I haven't looked at my SHE system for ages. I'm running on habit as far as daily and weeklies is concerned and on "OMG this needs to be addressed" when it comes to month/season/annual chores. Will a new software package actually get me to do the work?
Does my SHE system no longer interest me and do I need something new and shiny?
Have I grown out of needing something the way P&P envision it? (They changed the original SHE system as their children grew and it was the Happiness File system that worked best for me. Perhaps had they continued to develop and write, they would have tweaked the system further to deal with retirement and grandchildren and all the other challenges we have with aging.)
Do I just need to reread Happiness File and tweak my existing system to get back on track?