focus pending
I have such a hard time focusing on things when there’s pending actions in my life. The result is that I’m very bad at making good use of my time. If I have 45 minutes until some event is going to happen, I can’t seem to think clearly about anything because I’m constantly fretting about getting interrupted in 45 minutes… then in 30 minutes… then in 15… and finally it’s so close to the event that it just isn’t worth starting anything, and, well, there went 45 minutes of my life down the drain reading RSS feeds or diligently thinking about how I’d like to do the job at hand - if only I had the time…
The reason this comes up now is that the house deal is one of the longer term “pending actions” I’ve had in my life (aside from my wedding, maybe) - and it’s killing me. I’m obsessing over the fact that we have to move soon. We have to pack. We have to lift heavy things, clean things, buy new things, sell some things, etc. All this stuff needs doing - but a lot of it can’t be done yet because the deal isn’t closed. The process isn’t complete. Heck, the house hasn’t even had the inspection yet! (That’s tomorrow, btw.) For all I know, there could be catastrophic problems with it and the whole deal will fall through! Ahh! So not only is the house deal itself pending, but even sub-actions related to the house are pending like the inspection, bug testing, financing, moving, etc. Blither.
Sometimes I think I have a pretty stupid brain. Then I realize that the thing that did that thinking was the brain itself. Suddenly the phrase “out of my mind” seems entirely plausible.
April 5th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
I have a similar problem in my life, and a theory to explain it. (Is it a bug? Or is it a feature?) The more important said event is, the more disruption it causes. I think it has to do with lack of structure in my daily routine. Since most of what I do is almost entirely on my own schedule, all the time, having something that’s set to the clock’s schedule seems to cause some level of disruption of my otherwise entirely self centered life. I didn’t say it was good, or flattering, but that’s my best working theory. And that seems to cause anxiety. And it’s really stupid anxiety, and it’s without any real rational reason. As long as the event is set in my palm, I’m not going to forget it… so I don’t understand where the anxiety comes from. So I try and busy myself with work that doesn’t allow my mind to wonder, or dwell on the impending appointment. I treat the appointment not as impending doom, but as a type of deadline that I have to work up against, and that helps a lot. I’ve found that by taking that approach, having these planned events sitting out there in the future usually increases my productivity in the present.
April 6th, 2007 at 9:27 am
I’ve found that the kinds of work that keeps my mind from wandering is largely physical. Naturally, of course, that’s not the kind of work that I get paid for… but none the less, lately I’ve found it to be very therapeutic to work on packing and stuff like that when I can’t focus on anything else. It’s like all the heavy lifting, cleaning, moving, etc. somehow helps burn off the stress that won’t go away any other way.