Change Of Plan

I am switching to Kelly McGonigal's methodology for now. The book is called "Maximum Willpower" in the UK (it has a different title in the USA), and a good overview can be found by searching for her name and "authors at Google" in YouTube (the January 2012 video). For reference, here are the changes I was going to make if I hadn't stumbled on this brand new programme:

* have one daily point of focus / rallying call instead of multiple ones each day - which is confusing and dilutes the message

* keep a record of how long each daily rallying call was used for, and how useful it was

* dealing with exceptions that arise to following the rules (they seem to grow like weeds!)

* following links is a particularly strong urge in my case

* think about improving robustness to distraction

* too much browsing at lunchtime

* think about a reward model that takes account of hyperbolic discounting

In Kelly's programme, the step I am on at the moment is getting more sleep. Unfortunately this has been the week that the clocks went forward one hour - and I tend to have difficulty in adjusting my circadian cycle forwards, so this hasn't worked out very well for me. I have had success at getting myself to bed at a reasonable time - but am still feeling over tired, and in deep sleep when the alarm goes off.

Action: bed time tracking spreadsheet to be opened an hour earlier. I hope that this will also teach me to read fewer entries in the AR links: actionable items only! This should end at 20:00 sharp when modelling work will begin. Any unread links will keep until tomorrow morning!

Seinfeld chain will continue for the time being. However - it will not now be used for its original purpose as a source of motivation, but instead to monitor progress only. It hadn't been successful as a motivating tool anyway - but it is a quick and easy way to both record and view progress.

Morning and afternoon starts are both going VERY badly at the moment. Will try the following "restart" procedure:

private void procedure() {
  switch (currentTime) {

    case before_9:   allowForums();
                     allowNews();
                     allowAR();
                     break;

    case afterLunch: allowNews();
                     allowAR();
                     break();

    default:         disallow();

  }
}

It is set up in task scheduler to open each time the workstation is unlocked.

For bedtime control: tracking spreadsheet is now triggered for 21:00. If AR isn't read, it will have to wait until the next day.

One other step I have taken during the creation of this blog entry: I have removed my football news feed (as well as "Hark! A Vagrant"). The football feed just had too many entries in, and was becoming a regular distraction.

A big session today, with several important changes being made!