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Oct. 6th, 2003 05:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andrewduckerWe see change. If you paralyse the muscles in the eye so it can't move, after a few seconds we're blind, it's only the constant movement of our eyes that allows us to see at all. We see edges and differences and changes from one moment to another, and if something doesn't change, then after a while it drops beneath our field of notice, becomes just another part of the background (leaving aside certain alarm signals like "my arm is on fire").
Some people seem to need more change than others in order for it to register. Some people adjust to change faster. If both of these things are true, then you probably have the attention span of a goldfish, failing to notice most common-place things around you and forgetting about the new things a few minutes after they occur. Repetitive tasks will take you forever, as the action's you are carrying out simply drop out of sight. In order to get at all involved in something you'll have to turn it into a game. You'll find that your speech and action tend towards the flamboyant, as you try to put a fresh spin on everything you do to stop it from boring your pants clean off.
As you may have guessed, I fall into this category (although not quite as badly as the symptoms listed above). And this, as far as I can tell, is where my problems with organisation come from - one half "tidying up bores me to death" and one half "the place is untidy?". To give an example of the latter problem, last week I was idling at the computer when I noticed that there were a few plates sitting next to me. I only noticed because I went to get a piece of paper I wanted and had to move the plates out of the way, but having done so, I thought "I ought to go and put those in/near the dishwasher. I'll do it in a minute.". When I stood up less than 5 minutes later, I had completely forgotten about the dishes (and because they'd been there for more than 15 minutes and weren't getting in my way I completely failed to notice they were there).
This is a constant problem in my life. Contrary to what my various flatmates think, I'm not enamoured of an untidy life - I genuinely prefer to live in neatness. But the combination of untidiness slipping beneath my radar and tidying up being repetitive and dull means that it just never tends to happen. Dull jobs get postponed and then forgotten within minutes.
I've found two solutions to this problem - patterns and game-making. While I'm very bad at remembering to do spontaneous things, like any animal I can be trained into a habit. So rather than following a rule of "When I notice dirty plates, move them to the kitchen.", an event guaranteed to occur once or twice a month, I'm currently building a habit of "Whenever leaving the living room, check it for dirty plates and take them to the kitchen." By building in a trigger that is easily triggered, I should be able to set up a habit that leads to an outcome I want to achieve.
The other technique means finding some way of making the task fun. And this is what my to-do list seems to have achieved. The PDA pops up a list of things I need to do and I knock them off. I've quickly developed a dislike of having outstanding items on the list, and of watching the balance-meter to see how what I've done has affected it. On Sunday morning I had a choice between tidying my desk or filling the dishwasher before I went out (not having enough time for both). Tidying my desk was on the list, filling the dishwasher wasn't. I found myself wondering if it would count if I put "fill dishwasher" on the list and then crossed it off immediately, before opting to tidy my desk instead. I've successfully fooled the "keeping score" part of my brain into thinking that doing housework is a competition, and it's keeping me on-track with getting things done. Whether I can fool it long-term is another matter, but hopefully I can keep it up long enough to build some good habits.
Some people seem to need more change than others in order for it to register. Some people adjust to change faster. If both of these things are true, then you probably have the attention span of a goldfish, failing to notice most common-place things around you and forgetting about the new things a few minutes after they occur. Repetitive tasks will take you forever, as the action's you are carrying out simply drop out of sight. In order to get at all involved in something you'll have to turn it into a game. You'll find that your speech and action tend towards the flamboyant, as you try to put a fresh spin on everything you do to stop it from boring your pants clean off.
As you may have guessed, I fall into this category (although not quite as badly as the symptoms listed above). And this, as far as I can tell, is where my problems with organisation come from - one half "tidying up bores me to death" and one half "the place is untidy?". To give an example of the latter problem, last week I was idling at the computer when I noticed that there were a few plates sitting next to me. I only noticed because I went to get a piece of paper I wanted and had to move the plates out of the way, but having done so, I thought "I ought to go and put those in/near the dishwasher. I'll do it in a minute.". When I stood up less than 5 minutes later, I had completely forgotten about the dishes (and because they'd been there for more than 15 minutes and weren't getting in my way I completely failed to notice they were there).
This is a constant problem in my life. Contrary to what my various flatmates think, I'm not enamoured of an untidy life - I genuinely prefer to live in neatness. But the combination of untidiness slipping beneath my radar and tidying up being repetitive and dull means that it just never tends to happen. Dull jobs get postponed and then forgotten within minutes.
I've found two solutions to this problem - patterns and game-making. While I'm very bad at remembering to do spontaneous things, like any animal I can be trained into a habit. So rather than following a rule of "When I notice dirty plates, move them to the kitchen.", an event guaranteed to occur once or twice a month, I'm currently building a habit of "Whenever leaving the living room, check it for dirty plates and take them to the kitchen." By building in a trigger that is easily triggered, I should be able to set up a habit that leads to an outcome I want to achieve.
The other technique means finding some way of making the task fun. And this is what my to-do list seems to have achieved. The PDA pops up a list of things I need to do and I knock them off. I've quickly developed a dislike of having outstanding items on the list, and of watching the balance-meter to see how what I've done has affected it. On Sunday morning I had a choice between tidying my desk or filling the dishwasher before I went out (not having enough time for both). Tidying my desk was on the list, filling the dishwasher wasn't. I found myself wondering if it would count if I put "fill dishwasher" on the list and then crossed it off immediately, before opting to tidy my desk instead. I've successfully fooled the "keeping score" part of my brain into thinking that doing housework is a competition, and it's keeping me on-track with getting things done. Whether I can fool it long-term is another matter, but hopefully I can keep it up long enough to build some good habits.
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Date: 2003-10-06 09:50 am (UTC)So, for instance, I would pick up the plates, take them to the sink, (hopefully get them into the sink) then check the counter for something that doesn't belong there. Say my hat. I take my hat into the hallway (hopefully putting it on the rack) and pick up something in the hallway that doesn't belong there. If there is nothing amiss in the hallway I will wander about until I find something that IS out of place, and moving it will take me into another room where I will find something else to do, etc. etc. I clean my classroom the same way.
Only problem is, this takes me past my computer, and so I, logically, must stop and check my e-mail and friends list, and that can take a while.
no subject
Date: 2003-10-06 11:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-10-06 02:48 pm (UTC)If you have a sink/room full of washing up to do, it takes a while. One meal's worth can take less than a minute. But then, if you can't -not- leave it around to build up to be caught by your trigger..... this is rather useless advice.
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Date: 2003-10-06 02:52 pm (UTC)If I'm leaving the room anyway, then taking plates with me doesn't add to the chore, so that seems to take better.
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Date: 2003-10-06 02:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-10-13 03:59 am (UTC)I suffer from a nasty combination of insanely high standards of neatness/cleanliness and less than zero patience with repetitive tasks. So any effort that I make NEVER achieves the result I want, no matter how much I do. I'm a compulsive optimiser, too, so that the mere existemce of a repetitve tasks offends me and depresses and frustrates me that I haven't managed to automate/eliminate it.
In fact, that actually describes my whole life, not just the housework. Nothing I do is ever good enough (for me, at any rate). I can always imagine better/cheaper/faster/bigger/more/cleverer.