Hey Team,
Following up on being kind to yourself and starting small, one of the kindest things I have ever done for myself is learn to pick a time for certain tasks that can actually be done at any point.
(For me ‘do it whenever’ might as well be called ‘never get around to this.’)
Imagine that I have a phone call to make. I’m not particularly anxious about making phone calls but a call is the kind of task that tends to loom in the back of my mind and get on my nerves until it is done.
Before I learned to schedule tasks like this, my brain would go in endless loops trying to decide on a ‘right’ time for the call. When would be best for my schedule? When would be best for theirs? Would it be better to do some writing first? Maybe I should wait until Wednesday because I will have more information by then?* Should I call now? How about now?
At some point though, I hit on the technique of choosing a (often arbitrary!) time to do the task “I’ll make that call at 2pm on Tuesday.”
This is hardly ever because it is important to do the task at that time.
The value in choosing a time is the fact that if I am ‘supposed to’ make the call at 2pm on Tuesday then I am NOT supposed to do it at any other time.
Scheduling that task lets my brain rest.
It gives me a place to put that task and keeps me from spending any energy on guilt or procrastination or avoidance.
And if something comes up and I can’t make that call on Tuesday at 2?
I don’t go back into the endless ‘when’ loop, I just reschedule it and carry on.
This is, of course, easier when you have a one-off task or you are doing something once or twice per week, but it also works for daily practices – as long as you are kind to yourself about days that go completely off the rails.**
So, Team, today I invite you to consider picking a specific time for your new habits or practices so you don’t waste any energy wondering if you should do them now, or now, or now, and so you don’t end up feeling bad if ‘whenever’ becomes ‘never.’
And here is your gold star to celebrate your efforts whether you are scheduling, planning, doing, or resting.
Your efforts matter and so do you!
Go Team Us!
*If I was actually going to need/have more info by Wednesday, this might be useful. Generally, however, I was looking for more (often unnecessary) information for no reason other than the fact that my ADHD brain didn’t want to do this slightly hassle-y task at the moment. And, of course, I was often seeking certainty in a situation that didn’t really require it. File all of this under things that used to plague me more than they do now.
**In fact, my post from this morning is about experimenting with picking times for my daily practices because I am trying to give my days a better rhythm and I would rather have a specific time set out for my practices than spend all day wondering about the right time to do them.
