The Deliberate #60: No Phone Mornings & Time Tracking
A quick retrospective on two Deliberate Pattern experiments and some other goodies
This is The Deliberate and I'm Sam. Thanks for coming along on this eclectic collection of what has had my attention recently. I never look at who unsubscribes so if this newsletter isn’t something you want to keep around please unsubscribe and know that my feelings are impossible to hurt (at least in that regard!)
I usually use my newsletter to highlight an article I've recently written and published on SamSpurlin.com. However, if I only send newsletters when I've written a new article then I'm probably not going to be sending this very often. And if every newsletter is just a shout out to an article what's the point of even being a newsletter subscriber, right? So, no new article to shill today; just some thoughts about a couple of Deliberate Patterns I've experimented with throughout January and a few other things that have grabbed my attention.
No Phone for the First Hour of the Day
The first pattern I played with in January was simply staying away from my phone for the first hour of every day. I found myself too frequently spending the first 20-40 minutes of the day idly swiping between Twitter and Reddit while sipping my coffee. Not the worst way to start the day, but not particularly wholesome, either. What would it feel like to keep my phone on its charger for the first hour of the day? Turns out, pretty good! It's probably something I should make a permanent part of my life, but I've moved away from it over the past few weeks. Even after I stopped doing this experiment I realized I was still using my phone far less than I had been prior to the experiment. I've landed on a morning routine where I do a quick scan through things that happened overnight while I wait for my kettle to warm up for coffee (like, 5 minutes tops) and then another 2-3 minutes while I'm doing my pour over. After that, it's straight to my comfy chair and a book for at least 45 minutes. I'd be very open to future experiments in a similar vein, though!
Time Tracking
In January I picked up another client project which immediately put a bunch of new pressure on my schedule. I pretty quickly started to feel the familiar shadow of overwhelm creeping toward me so I turned to a pattern I've used many times in the past, Time Tracking. I usually use a tool called Toggl and a relatively simple scheme where I track the client I'm working on and whether I'm doing solo work, an internal meeting, or a client-facing meeting. The data I capture when I do this can be cool but the bigger benefit is the mindfulness of being forced to notice what I'm working on when shifting between timers. While useful, this is not the type of pattern I aspire to make permanent. I see it as something worth doing as a recalibration from time to time. It can help bring clarity to where I'm spending my time and whether I'm okay with that breakdown. I did it for three weeks straight but decided to not do it this week. I think it's actually wholesome for me to do something related to data tracking and not make it a thing I do forever. The completionist in me says, "You started tracking at the beginning of the year so don't you want to be able to look at a full year of time tracking data? Keep going!" No thank you.
Simple Wardrobe
Not really an experiment, but a slight refinement to something I already do (Radically Simple Wardrobe). I really like keeping my wardrobe as simple as possible and once I find a brand or style of something I like, I tend to buy only that. That means the bulk of my wardrobe is a couple pairs of pants, a small set of solid color t-shirts, and a handful of slightly nicer shirts for being in front of clients. I also realized that having one brand and style of underwear and one brand and style of socks makes doing laundry so much simpler. So, I re-stocked on t-shirts, underwear, and socks (all from Everlane) and now I'm guaranteed to wear my favorite socks, underwear, and t-shirt every day. It's the little things.
What Has Had My Attention
Elsewhere On the Internet
and then? by ayjay
"I say: If you’re trying to get through your work as quickly as you can, then maybe you should see if you can find a different line of work. And if you’re trying to get through your leisure-time reading and watching and listening as quickly as you can, then you definitely do not understand the meaning of leisure and should do a thorough rethink."
Design Diary 20: A Staycation Greycation (video)
Independent app developer David Smith talking through the idea of a "staycation Greycation." This is a practice he developed to work through a piece of work that can't fit into his normal process. It's relevant for anyone who works on creative endeavors and has some control over their work environment. It's probably worth filing this pattern away for the next time you feel like you need to make progress on something substantial and are up for doing something a little drastic.
Cultivating depth and stillness in research by Andy Matuschak
Taking lots of inspiration from this article for my "Focusing" theme. Andy writes about what has worked for him as he strives to figure out how to "cultivate deep, stable concentration in the face of complex, ill-structured creative problems." A few nuggets: "Collect vivid stories which reinforce a more realistic pace of progress for this type of work. Memoirs of scientists and artists are great for this. Mason Curry’s Daily Rituals is a nice anthology in this vein," and simply pushing his afternoon break back an hour or two after noticing it was tough to get back into deep work after a break. Simple but powerful stuff and just a great example of carefully looking at improving something that's important to you through careful noticing and experimentation.
Reading
I finally finished Children of Dune. I can be done now, right? There's no reason I need to keep slogging through these books. Somebody tell me I can be done.
Ways of Being was fascinating and I feel like I need to go back and dig through the chapter on randomness and its implications on organizations navigating complex environments. I took some vague notes as I was listening to it but I think there are some nuggets in there worth excavating.
Still working on The Odyssey. Odysseus and friends just had their run-in with the cyclops. What fun will they get up to next?
Also picked up the new Beyond Budgeting book This Is Beyond Budgeting. I feel like I haven't read a book that's super relevant to my job in a while. I kinda highlighted the hell out of the introduction and chapter 1, so I've got good feelings about this one.
Playing
I want to watch the new The Last of Us TV show on HBO but I feel like I need to play the game first. So, that's what I'm doing. So far I'm incredibly impressed with how the game looks (especially for how old it is) and the quality of the writing and voice acting. Looking forward to chipping away at this.
Thanks for hanging out with me. Until next time!
The Deliberate #60: No Phone Mornings & Time Tracking
you can 200% be done!!
really liked hearing about your experiments