Before my Costa Rican volunteering trip, I was rather nervous. Not because I was going to a foreign place whose people speak in a language I didn't understand, nor was I worried about the security of the country. ISV assigned to me a community project, meaning I would be working closely with the locals. Being an introvert there was some concern that I would find it hard to fit into the culture. Throughout my life I was always the person no one really cared about. My friends don't totally ignore me, but I'm definitely not the most important friend, the first one that comes to mind. I am never great at creating conversations -- in fact I question the need to converse just to break the silence -- which doesn't help with attracting my friends' attention. All these experiences lead me to conclude that I will be left out in the project: the person who works in the background, and when he leave the project no one would remember him, or even notice he has departed.
My fears turned out to be unfounded. During the project I felt I was being recognised by the locals as well as my group members. You can say this was my first taste of being an extrovert. As a result I now feel more comfortable working with people. I am still a long way from becoming an outspoken person, the centre of attention. That's fine. I don't aim to be a celebrity in my life. All I need is enough courage to actively look for people I can help, rather than wait for them to seek my assistance.
Showing posts with label life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label life. Show all posts
Wednesday, 9 January 2008
Friday, 27 July 2007
Time is scarce; therefore I am picky
My time is filling up. Apart from eating, sleeping and other "housekeeping" activities, there are uni classes, homework, revision and work. Upon completing these tasks I can move onto more leisurely activities. The problem is, by that stage I am usually left with insufficient time to do all the fun things I planned to do.
Let's use TV as an example. There are many TV shows I like watching. Altogether they roughly add up to 10 hours per week. I simply do not have 10 hours a week for TV, unless I give up all my web surfing, newspaper/book reading and even some optional studying. Therefore I began to reduce the number of shows I would watch, which means being picky about my TV consumption. As my workload increases, so does my pickiness.
So I stop watching every TV show or movie that comes my way, unless they are worthy of my time. I go through the newspaper much quicker than before because I skip the uninteresting columns, the biggest offender being reports about a little boy recovering from cancer in the Royal Children's Hospital: I care about the boy but I do not need to know all the details. The same applies to all web sites.
It turns out that consuming less isn't such a big loss, because I have retained those that mattered most to me. The ones I have dropped can be considered bloat of varying degrees. The result is that I have become more efficient at spending my leisure time.
Who would have thought quality leisure time requires careful planning (opposite of leisure), and that being picky is a good virtue?
Let's use TV as an example. There are many TV shows I like watching. Altogether they roughly add up to 10 hours per week. I simply do not have 10 hours a week for TV, unless I give up all my web surfing, newspaper/book reading and even some optional studying. Therefore I began to reduce the number of shows I would watch, which means being picky about my TV consumption. As my workload increases, so does my pickiness.
So I stop watching every TV show or movie that comes my way, unless they are worthy of my time. I go through the newspaper much quicker than before because I skip the uninteresting columns, the biggest offender being reports about a little boy recovering from cancer in the Royal Children's Hospital: I care about the boy but I do not need to know all the details. The same applies to all web sites.
It turns out that consuming less isn't such a big loss, because I have retained those that mattered most to me. The ones I have dropped can be considered bloat of varying degrees. The result is that I have become more efficient at spending my leisure time.
Who would have thought quality leisure time requires careful planning (opposite of leisure), and that being picky is a good virtue?
Monday, 14 May 2007
Shitty Days
Last Thursday and Friday were two of the worst days of my life. Unpleasant things happen all the time but seldom did so many bad events descend on me in just 48 hours. I thought I was going to give a description of the happenings in those two days but I think I'll spare you the extra reading and myself the extra typing because this is not the main theme of this entry. Just take it from me that it is really really bad.
The point is when all of that had passed and I was walking to the train station from uni, I was contemplating how to write this post, when I suddenly realised I had been going through events in the past 48 hours, analysing them and recollecting all the little details, yet none of that triggered any frustration or sad feelings that one would expect to feel on such a shitty day. It was as if the victim was another guy and I was merely an observer. And having realised that I still didn't feel bad so I knew I didn't "forget" to feel sad. In other words I was quite numb to these undesirable events. There were only indifference, apathy and boredom. It is possible that the sadness is still inside me waiting to be released, but so far I am not sensing any. Maybe all that economics training does have an effect on me: what you can't change does not matter any more, so don't base your decisions on them.
The point is when all of that had passed and I was walking to the train station from uni, I was contemplating how to write this post, when I suddenly realised I had been going through events in the past 48 hours, analysing them and recollecting all the little details, yet none of that triggered any frustration or sad feelings that one would expect to feel on such a shitty day. It was as if the victim was another guy and I was merely an observer. And having realised that I still didn't feel bad so I knew I didn't "forget" to feel sad. In other words I was quite numb to these undesirable events. There were only indifference, apathy and boredom. It is possible that the sadness is still inside me waiting to be released, but so far I am not sensing any. Maybe all that economics training does have an effect on me: what you can't change does not matter any more, so don't base your decisions on them.
Tuesday, 1 May 2007
Cappuccino, No Sugar
Last week I decided to walk a few blocks from the uni to try out Starbuck's coffee. Until then I had always bought my coffee at the uni. It turned out their smallest cup is "tall" which is bigger than a medium and certainly more expensive. "No problem," I thought, "a bigger cup costs more." Because the uni cafes always added the sugar for me, I just took my cappuccino and left. I don't really mind sugarless coffee but the liquid in the Starbuck's cup tasted like hot coffee-flavoured water. It got better after I went through half the cup and it cooled down a bit, but overall it was not that great and the premium I paid for the Starbuck's brand was not really worth it. I was tempted to make a direct comparison to the uni coffee but in the spirit of fairness I had to compare apple to apple so this week I have been buying coffee at the uni without sugar. I will not go to Starbuck's again.
On the other hand, I don't think I'm in a hurry to return to sweetened coffee either. Latte has more milk so even without sugar it's easier to drink but cappuccino can be quite bitter at first. Nonetheless I found myself drawn to the supposedly unpleasant taste. Although my tongue tells me I shouldn't like the stuff I am able to pick up more of the "real" coffee flavour, previously masked by the sweet taste of sugar. The excitement generated by this discovery overpowered the tongue's reluctance for more bitter coffee, and is fuelled on by the thirst to find out even more. So far I have found out the same cup of coffee has very different tastes at various temperatures. The effect was not so pronounced before since it was sweet no matter how cold it got. I can't wait to try out other kinds of coffee and buy them at different shops. From now on, coffee will cease to be just another sweetened drink; it becomes a hobby, a field of study where I can have fun while learning.
On the other hand, I don't think I'm in a hurry to return to sweetened coffee either. Latte has more milk so even without sugar it's easier to drink but cappuccino can be quite bitter at first. Nonetheless I found myself drawn to the supposedly unpleasant taste. Although my tongue tells me I shouldn't like the stuff I am able to pick up more of the "real" coffee flavour, previously masked by the sweet taste of sugar. The excitement generated by this discovery overpowered the tongue's reluctance for more bitter coffee, and is fuelled on by the thirst to find out even more. So far I have found out the same cup of coffee has very different tastes at various temperatures. The effect was not so pronounced before since it was sweet no matter how cold it got. I can't wait to try out other kinds of coffee and buy them at different shops. From now on, coffee will cease to be just another sweetened drink; it becomes a hobby, a field of study where I can have fun while learning.
Monday, 16 April 2007
Like Not Love
There are people that we like, and there are some that we love. What's the difference? Isn't love just the superlative form of like? Furthermore, we often like one person more than another, meaning there are varying degrees of like. So when does like becomes love? Does the affection for someone build up gradually so that it crosses the region of like and enters the love territory, or is there a sudden jump from like to love? From my observations the latter appears to be the case, though one wonders if it's possible to be "on the verge of love but not quite there".
So lately I have been getting these weird feelings. Not necessarily contradictory, but weird. I have identified some people that I like, whom I don't mind talking to or seeing everyday, would in fact be looking forward to doing that, but whom I know I will never love. Oh and of course these people are all female. This sounds like I'm a big pervert, but I'm not, because I do not want to be intimate with any of these girls, which is why I do not love them. I am obsessed and yet I am not. This is the most strange and confusing feeling I have ever experienced.
So lately I have been getting these weird feelings. Not necessarily contradictory, but weird. I have identified some people that I like, whom I don't mind talking to or seeing everyday, would in fact be looking forward to doing that, but whom I know I will never love. Oh and of course these people are all female. This sounds like I'm a big pervert, but I'm not, because I do not want to be intimate with any of these girls, which is why I do not love them. I am obsessed and yet I am not. This is the most strange and confusing feeling I have ever experienced.
Friday, 13 April 2007
The Best Social Networking Site
I must apologise for playing a word game in the title, but my choice of social networking "site" would be a good old party. I am not a terribly sociable person and at times even find facing people a little daunting. Still, given a choice of online communication, phone and face-to-face meeting, I will pick the latter. It is hard to explain this is so; my guess is that the physical proximity forces both parties to give their full attention to the conversation and that makes the interaction more substantial. Which explains why I get pissed if my friend would interrupt the conversation to answer a phone call.
It is not that I do not believe in online technologies. Instant messaging can be very effective if friends are separated by great distances, and emails are good if instant feedback is not required. For some strange reason, I never seem to understand the purpose of a social networking service such as MySpace. I have a Friendster account for years now (don't ask why I got it), but I have done little with it except going through my friends' photos. I have tried sending messages to a friend, but couldn't see the point in using Friendster as a middleman, when I can just email my friend directly. Come to think of it, my friend probably found out about my message when Friendster sent her an email. Clearly this is getting nowhere.
My sister has a Facebook account, but it seems that she only uses it to check out her friends' photos, and I assume her friends use the service in a similar fashion. When they want to communicate, they do it on MSN. While there is nothing wrong with using Facebook as a photo album, the same job can be done equally well with Flickr or Picasa. Again, I'm missing the point on social networking.
The newest kid on the block is Twitter, where users tell the world what they are doing right this moment. For the life of me, I don't understand why I want to know gcorrin aka greg is currently "reheating [his] spaghetti". Conversely, I cannot find a reason to post an update every few hours, an exercise that is needlessly annoying and time consuming.
In short, these online services have some very interesting ideas and innovations, but for me they fall short of delivering a good socialising experience. Ideally I want to see and touch my friends, not a static picture or blocky video. When I laugh at a joke I want to hear my friends laugh too. Most online services facilitates keeping in touch constantly, but I argue it is the quality rather than frequency of each meeting that matters.
It is not that I do not believe in online technologies. Instant messaging can be very effective if friends are separated by great distances, and emails are good if instant feedback is not required. For some strange reason, I never seem to understand the purpose of a social networking service such as MySpace. I have a Friendster account for years now (don't ask why I got it), but I have done little with it except going through my friends' photos. I have tried sending messages to a friend, but couldn't see the point in using Friendster as a middleman, when I can just email my friend directly. Come to think of it, my friend probably found out about my message when Friendster sent her an email. Clearly this is getting nowhere.
My sister has a Facebook account, but it seems that she only uses it to check out her friends' photos, and I assume her friends use the service in a similar fashion. When they want to communicate, they do it on MSN. While there is nothing wrong with using Facebook as a photo album, the same job can be done equally well with Flickr or Picasa. Again, I'm missing the point on social networking.
The newest kid on the block is Twitter, where users tell the world what they are doing right this moment. For the life of me, I don't understand why I want to know gcorrin aka greg is currently "reheating [his] spaghetti". Conversely, I cannot find a reason to post an update every few hours, an exercise that is needlessly annoying and time consuming.
In short, these online services have some very interesting ideas and innovations, but for me they fall short of delivering a good socialising experience. Ideally I want to see and touch my friends, not a static picture or blocky video. When I laugh at a joke I want to hear my friends laugh too. Most online services facilitates keeping in touch constantly, but I argue it is the quality rather than frequency of each meeting that matters.
Monday, 12 March 2007
Un-bloat My Life
Many months ago I blogged about clearing my Windows desktop. This has largely been done. Items that survived the cut are what I use on a daily basis. I have also stopped launching programs that served no functional purposes.
In another previous post, I indicated an interest in applying the same principle to my life. This ambitious project has commenced and some progress has been made. One example is eating, which I mentioned in the last post. Although eating is an essential part of anyone's life, usually only a small part of that actually contributes to satisfying one's hunger -- the rest is about satisfying the taste buds or a psychological reaction to the value of the food being consumed. To me the latter parts are not that important so I paid less attention to them. I call these unimportant things "bloat", and there is no better time to remove bloat when I barely have enough time to keep up with uni work. And by keep up I mean 100% on top of taught materials.
It is very important to distinguish removing bloat and removing distractions. The latter could potentially include everything not directly related to my studies. This is not what I'm trying to get rid of. I still have a life outside of uni work, thank you. Rather I seek to track down activities that I don't really want or need to do, things that I do because I can (most likely to avoid doing any real work), and put a stop to them. For this reason I am not going to stop watching TV but will only watch programs that genuinely interest me. For example, I finally convinced myself 24 is so unrealistic it's not worth investing an hour per week just to find out the ending. I have a feeling Iron Chef will soon follow for being too repetitive but unable to improve my culinary skills. I can think of a few more examples but that will just impose more bloat on everyone, so I shall move on to conclusions.
For a computer, the less programs you have running the faster it will process tasks. I cannot tell you how much faster Windows Vista runs when it loses all the cosmetic bloat. The same goes for life. Sure I can do this and that and a million other things, but if they do not benefit me that much maybe it's time to switch activities rather than clinging onto the status quo.
In another previous post, I indicated an interest in applying the same principle to my life. This ambitious project has commenced and some progress has been made. One example is eating, which I mentioned in the last post. Although eating is an essential part of anyone's life, usually only a small part of that actually contributes to satisfying one's hunger -- the rest is about satisfying the taste buds or a psychological reaction to the value of the food being consumed. To me the latter parts are not that important so I paid less attention to them. I call these unimportant things "bloat", and there is no better time to remove bloat when I barely have enough time to keep up with uni work. And by keep up I mean 100% on top of taught materials.
It is very important to distinguish removing bloat and removing distractions. The latter could potentially include everything not directly related to my studies. This is not what I'm trying to get rid of. I still have a life outside of uni work, thank you. Rather I seek to track down activities that I don't really want or need to do, things that I do because I can (most likely to avoid doing any real work), and put a stop to them. For this reason I am not going to stop watching TV but will only watch programs that genuinely interest me. For example, I finally convinced myself 24 is so unrealistic it's not worth investing an hour per week just to find out the ending. I have a feeling Iron Chef will soon follow for being too repetitive but unable to improve my culinary skills. I can think of a few more examples but that will just impose more bloat on everyone, so I shall move on to conclusions.
For a computer, the less programs you have running the faster it will process tasks. I cannot tell you how much faster Windows Vista runs when it loses all the cosmetic bloat. The same goes for life. Sure I can do this and that and a million other things, but if they do not benefit me that much maybe it's time to switch activities rather than clinging onto the status quo.
Tuesday, 6 March 2007
The Boring Old Life
After a mere 22 odd years of living in cities, I am thoroughly tire of it. To me, an average day would involve working, eating, followed by some entertainment. This daily routine is so repetitive and uninteresting that I can no longer get any excitement out of it. While I will continue to work, eat and play in order to survive, I don't think I really care if I'm doing job A or job B, eating Pizza or KFC, watching TV or surfing the net for news, and so on. There is the feeling that none of these things can add to my experience in a substantial way, regardless of the choices. Thus I am becoming less particular about my choices.
One of the most obvious changes is my diet -- I simply don't care too much what I eat, as long as it's not too unhealthy. Next is my career ambition. As of late, a new possibility, namely working the financial sector, had opened up and I can no longer be sure I will be an engineer after graduating from uni. The ambiguity arises because I can no longer say one field interests me more than the other, which is to say I am interested in neither one.
This mentality opens up a can of worms. If I have no desires, should I still work so hard? If there's nothing more to get out of this life, is there a reason to still be breathing? I hesitate to declare I am tired of living, as that would be dangerous, and in any case I am not there yet. There is still hope, and reasons to live -- I just have to find it.
One thing I would really like to do is to escape the city, or what known to most of us as civilisation. I need to get away to some place where the inhabitants are not concerned daily with money, career and paying bills. And if that means parting with security, technology and luxuries then so be it. I'm not saying I'll like this for sure, but I'm willing to give it a try.
If you think this post is confusing, it's because I am not sure where I'm headed. A lot of thought is going through my mind right now. I can see many possibilities. The problem is not whether or how I can achieve any of these, but which one I want to pursue. The above is a snapshot of my mindset now, but it is perhaps just the tip of an iceberg.
One of the most obvious changes is my diet -- I simply don't care too much what I eat, as long as it's not too unhealthy. Next is my career ambition. As of late, a new possibility, namely working the financial sector, had opened up and I can no longer be sure I will be an engineer after graduating from uni. The ambiguity arises because I can no longer say one field interests me more than the other, which is to say I am interested in neither one.
This mentality opens up a can of worms. If I have no desires, should I still work so hard? If there's nothing more to get out of this life, is there a reason to still be breathing? I hesitate to declare I am tired of living, as that would be dangerous, and in any case I am not there yet. There is still hope, and reasons to live -- I just have to find it.
One thing I would really like to do is to escape the city, or what known to most of us as civilisation. I need to get away to some place where the inhabitants are not concerned daily with money, career and paying bills. And if that means parting with security, technology and luxuries then so be it. I'm not saying I'll like this for sure, but I'm willing to give it a try.
----------------------------------
If you think this post is confusing, it's because I am not sure where I'm headed. A lot of thought is going through my mind right now. I can see many possibilities. The problem is not whether or how I can achieve any of these, but which one I want to pursue. The above is a snapshot of my mindset now, but it is perhaps just the tip of an iceberg.
Friends
This must sound crazy to a lot of people, but I am not really interested in making lots and lots of friends. It does not mean I want to have no friends, just not a lot of them that I would get calls from friends on a daily (or even weekly) basis, or have people that I would see every day. Curiously enough, often when I am by myself I feel liberating rather than lonely. This contrasts strongly with studies that shows the average Korean kid would be anxious if he or she does not get a phone call every 10 minutes throughout the day.
It is not that I dislike people or their presence, but maintaining a friendly relationship requires investing time doing activities and communicating with the friend. More often than not I would rather spend that time carrying out my own agenda. In other words, I treat time as if it is money, choosing very carefully where I will spend it. Perhaps my attitude would be different if I have unlimited time.
While on the subject of friends, while I may give the impression I am a shy or quiet person, this is simply not the case. While it may be true that I am not good at generating conversations, it is also true that I believe in saying as much as necessary and nothing more. If there is nothing more I want to tell or learn from you, I cease talking. There is no reason to invent a topic that interests neither you nor me. Some people apparently cannot stand the silence and in order to fill the void, they start blurting out random jokes or comments that only cause a laugh because of its vulgarity. Truth be told at times I too feel uncomfortable at these quiet situations but I prefer to be perceived as shy than foolish. If, however, the other party and I share some common interest or knowledge you can be sure I will talk non-stop for a very long time.
It is not that I dislike people or their presence, but maintaining a friendly relationship requires investing time doing activities and communicating with the friend. More often than not I would rather spend that time carrying out my own agenda. In other words, I treat time as if it is money, choosing very carefully where I will spend it. Perhaps my attitude would be different if I have unlimited time.
While on the subject of friends, while I may give the impression I am a shy or quiet person, this is simply not the case. While it may be true that I am not good at generating conversations, it is also true that I believe in saying as much as necessary and nothing more. If there is nothing more I want to tell or learn from you, I cease talking. There is no reason to invent a topic that interests neither you nor me. Some people apparently cannot stand the silence and in order to fill the void, they start blurting out random jokes or comments that only cause a laugh because of its vulgarity. Truth be told at times I too feel uncomfortable at these quiet situations but I prefer to be perceived as shy than foolish. If, however, the other party and I share some common interest or knowledge you can be sure I will talk non-stop for a very long time.
Tuesday, 30 January 2007
Meeting The Saleperson
I have a funny habit of paying more attention to marketing pitches than I should. The pitch can be about anything: obtaining my vote for the student union, getting me to donate to a charity, even converting me to a Mormon. It doesn't matter what -- I just can't resist stopping and listening to what they have to say. Part of the reason maybe me feeling impolite to ignore even a stranger, but it can equally be my subconscious curiosity at work.
Since most passers-by ignore salespeople, they get quite excited when someone actually stops and listen to their pitch. I'm not a marketing person, but logic tells me that the longer a subject stays and listen to your pitch, the more likely you will succeed. That is, unless I am the subject.
The problem (for the salespeople at least) is that I don't consider myself an impulsive "buyer". I will in fact go further to declare that I don't like being told what to do, so any attempt at persuading me is likely to fail or even backfire. Perhaps the only time someone can convince me is if I already had the desire to buy or carry out that very same thing they are pitching. Despite having made up my mind before they started talking, I will listen to them and will not interrupt unless I'm in a hurry. That's right, I let them talk all they want, knowing they will never reach their goal. To make matters worse, if they ask me a question, I will respond in a positive way rather than sounding bored or irritated (again, to be polite). This of course encourages the salespeople and gives them more hope. Then comes the moment of truth, where, having expressed so much interest during the conversation, I am fully expected to commit and seal the deal. As it turns out, I will tell them bluntly that I am not interested and walk away without making any promises.
This may sound like a perverse practical joke, and someone actually wrote to the newspaper suggesting everyone give salespeople the "treatment". However this has never been my intent, even though I prefer they stay off the streets and my front door. It's just that once I started listening I do get interested in the information they gave but not the sale. Maybe secretly I hoped one of these guys can really convince me to move away from my status quo, so I gave them plenty of talking time to make their attempt. This has yet to happen.
Since most passers-by ignore salespeople, they get quite excited when someone actually stops and listen to their pitch. I'm not a marketing person, but logic tells me that the longer a subject stays and listen to your pitch, the more likely you will succeed. That is, unless I am the subject.
The problem (for the salespeople at least) is that I don't consider myself an impulsive "buyer". I will in fact go further to declare that I don't like being told what to do, so any attempt at persuading me is likely to fail or even backfire. Perhaps the only time someone can convince me is if I already had the desire to buy or carry out that very same thing they are pitching. Despite having made up my mind before they started talking, I will listen to them and will not interrupt unless I'm in a hurry. That's right, I let them talk all they want, knowing they will never reach their goal. To make matters worse, if they ask me a question, I will respond in a positive way rather than sounding bored or irritated (again, to be polite). This of course encourages the salespeople and gives them more hope. Then comes the moment of truth, where, having expressed so much interest during the conversation, I am fully expected to commit and seal the deal. As it turns out, I will tell them bluntly that I am not interested and walk away without making any promises.
This may sound like a perverse practical joke, and someone actually wrote to the newspaper suggesting everyone give salespeople the "treatment". However this has never been my intent, even though I prefer they stay off the streets and my front door. It's just that once I started listening I do get interested in the information they gave but not the sale. Maybe secretly I hoped one of these guys can really convince me to move away from my status quo, so I gave them plenty of talking time to make their attempt. This has yet to happen.
Sunday, 14 January 2007
Time Management
For the past few semesters I had trouble concentrating on my uni work. Things were getting harder and I was doing more subjects than I should. Along the way I made a few attempts to manage my time efficiently. None of them worked really worked. There didn't seem to be enough time to finish assignments and still revise as much as I would like. At least that was what I told myself.
Upon reflection, I found that when I was doing fun things, time passed very quickly without me realising it. So maybe it is not that there was not enough time before. I just wasted more time than I thought I did. Therefore I will now correct this with the most direct method -- I will schedule what I do everyday.
To this end, I divided all the things I can do into three categories or levels: 1, 2 and 3. Level 1 is the "must do" tasks like work and revision. Level 2 are optional but still "good to do" things such as practising piano, reading a novel, coding (a favourite pastime). Level 3 things are true time wasters which are purely for entertainment purposes. Obvious candidates include TV and games.
At the start of everyday (or back from uni) I work out how much time I have left until the end the day, and divide that into three blocks: one for each level. Currently I am trying to put at least 50% of the time into level 1 -- we'll see as time goes on. In any case, I am not going to dictation "when I will do what", but that at the end of the day I should have used the time as planned. Also if a higher level task requires more time I can take hours off the lower levels but not the other way round. I do that to ensure I do not make excuses and "delay" my revision.
Of course there are some problems. The main one is deciding what tasks fall into each of the levels. Even now, I cannot decide where blogging should go. I said level 3 an hour ago, but I am having second thoughts. ^_^
Despite some ambiguity problems, it works. Yesterday I managed to put in 4 solid hours into learn control theories, and I am in the middle of my holiday! It goes to prove that I can concentrate and there is sufficient time. I just need to stop making excuses.
Upon reflection, I found that when I was doing fun things, time passed very quickly without me realising it. So maybe it is not that there was not enough time before. I just wasted more time than I thought I did. Therefore I will now correct this with the most direct method -- I will schedule what I do everyday.
To this end, I divided all the things I can do into three categories or levels: 1, 2 and 3. Level 1 is the "must do" tasks like work and revision. Level 2 are optional but still "good to do" things such as practising piano, reading a novel, coding (a favourite pastime). Level 3 things are true time wasters which are purely for entertainment purposes. Obvious candidates include TV and games.
At the start of everyday (or back from uni) I work out how much time I have left until the end the day, and divide that into three blocks: one for each level. Currently I am trying to put at least 50% of the time into level 1 -- we'll see as time goes on. In any case, I am not going to dictation "when I will do what", but that at the end of the day I should have used the time as planned. Also if a higher level task requires more time I can take hours off the lower levels but not the other way round. I do that to ensure I do not make excuses and "delay" my revision.
Of course there are some problems. The main one is deciding what tasks fall into each of the levels. Even now, I cannot decide where blogging should go. I said level 3 an hour ago, but I am having second thoughts. ^_^
Despite some ambiguity problems, it works. Yesterday I managed to put in 4 solid hours into learn control theories, and I am in the middle of my holiday! It goes to prove that I can concentrate and there is sufficient time. I just need to stop making excuses.
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