focus

The cluttered mind

Sam Falco1 Comment
Bloganuary writing prompt
Where can you reduce clutter in your life?
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Before I address this prompt, I have to have a cantankerous old man moment: “Bloganuary” is a terrible, ugly portmanteau which we did not need. Ugh. It’s like trying to make “fetch” happen.

And now, we return to our regularly scheduled program.

Reducing clutter has been on my mind a lot lately. In November, I wrote about how Sweetie and I are digging out from two decades of accumulated belongings. We’ve tried and discarded a lot of hobbies, together and separately, but we never got rid of the stuff. It’s difficult to let go of the thought that we might get back to it, or to acknowledge that we aren’t going to get our money back by selling it. We’ve made progress, yet we still have a long way to go.

Clutter is not limited to things. Clutter can also be mental debris. Similar to the way our closets can be filled with belongings that are no longer wanted or useful, our minds can be cluttered with thoughts and behavior patterns that are no longer helpful–or never were. Hiding your feelings might have been an adaptive habit when you were a child, for example, but it sabotages your adult relationships. Some people learn not to trust their skills, or devalue them, and it keeps them from doing things they want to do.

Tasks are another form of mental clutter. We’re all busy. There are so many things to do, and the list never seems to get shorter, does it? Little tasks that will “only take a few minutes” multiply like tribbles, and “a few minutes” can wipe out an entire afternoon. We lack the time to think. We lack the time to focus. This is where I most need to reduce clutter in my life. I add tasks to the list without thinking about whether they are really worth doing, or asking if I am the one who ought to do them. I try to do everything.

When I was told my job would be eliminated, I thought at first that at least I would “get things done.” I deluded myself that what I needed was time. No longer tied to my desk, I would become a dynamo of accomplishment. To a degree, that was true. I did get a lot done. But I forgot that there would be other “to dos” and I found myself just as overwhelmed as before.

I have been working on cutting down that clutter. I started by switching to a paper calendar and managing my time. Something about writing tasks on paper helps me be more realistic about how much time they’ll take. With a context-free list of reminders on my phone, it’s easy to underestimate how big a task is. Or to flat-out lie to myself. “I know that’s an hour, but I’ll just have to do it in fifteen minutes.” I’m not joking there–I have literally told myself that, countless times. For whatever reason, blocking time on a paper planner forces me to be more honest about what I can do.

It also makes it easier for me to evaluate my capacity. How much time can I spend? When I see appointments, it forces me to reckon with how much time I’ll need to travel to and from them. Or if they are online, to allow time to clear my head before and after them.

With an honest view of how much time I have, I make better choices about how I want to spend it. Instead of trying to churn through as many tasks as I can in as little time as I can, I’m evaluating what is really important to do. I also reserve time for focus and defend against the intrusion of “just a few minutes” tasks that have nothing to do with what I’m focusing on.

Cutting down on that mental clutter isn’t easy, but doing it reduces stress and increases satisfaction. I’ll continue eliminating physical things I no longer need, but the most important clutter I can reduce is the need to feel constantly busy.

Sisyphus with a pen

Sam Falco

Yesterday, I realized that I hadn’t written a blog post since Monday. I should write something, I thought, and within minutes of putting pen to paper, I ran into a familiar challenge. Although I had a topic in mind, it was too broad. The more I wrote, the more subtopics popped up. It was like playing whack-a-mole, but the moles were hydra heads. Knock one down and two more take its place. Worse, I’ll realize that I need to go back and expand on an idea even more.

This phenomenon happens when I write just about anything. I’ll try to dissect a broad idea into manageable pieces. Each piece reveals more, often interconnected ideas. The enormity of the task overwhelms me, and I often give up.

I’ve experimented with various techniques for generating focus. Handwriting on paper forces me to slow down but slowing down only helps a little. Bullet-point outlines seem like the answer until I start writing from one and realize that I’ve missed something. Mind mapping ought to help but only produces its own chaotic web of thought. The only benefit seems to be that I get frustrated and give up faster, which saves time. “It’s a great way to visualize your topic,” I’ve been told. For me, it’s a great way to visualize my inability to focus. It’s discouraging, to say the least.

The best thing is to talk through the topic with someone, then write the ideas down as quickly as I can afterward. That’s great if someone happens to have the time and inclination to indulge me. That’s not always the case and it’s not reasonable for me to expect people to be a sounding board for me at all times. I’d need an entourage, but how could I afford to feed them all? 

I do have an OpenAI account and a subscription to ChatGPT, though.

I disdain the use of Large Language Model tools to replace human writing. Using it as an aid to writing is different, and ChatGPT excels at being a sounding board. When this very post threatened to get out of hand, I decided to give the chatbot a try. Here’s the prompt I started with:

Act as a conversation partner as I think through a topic. Your goal is to help me explore the topic and clarify my thinking for something I might write about. Ask me one question at a time. After I respond, comment on what you think I mean and ask me if I want another question. Ask me for a topic.

The result was a series of exchanges in which the tool helped me sort through all the things I might want to cover. After eight questions, I had a clearer grasp of what I wanted to say and started writing this post. I don’t know why I have so much trouble focusing. One possibility is… (BAD SAM, LEAVE IT!) … a topic I’ll have to explore another time. Meanwhile, I’m glad I’ve discovered a new tool to help me think and write with clarity.

Dropping out of warp

Sam Falco

Last weekend, I joined the members of my critique group for a writing retreat. Over four days, I logged thirty hours of writing and added 9,000 words to my manuscript. It’s amazing what you can do when you’re in a house with three other writers and no one wants to break anyone else’s focus. Coming home to a normal writing schedule of about two hours a day feels like dropping out of warp speed.

I’ve begun every session of this project by writing, “My primary objective is to write an enjoyable PI story.” Every prior attempt to write a novel has been haunted by the ghosts of my graduate studies in literature. No matter what I wrote, I felt I ought to be writing something with deep significance. I never could live up to the ideal, and I berated myself for it. Filled with despair and self-loathing, I’d shift the story toward a didactic theme. Characters turned into mannequins and plots turned into lectures. I’d hate every minute of it, veer back toward more adventure-style fare, and begin the cycle anew.

With this story, I wanted to remind myself every day to focus on writing a story people would enjoy. “Social significance” would have to emerge—if it emerged—on its own. The mantra did help in that regard. Police corruption is an integral part of the plot, but the story is not a lecture about how All Right-Thinking People Must Stand For Justice. I’ve built characters with interesting motives, flaws, and strengths and let them interact.

But this weekend, I realized a curious thing had happened over the course of writing the first draft. My objective shifted from “write an enjoyable PI story” to “write 80,000 words.” The shift translated at first to setting a punishing daily goal. Even after I moved the target date to the end of January, I still focused on the target total. I wrote a lot of material not to serve the story but to pile up word count. If my focus really had been on writing an enjoyable story, I’d have stopped, re-examined my plans and the state of the story, and adjusted what I was writing.

It’s funny because I chose one word in my objective deliberately so I wouldn’t worry about length: “story.” I didn’t say I wanted to write “an enjoyable PI novel.” I chose the word “story” because I wanted to leave it open to finding the right length. I wasn’t sure whether it should be a short story, a novella, a novel, or a series. But once I recognized it was going to be a novel, I focused on the target length and sacrificed good storytelling.

Today, there’s not much story left. Mark knows who the killer is and needs only one crucial piece of evidence to prove it. There’s one subplot to wrap up—will he reconcile with his ex-girlfriend? (I don’t know yet.) Two to four scenes will take care of plot and subplot. Regardless of the final length of the draft, I will type “The End” once I write them. If the book is too short, well, there’s another draft after this one, and I can worry about it then.

2024: The Year I Don’t Write a Novel

Sam Falco1 Comment

Every year, I tell myself that this will be the year I write a great novel. It never quite works out that way. The truth is that I don’t so much “finish” a novel as “get bored with and abandon” novels. I am always looking forward to the next one. The one that’s going to be so great, not like the puddle of puke I’m working on now. The next novel will flow from my pen like liquid chocolate, rich and delightful. It will not take much revision because I’ll do it right this time.

Of course, that never happens because first drafts are never like that.

And then my mind is looking forward to the next thing, instead of working to refine and improve what’s right in front of me. It’s as if, having arrived at an oasis in the desert, I go chasing the mirage of a bigger, better oasis that might not exist.

This year, I am not resolving to write a new novel. I’d like to finish Gulf City Blues without rushing it. I’d like to set it aside for a month and not start the next thing, so that I can return to Mark Marshal and his problems without having another story gnawing at me. I don’t know what I’ll do with the down time. I might take that time for related research, or to develop elements of the setting that I know need attention. But I won’t start a different project.

When I come back to the story for revision, I won’t rush that, either. A few pages a day is plenty. If it takes months, then it takes months. Maybe it will take the rest of the year. Maybe it will take longer. I don’t care. I can’t rush through stories anymore only to abandon them before they get good.

Get rid of the screens

Sam Falco
Daily writing prompt
How do you manage screen time for yourself?
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Almost two months ago, I put my iPad in a drawer to break a bad habit of frittering away my time. It was a good decision. That’s how I’ve had time to revitalize this blog. I’ve also completed projects around the house, written more fiction, and read more. I’m more productive, more creative, and happier.

Banishing the iPad didn’t end my addition to screen time, though. After a while, I realized I’d shifted some of my time-wasting to my phone. The difference was that now I was giving myself eyestrain doing it. I suppose that did decrease the raw amount of time I spent eyeballing a screen because I physically couldn’t do it as much.

Beyond the temptation to surf, the phone presents another challenge. It’s a distraction machine. Say I’m writing in my journal and I think of a household task I need to do soon. If the phone is within arm’s reach, I’ll stop writing to pick up the phone and check my calendar to see when I can squeeze it in. I’ll do that even if the decision doesn’t need to be made right then. I could note the idea, start the margin so I can find it again, and move on. But if the phone is right there, I’ve trained myself to reach for it.

I’ve taken to tossing the phone to the foot of my chaise to force me to pause. If I have to reach for it, usually remember that I’m distracting myself. I’ve also experimented with leaving it in another room so that I don’t hear alerts. What I’m getting is that I’ve realized that the best way to manage screen time is to take the screens away. I can use them when I need them, but without a specific purpose to achieve, I should keep them away from me.

WIP Limit: 1

Sam Falco
Daily writing prompt
What have you been putting off doing? Why?
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I used to be a world-class procrastinator. I put off doing things so much that my to-do list would grow to enormous, anxiety-provoking lengths. Eventually, I’d start something from the list. I’d set it aside when I ran into an impediment (or if it was hard or tedious). Then I’d start something else. That would go on until I had so many projects in progress that I couldn’t keep track of them all. Then I’d procrastinate some more.

I started to change my ways as a result of my work in software development, where I learned lean and agile practices. One of those practices is to limit “Work in Process,” abbreviated WIP. Unfinished work is a form of waste. One way to limit that form of waste is to only have a few things in progress at a time. Whether the focus is organization wide and applies to major initiatives or at the team level and applies to smaller goals, we focus on a very small set of things to work on. Focusing on a particular initiative, project, or feature means we finish it faster than if we dispersed our attention across multiple streams of work.

Since WIP limits helped in my professional life, I thought they’d work in my personal life as well. I made a list of all the work I had in process. There was a surprising number of uncompleted projects in the wood shop, the yard, the house, and in my writing. There were so many that I almost gave up before I went any farther.

I knew that wouldn’t help, and I turned a critical eye on the list. I made the hard decision to abandon some of the projects. That bar cart I’d been “going to get to?” It pained me to throw it out, but I knew I’d never get back to it and if I did, I was going to have to start over anyway. Being honest with myself and getting rid of things I was never going to do freed up space–in my life and in my head–for the ones I could do.

Next, I surveyed the remaining projects. I selected one that would be easy to finish yet would give me the biggest benefit. I ignored that other projects were waiting and worked until I finished it. Then I picked another and focused on that. Again and again. Just like a software development team delivers faster when it focuses on a single feature, I started finishing projects faster. When I got stuck on one, I refrained from switching to another. Instead, I focused on getting that project unstuck.

My list is much shorter now, and it doesn’t cause me anxiety even when it grows. I recognize that I can only do so much at a time. As long as I’m smart about selecting the most valuable things to do, that’s enough. It’s not that I’m putting things off. I’m focusing on doing what I can do so that I can do it well and finish.

Blogging more

Sam Falco1 Comment

I wrote a blog post every day for the past seven days. This is a big deal for me. I go for long stretches during which I don’t post anything, but that’s not for lack of desire. It’s for lack of confidence that I have anything to say worth saying.

That feeling usually takes the form of being unable to settle on a subject. Even when I have one in mind, I can’t select a focus. The result is either a rambling mess or a series of false starts. When I don’t have a specific topic in mind, I’ll look through my notebook for ideas I’ve jotted down. Usually, I reject them all before becoming frustrated and giving up.

Last Friday night, I decided to experiment with blogging every night. I needed a way to select a topic quickly and focus on it. A gift from my wife supplied the method: the “Hemingway Deck,” which is a deck of cards with a writing prompt on each card. Some of the prompts aren’t relevant to me, so I didn’t want to commit to selecting one at random and hoping for the best. On the other hand, if I tried to select one, I knew that I would reject one after the other.

I chose to select three cards at random, and then select one. That way, I had some choice, but not so much that I never settled on a topic. This method took away one of my excuses not to write. I had a topic. I didn’t give myself a target length, so a few sentences was enough. As a result, I wrote several posts, including one that didn’t come from the cards but occurred to me before I sat down to write.

I intend to maintain the momentum this week. I would like to get to the point where I can write deeper posts than my typical response to a prompt. For now, though, I’ll settle for establishing the discipline of publishing something daily.

 

Focus

Sam Falco4 Comments

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Every morning at work, I start with seemingly limitless reserves of energy. But by the time I wade through emails, prepare a list of things I need to do, and get ready for my first meeting of the day, I often find myself drained and uninspired. The rest of the day is harder to get through, and I often feel unsatisfied with what I’ve accomplished when it’s time to leave.

This morning, I decided to take a different approach. I didn’t check my email. I didn’t reconcile my calendars. I didn’t look at Twitter, or my schedule for the day. I picked something I needed to focus on and got to work.

What a difference it made! I finished a proposal for a speaking engagement that I fretted over all last week. I read–and understood–a systems architecture document I’ve been meaning to get to. And I reviewed a slide deck I’ll need to use for an upcoming training session. I got more done in two hours than I usually get done in twice that amount of time. After my first meeting, I capitalized on the momentum I’d built and accomplished even more.

Before I left the office, I did all the tedious chores I normally would have done first thing in the morning, and wrote a note for myself to find in the morning. When I get there tomorrow, I’ll have my day laid out for me and a head start on another good day.

 

Photograph by Musuvathi J Ubendran.