Wednesday Routine
Today was the first day that I wasn’t really sure what to write about before sitting down to compose this post. I find myself starting to think about what to write before going to bed the night before, then having the same thoughts occupying my mind until I sit down to write. This isn’t how I want the writing for the blog to go, as I find myself starting to try and corral my thoughts and write about the right thing for the right reasons. Now that I’m back in my usual live and work environment, I need to work on letting this get back to the original spirit of this blog as a free-form outlet for me.
As the new year begins, I constantly remind myself that one of my goals for 2014 is to explore subtracting things from my life, rather than constantly trying to add things. Last year I found myself in a bit of a productivity trap. As I became more productive in some areas, I used the time that was freed to pack more things into that newly found free time. This turned out to be counterproductive and resulted in an increase in my stress level rather than the decrease I was looking for in the first place. Brad Feld at Feld Thoughts, had a great post toward the end of last year called “What are you going to stop doing in 2014?”that really helped me realize that subtracting, rather than adding, things to my daily routine was what I needed to try for 2014.
(So I just found myself straying from writing content to try and begin perfecting the structure of this blog. As I was about to research a link to quote from Feld Thoughts, I thought that securing a new domain for this site might be a good idea. I then went to GoDaddy to do a quick domain search. As I mentioned previously, my plan is to document these asides in an attempt to help me keep my “unfocus” and letting this blog serve as a freely flowing capture and expression of seemingly, at least to me, unstructured thoughts and ideas.”
Alright, I just did it again, finding a post on Feld thoughts to comment on, then felt compelled to add this blog link to my Twitter profile!)
This brings me to my Wednesday routine. Toward the middle of last year I settled on a daily and weekly routine that seemed to be, if not be optimal, at least sustainable. This year I’d like to move from sustainable to optimal, in an attempt to better manage stress along with making productivity improvements. This is new territory for me and I expect it may emerge as a theme of this blog over time.
Wednesdays for a long time have been a peak in the week for me. The beginning of the week begins to build, peaking on Wednesday, then rolling a bit easier through Thursday and Friday to the weekend. Some combination of that and scheduling has resulted in my Wednesday schedule looking something like this —
Wake up around 6A Get ready for the day and spend time with my wife before she leaves for work around 6:30A Walk the dog until 7A Daily writing time until 7:30A Church until around 8A Breakfast Work until 6P, with a break for exercise, usually cycling, around mid-day Yoga until around 9P Back at home to spend some time with my wife again Head to bed by 10:30P, after a quick trip outside with the dog
Is this too much for a Wednesday or any day? Even after writing it down I can’t really make that determinination. It would be great to move church, which I try and attend once during the week, as well as on Sundays, to a different day. I could probably try Tuesday for church, as Thursday’s schedule is too tight and if I let it go to Friday, it defeats my purpose of trying to get to church mid-week. Tuesday, although a bit of a push, may make sense and I might try Tuesday next week. A Tuesday night yoga class would be ideal, however the only evening the gym and instructor whose class I enjoy offer the class is on Wednesday, so there’s no moving that. In the meantime, this is the schedule I’m dealing with today and now’s my time to keep it rolling…off to church!