Day 3 — Remember Lazily
In the last story we talked about meditation, metacognition, and mindfulness and in the first story I talked about why I decided to make this my version of NaNoWriMo. I promise I won’t do a recap for every episode; otherwise, I’ll end up like CW’s Arrow and by day 10 you’ll be 15 minutes in and still reading the recap.
Decision fatigue is real. Remembering requires mental energy. The trouble is that it’s little tiny, barely noticeable but incredible frequent slices of memory that we don’t realize we’re using as often as we are (unless we’re getting those mindfulness GAINZ). So if you’re looking to be on time, remember when things are happening, track events and information, look no further than your trusty smart phone calendar. “But Webs, I don’t use my smart phone calendar, I like having a paper calendar.” To you I say:
This probably isn’t the post for you then. There’s nothing wrong with your paper calendar except that it has no backup unless you do the work to write everything twice, it loses everything when you spill coffee on it, and you’ll only remember things by actually looking at the calendar. Digital calendars however will alert you when something is coming up, interact with things like email and text message making adding dates relatively easy and if you wanna get deep into that automation they can do some fancy, funky things that make adding complex events pretty painless.
The key here though is reducing the fatigue involved in remembering. When we have things we don’t want to forget they’re always running in the background otherwise we forget them. As a result, they’re taking up precious brain power. Get those things out of your head and into a place with automatic redundancy that will tap you on the shoulder when you need reminding like your digital calendar.
Effortless(ish) Remembering for Future You
Today I was texting with my mom and she mentioned she couldn’t forget that my uncle had a choir event on December 12. Right there in the text message she had the date. RIGHT. THERE. Instead, she said she was going to write it down on a note and put it on her calendar. I sent her a quick video like the one below showing her how dates become active so that with a few taps they can be added to your calendar. She did add the event to her phone’s calendar and also still opted to use her paper calendar reminder (I can say, nothing wrong with that). By setting reminders 1 week, 1 day, or whenever you need the reminder before and event, you won’t be caught by surprise.
This works well with holidays and birthdays as well. Set an all-day event a week before to remind you that your mom’s birthday is coming up and set it to recur every year. Never miss a birthday or anniversary again! The tired trope of the husband who forgets his wedding anniversary can die. No shame in the game of using your tech to help you remember important dates.
Effortless(ish) Remembering from Past You
If you are pretty consistent about how you title your events, they can be a helpful diary of your past as well. For example, my last year of teaching I went to the doctor A LOT. Every time I did, I put “Doctor Appt” and added my doctor’s office as the location of the calendar event. Then, when the doc asked, “Weren’t you just here?” I could quickly search “Doctor Appt” and see all my previous appointments or, at the end of the year, when I wanted to tally up how many times I had gone, I could do a search and they would all show up (Six by the way. Six times in a 9-month period. It wasn’t a great year.). Take this skill a step further by adding notes like what you got your sister for her birthday this year so that next year you don’t get her the same travel pillow you got her the last two years.
Today look for opportunities to use your calendar. Maybe you get hit with that stupid monthly recurring checking account fee that you always forget about. Add it as an all-day calendar event with a reminder for one week before. Maybe you had an idea for a gift for your brother’s birthday. Add an all-day event and add the link to the gift idea in the notes section. Stop accepting that you have to remember and let your calendar do it for you.
