Excursions

I have been thinking a lot recently about self-discipline and doing things I love. I want to understand why I need self-discipline to make myself do things that I love. There can be two reasons for this.

There’s an inherent dichotomy between the things that I love and the things I want to believe I love. Maybe I don’t love love journaling. Or meditating. But I want to believe I do. Hence, I need to fit these into my routine, or I just won’t do it. On the other hand, I do love reading blogs and non-fiction. Or mysteries. So, I don’t need a routine to make myself follow people’s feeds. Or read books. If this is the case, how can I separate things that I love from those I want to believe I love?

Another reason might be that the things I love aren’t easy for me to do. I haven’t mastered how to meditate. Or to journal. They don’t come naturally to me and hence, even a feeble friction – late nights or a busy work schedule or an unplanned travel – derails all my attempts to do any of these regularly. I need self-discipline to force myself to do such activities regularly (and patiently) as only through repetition will I master them. Only then would they start coming naturally to me.

I am yet to be convinced of the real reason. Maybe it is both; maybe neither. Whatever the case, I continue to force a routine on myself for I know of no other path to self-discipline.

YouTube is boring without recommendations. And I love that I could disable them by turning the watch history off.

YouTube is boring without recommendations. And I love that I could disable them by turning the watch history off.

I watched three movies over the weekend. I don’t usually do this, but after a hectic week at work, I had to give myself some relief. Two of the three movies were absolutely (and surprisingly) brilliant. Another one was just a mindless filler.

The first was 12th Fail. Such an inspiring story told in a simple, no-nonsense manner. In today’s phase of over-produced, over-dramatic, loud action movies, the plain narration was a treat. There was no ear-splitting background music and no unnecessary slow-motion effects. The life the movie was based on already had enough drama that it didn’t need any additional masala. Plus the music from Shantanu Moitra was mesmerising, especially the track Bolo Na that plays in the film. A beautiful, uplifting movie that can be watched with family, something that’s rare these days!

Next, we watched Migration – an unplanned rush to the theatre with the only intention to spend quality family time. And we did. A light, colourful movie with moments of hearty laughs. Of course, with a bucket of popcorn and coke. I always feel refreshed when my daughter has a wonderful time in a movie theatre. Watching her guffaw at the silliest of the jokes brings a big smile to my face. Today was no different.

With this much of the weekend spent on entertainment, I still had time for myself, for writing and lots of reading. I must be doing something right. I have a theory, but I am not ready to share it yet.

I watched three movies over the weekend. I don’t usually do this, but after a hectic week at work, I had to give myself some relief. Two of the three movies were absolutely (and surprisingly) brilliant. Another one was just a mindless fi… www.amitgawande.com/2024/01/0…

“Self-discipline is overrated. I should do what makes me feel good.”

“Just doing what makes me feel good makes me lazy. I need self-discipline.”

These are the two extremes I hop between. I would love to be in the middle somewhere. Self-disciplined enough not to be lazy, yet allow myself space to do what I love. Is attaining such a balance a myth? And what do I love? What does make me feel good?

Is it anything that’s frictionless or passive, like watching TV or clicking through YouTube recommendations? Or is it something that lends me a hollow feeling of achievement? Like reading random “intelligent” posts that I have no interest in? It must be neither. It is both.

Irrespective of which extreme I find myself at, I subconsciously judge how I spend my free time. It can’t be healthy. But I haven’t yet mastered the way not to be self-judgemental.

Here’s what I want to achieve. Be self-disciplined. To do things that keep me void of any guilt. But shouldn’t those be the things that make me feel good? As a result, won’t self-discipline make me lazy?

The last few days have been extremely hectic at the office for me. I want to get hold of things, but there just are too many threads to look after. I need some system of sorts – I know prioritizing and time-bounding the tasks has helped me in the past. Plus I have come across so many useful systems for getting more done.

But I, of course, still need a system that works for me. I am starting small – stitch a list of tasks, merge a few to shorten it, and finally get them lined up to be ticked off. My only concern at this point is I am adding a lot more tasks to the list than I am getting off of it.

My hope was things would settle down in a couple of days. I am afraid it’s not going to correct on its own. Tells me something is inherently wrong with how I am managing stuff.

The last few days have been extremely hectic at the office for me. I want to get hold of things, but there just are too many threads to look after. I need some system of sorts – I know prioritizing and time-bounding the tasks has helped me … www.amitgawande.com/2024/01/0…

I came across this prompt a while back, which I had no opinion on. I wanted to attempt to elaborate my thoughts on it now.

If someone looked at how you spent your time over the last year, would what they see as your priorities match what you see as your priorities?

They won’t.

I had set health and focus as my priority for the year. Even after starting the year well, I didn’t spend enough time on any of those. What’s worse is that towards the end of the year, I was numb enough not to attempt doing any of them.

The results are here to show. I am distracted. I am not in the best of my shape.

Is it time to set them as a priority again, then? Nope. It is time to discover why my attempts were derailed later last year.

Back from a week-long vacation, the first thought I had when I logged into my system after a couple of days rest was I must have missed so much. I wasn’t wrong, of course. My feed reader and timelines were full of unread posts. I did what any sane mind should do - I marked all items as read and started fresh.

It’s very unlike me. I tend to skim through the list and keep things to catch up on later and discard everything else. I simply discarded everything this time. I have learned from the past. I rarely catch up. The list stares back at me the psychological pressure rising with each day until I eventually mark everything as read.

I pre-empted that this time.

One entry missing from the list to handle this time was my email inbox. Surprisingly, HEY has that covered brilliantly. Nothing that’s not of interest reaches my inbox anymore. After a period of indecision on the utility of HEY, I am hooked to the service now that it has solved my email problem.