Weeding, Curating and Time Blocking
“To change your life, you need to change your priorities.”
– Mark Twain
Spring is finally showing her face here in Vermont, which means I embrace every possible opportunity to enjoy being outside. To the left of our front deck, we have a large garden bed, about twelve feet long by six feet wide. When we moved in three years ago, the bed had a handful of beautiful, early-spring wildflowers such as trillium, bloodroot, and bleeding heart, yet few flowers that bloomed throughout the summer. It also had an abundance of stubborn, hard to remove weeds and ferns, ferns, and more ferns.
I’ve made slow but steady progress over the past two years in changing out the plethora of ferns and weeds for new bunches of perennial flowers that I love -- black-eyed Susans, coneflowers, and dianthus among others -- yet I’ve been in a losing battle against the weeds. Typically by summer’s end, the weeds threatened to overshadow the beauty of my new beloved flowers. But this spring, I’ve had the time, energy and mental focus to deliberately remove the weeds and random plants I no longer want in the bed when the ground is still soft and the weeds are still young. I’ve made room for new colorful, joy-inducing blooms (Icelandic poppies and columbine!) and space for existing plants to have more space to reveal their beauty.
I’ve reflected a bit on why weeding has felt so deeply satisfying this spring versus years past -- I think it is a tangible way to feel and experience what many of us are doing deep within ourselves. We are looking anew at our own life “garden” to reflect on which flowers we want to give more room to flourish, and which plants no longer suit us or are weeds that threaten the health of the plants we value.
This Fast Company article includes a number of helpful prompts to fuel thinking during this “gut-check moment” -- they suggest approaching work-life balance as a museum curator might in building an exhibit, versus a juggler trying to make all the balls stay afloat. What aspects of our life do we want to intentionally give focus and attention to? How will we choose to be proactive in deciding what we focus on versus reacting to the many interests competing for our time? What will my life’s exhibit include?
I’m highly aware of some of the aspects of life that I miss -- I am very extroverted and derive enormous energy through interactions with other human beings, especially my family, friends, and colleagues. The simple pleasure of gathering with people, either on outdoor adventures or over shared food and drink to enjoy conversation and laughter is something I will always include as a featured part of my gallery.
I miss the ability to take adventures beyond my home. Whether its an afternoon adventure to favorite local shops to look at beautiful clothing and intriguing books...or a drive north to the Mad River Valley for skiing or hiking followed by dinner at American Flatbread pizza...or the chance to board a plane to go further afield, I long for the opportunity to feed my adventuresome spirit and to experience different contexts and environments to inspire me. Travel and adventure will return to my life gallery when social distancing measures allow.
I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how I’ve come to appreciate the ability to work from home. Before Covid began, I found myself wondering if working from home (WFH) was like kryptonite to my extroverted spirit. I love the energy that comes from working in the same physical space as others -- even when my work requires me to be “heads down,” I feed off the energy of others engaged in similar activity. Yet over the last eight weeks, I’ve found that bursts of interaction over Zoom or the old-fashioned phone line can fuel a lot of that need for interaction. And I’m grateful for the opportunities I have to take short breaks with my daughters or husband instead of a colleague -- our familial connections have grown so much deeper in this time, and I appreciate that. I am curious about how WFH will remain as a part of my curated life gallery.
As we reimagine the volume of human interaction in the days ahead, perhaps we will preserve physical gatherings for the most important times, and rely on ever-evolving technology to help us connect without requiring arduous and unnecessary travel. That is a weed I hope we might collectively reduce from our gardens, as the positive impact on climate change, mental and physical well-being has great potential, as does the opportunity to re-invest time lost to traffic and getting back and forth into more fruitful endeavors.
Relatedly, I’m intrigued by and trying to implement the concept of “time blocking” for my daily schedule. Inspired by my friend and travel advisor, Mimi, as well as the ideas of Cal Newport about deep work and Daniel Pink about the power of timing, I’m trying to be more purposeful in how I use each hour of my day to achieve my goals.
Mimi has reminded me of the power of starting your day with intention and routine -- for her, it includes journaling and meditation. I am at my best when I wake up before everyone else, reflect on and write down my goals for the day over my first delicious cup of coffee, and then enjoy an hour of running, riding, or yoga to start the day with a blast of endorphin energy. This 90-minute block of “self-care” allows me to be more present in my interactions with others. A newer habit I hope to maintain is writing this blog -- I’ve found it a helpful way to connect the dots on what I am learning, reading, doing and thinking, and a fast track to feeling “flow” through the challenge and joy of the creative process.
One of Pink’s most resonant ideas is to pay attention to the typical flows of our energy throughout the day -- for someone like me, who is a “morning” person, my best time for critical and analytical work is in the morning. I’m putting this into action by scheduling work blocks for writing, thinking and “work” time as well as my data science problem sets and asynchronous classwork between breakfast and lunch.
After lunch into the afternoon tends to be an energy trough, and so it’s a great time to do more administrative or busywork. I tend to check email and LinkedIn often throughout the day, and so I am toying with the idea of creating a dedicated block in the early afternoon for this work (as well as brief email checks in the morning and end of the day to scan for anything urgent) instead of allowing it to distract me throughout the day.
Pink describes late afternoon into early evening as “recovery” and a powerful time to engage in creative work and idea generation. I’m going to try to save the more creative and exploratory pursuits on my to-do list for this time of day. At Connection 101, we aim to schedule our own meeting times following this model as well -- I will report back in a future post on how Pink’s framework is supporting me as well as our team in being our best.
If the opportunity to weed your garden and to curate your life going forward sounds appealing, here are a couple of other articles that highlight applications of these concepts in different ways: how we cultivate a welcoming home environment, and how to think about parenting through a weeding lens. I’d love to hear about what you’re weeding, and what you’re feeding, as you plot your path foward.
The CRAVE list
Cook:
This week’s recipe theme: resourceful bowls
My food challenge this week involves combining leftovers and other fridge contents into a tasty bowl of lunch yum. Some favorite combos:
Baby green leaf lettuce + leftover baked chicken tenders + sliced carrot + sliced almonds + avocado + mandarin ginger dressing
Quick fried rice inspired by the veggie-loaded fried rice recipe from Dinner: the playbook. (pro-tip -- double the garlic and ginger and go nuts with sriracha)
Baby green leaf lettuce (a new favorite) + avocado + fresh mozzarella + pistachios + dried cranberries + blush wine vinaigrette
Read:
Book: We are reading Nate Silver’s The Signal and Noise for my Data Analytics class. I’d give the book a B -- it’s interesting and yet at times repetitive. That said, Chapter 7, “Role Models” describes how scientists and doctors try to forecast virus outbreaks. If you have the chance to read that chapter, it is quite fascinating given these times.
Article: I bookmarked this IDEO post to read about making meetings better.
Absorb:
Learn: Gretchen Rubin (an author and podcast host who I enjoy) is offering her Four Tendencies course for $25 in May. I plan to sign up and get started over the weekend -- having taken the free quiz, I know I am a “Rebel” — I am eager to learn more about how this affects my approach to life!
Podcasts:
Loved this podcast from Dan Harris on how to rediscover patience -- its a combination of research and meditation.
If you don’t want to read Daniel Pink’s book, check out the Goop podcast here.
My amazing friend Ginny shared this podcast with me on rewiring our brains to be more positive -- its queued up for my next walk.
Playlists: I’ve been working on a Spotify playlist over the last few weeks, The beat goes on -- it reflects favorites from many sources and time periods and my eclectic and sometimes “cheesy” taste in music. It is upbeat and great for a long run or a personal dance party. Let me know what you think!
Venture:
Building on my comments earlier in this post, I’m going to venture to look at email and social media at very specific times of the day for a whole week to observe how it affects my productivity and focus. This is an enormous shift from how I typically work and feels liberating, exciting, and terrifying all at once… which tells me I need to give it a whirl. I will report back on my progress.
Exercise:
Trail running! Yesterday my C101 partner, Ashley, took me on a run on the trails behind her house. They link up to a couple of existing trail networks, including the AT. It was the highlight of my week! Absolutely gorgeous and peaceful. I can’t wait to get back out there.
Stay safe, healthy, and hopeful, and get outside!