Organization and Scheduling

Friday, July 19, 2024

7:30 a.m. I suppose it is time to get to work again. When the weather cools off even temporarily, the same conditions that may lead to breathing troubles often lead to a burst of productive activity. That’s how it feels this morning. So guys, a few tips would be appreciated

We have a “no tipping” policy.

Very funny. Come to think of it, that is the first joke you’ve made in a while.

It has been a while since your inner pressure has risen high enough.

So it’s the old “Tides and decisions both, not decisions merely.”

Doesn’t everything in your experience show you this? You all have to act as if you were independent of one another, and often enough as if independent of circumstances. But how could that be? It is the better part of wisdom to recognize that everything that is shaped is therefore bounded, and this goes for intangibles such as possibilities, no less than for physical objects or even abstractions such as something pictured. The very thing people kick against – limitation – is what makes them distinct, with their own possibilities.

Some people think our lives are predestined, though that makes no sense to me.

We have said, predestination and free will are intricately connected. It is only in seeing one in the absence of the other that you can go wrong. As usually, “both, and” or even “neither nor”; not one or the other.

Well, if my inner tide has risen to the point that we can go back to doing something more than passing the time, what can you tell me? On this, or on anything you care to discuss.

You had a dream that held your attention. Paraphrase your description.

This was yesterday morning. I dreamed of being in a vast room, surrounded by boxes or cartons – containers of some kind. I knew I was packing and also seeking visas, and it was an overwhelming task. I think I was trying to get papers for the cat, too. (Not genealogy but, again, visas.) I wasn’t panicked or frantic or even rushed, but I was overwhelmed. So much to do, and no one to help, come to think of it, and no structure, just all these boxes on all sides. And when you and I talked about it here, it became clear that it wasn’t a sense of urgency, just overwhelm at the extent of the clutter.

And in that recounting just now, you heard something.

Yes. Lack of structure. That has always been a problem for me. If no external structure, you have to provide one for yourself, and I haven’t been doing it.

You have done it sporadically, and occasionally, usually tied to one specific project which, accomplished or abandoned, leaves you again without structure to lean on.

This shouldn’t come as any great revelation, but I see that the simple habit of getting up to talk to you whenever I couldn’t sleep or had had enough sleep provided a structure.

It provided half a structure. The habit was half; the activity was the other half. When you had both, you functioned. When either failed you, you couldn’t. although, saying “when either failed you” is misleading.

No, actually, it’s clarifying, because sometimes the material dried up, but other times I wanted to keep on but for some reason I couldn’t. Or – come to think of it, that’s what you just said, it’s a matter of tides and decisions both.

There is something within you that rebels against compulsion every once in a while. It may be your own rule, your own resolution, but at some point you decide you’ll be damned if you will.

As my old friend Dave Wallis used to say, “Guilty, your honor.”

This is why every rule should carry within it the exception. A Sabbath day of rest makes the other six days bearable; it is a formula for continuity.

You have to un bend the bow every so often if you’re going to be able to use it.

Tastes and needs differ, but  regular periodic unbending is usually more reliable than unbending only when you happen to think of it (on the one hand) or unbending whenever you happen to feel like it (on the other).

I could use a realistic schedule I could keep to.

Again the schedule is half. The other half is awareness of what you want to do. It can be chasing rainbows or grinding corn; the nature of the task doesn’t matter. But clarity is always helpful.

So set up a schedule of projects always a little ahead of where I am, so never come to a gap?

That sounds practical, and for some it may be. For you, probably not.

What, then?

If you come to the end of a project, there’s nothing wrong with using the pause to survey your situation. Only, use the time. That is, actually consider what has been done, what needs to be done, what can or can’t be done.

Should I set up a definite amount of time when I work? I know that some writers resolve to sit in front of a blank wall for X time if need be, only not doing anything at all if they don’t write – which of course gets them writing, soon enough.

You wouldn’t observe the rule anyway, and there’s no need. If you schedule yourself for an hour, you will get something done, if only sifting things in your mind. But of course this will work differently for different people. That’s as it should be.

Often enough, all I accomplish is one of these conversations.

So?

Yes, I get it. The process, not necessarily the result.

Remember, this started with the realization that all those resources are clutter unless organized somehow.

But what about the travel aspect of the dream? Not urgent, not panicky, but definitely a presence.

One way to look at it, you aren’t going to live as you are forever. Another way is, in creation as in everyday life, you want to go somewhere, which means moving. Few people ever crossed the ocean by rowing with only one oar. Going in circles is not the kind of movement you find satisfying.

Neither is standing on a wharf surrounded by luggage!

You are neither on a wharf nor surrounded by luggage. Your dream describes you as isolated in a room among a clutter of background materials.

Well, I’ll send this out, see if it strikes people. And I’ll try to figure out how to apply it. Sitting at a desk willingly is one thing, but doing it to effect is something different.

You can do as you often do: Make lists, see what strikes you.

At least organize the boxes, anyway. Okay. Thanks as always.