20 for 2020: week 45
Week of 2 November 2020
What did I want to do better this week?
Learn to identify early warning signs of becoming distressed in overwhelming situations and removing myself instead of trying to push through because I “have to” stay somewhere.
So, how did that go then?
This week was much better at work. The noise wasn’t as bad and I made sure I used my noise-cancelling headphones when I needed them. I did my required two days in the office and worked from home the other three days.
I’ve also been doing some reading about managing myself in over-stimulating environments and know I need to make sure that I don’t force myself to stay in situations that I can’t cope with. This is up to me to manage. No one is going to look out for me and the noise isn’t going to stop just because I’m uncomfortable. I have to be more proactive and assertive, which doesn’t come easily for me and can sometimes make me just as anxious as the issue that’s causing my distress in the first place. It’s a bit of a vicious circle!
On to 20 for 2020
This week I focused on my 50mm lens challenge (thing 9). I’m finding this really fun and challenging in a good way. It’s forcing me to look at potential subjects differently to how I otherwise would and to pay a lot more attention to the camera settings and to what I include in the frame than I do when I wander round with my wide-angle lens.
It’s been really interesting so far. It’s made me have to think a lot more about what’s in and what’s out. And get really annoyed when I have to step back further to fit something in and bump into a wall behind me!
I’m updating my photoblog with the photos if you want to check them out.
I finally got around to reading what to do with the sprout jar (thing 21) and putting some seeds in it. It’s only taken ten months. More actually, as I got the jar some time in the middle of last year. I found myself confused by the conflicting instructions on the seed packet and the ones that came with the jar. Seriously? That’s what put me off doing it for this long? Just try it and see what happens. If it doesn’t work, the worst outcome would be that I’d lose a few seeds.
It is underway.
What did I achieve this week?
My regular check in: I’m keeping up to date with my street corners project and my weekly photojournal. I even printed a big backlog of collages this week, so I need to make time to cut them to size and stick them in the diary. I ordered next year’s diaries last week so I’m expecting them to arrive well in time for next year’s work.
I also decided to take part in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), which is a challenge that has been running for more than 20 years, participants set themselves the goal of writing a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. I’ve taken part in this three or four times and have reached the 50,000 word target only once. I wasn’t going to do it this year but there is a story I really want to write (I actually started it last year and didn’t complete it) and I keep putting it off, so this seemed like as good a time as any to pick it up. I decided to be more realistic and set myself a goal of writing 500 words a day or 15,000 words over the month, rather than the full 50,000. I just want to try and get the words flowing and not overwhelm myself when I’m in a very busy time at work and working on the 50mm challenge, which is my top priority for this month. So this is something I want to keep ticking over rather than it being a huge thing.
As of Sunday (day 8), I had 5054 words, so I’m on track.
What didn’t go so well?
It’s now been almost three weeks since I handed in my final uni assignment (thing 8) , which is about the timeframe I should be getting my result in. Sometimes the marks have been sent out in less than two weeks, so this week I found myself constantly checking my email for the message that would tell me my final mark. As a result, I’d get distracted by other emails a lot more than I normally would. Emails are bad!
I’m confident I’ve done enough to pass, but I just want to know for sure! I want the loop to be closed so I can put this behind me once and for all. I know it will come when it comes and I can’t control this, and that checking my email won’t make it come any quicker.
I mentioned Habitica a few weeks ago. It’s a habit tracker app that you can use to gamify your habits and you lose health everytime you do something you’ve set up to be “bad”. One of my habits I want to kick is checking Instagram when I’m supposed to be working, and I noticed a couple of times this week, I picked up my phone and went to that app without even consciously thinking about it, so my cute little avatar took a bit of a health hit this week. I do not want to be doing that automatically. So that’s something else to be working on.
What do I want to do better next week?
Put the phone down!
I went back to my physio this week. I hadn’t been for about six weeks, and I told him how the joint in my neck that has been causing me problems had improved significantly after a week’s break away from the computer. He said it’s because I’d been moving a lot more during the day when I was on holiday, and I’d been changing positions more when I wasn’t sitting down all day, and I needed to get more movement of that joint into my day if I want to see that improvement continue. Or at least not get worse. Looks like something else I need to do better next week
Summary for the week
- Things completed this week: 0
- Things completed to date: 12 (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 14, 15, 16, 18, 20)
- Things I progressed: 2 (9, 21)
- Things in progress I didn’t progress: 6 (7, 8, 11, 13, 17, 22)
- Things not started: 2 (12, 19)
- Days I worked on my art (Goal = 2): 7
- Days I read a book (Goal = 7): 7
- Days I did yoga stretches (Goal = 7): 0
- Days I shut my computer down before 10.15 (Goal = 7): 7
- Days I went for a walk in the afternoon (Goal = 7): 7
- Days I had a lunch break away from my desk (Goal = 5 work days): 5
About The Author
