All the greatest contributors to society have a routine I am told, just as I go flitting about my day full of chaos, I believe that time blocking is of the essence, also the fact that none of the self-made billionaires of merit seem to be fond of wearing watches and with that very gesture “own” their own time. Also add to that quirk the nature of avoiding any sort of decision fatigue that may arise as such from deciding on what to eat and what to wear on a daily basis. I would mostly go on my whim, or rank from the vegetable most in need of eating to decide the menu, but well that hasnt been on my plate thus far. Yet time and again we find that time blocking actually makes one more prone to getting the best out of their day. No worries I am not advocating the 5 am club, Mark Zuckerberg wakes at 8 and so do many others so waking up to me merits the sound of bird song more that the productivity bias, yet there is such a thing as circadian rhythms unless ofcourse one descends from the wolf, and that is a subject of much other discussions.
So time blocking is to set a particular time lets peg it at 30 minutes for the sake of discussion and keeping to one task in hand for all those minutes, it works on a physical basis too if not just psychological as one then can step and stretch every 30 minutes. This time blocking puts an end of time to the task and the proclivity of one finishing the task with an end time in mind really works wonders. What if the task cannot be completed in 30 minutes, like writing a novel or so, one would then be advised to break the task into bite-sized components, spread over many a day and that works too. Time blocking with a timer works best but just in case one does not want to yield to instruments of oppression a heightened awareness of one’s physical being helps in not getting just too absorbed in a task. When I would work as a full time architect or even now when I sit with drafting softwares like AutoCAD I find time literally melt away as the mode of meditation kicks in. Drafting can be super meditative just like writing this blog could be.
But for a creature of non-habit, settling down on a routine is caging and sometimes devastating. I could literally swear that my creativity comes from chaos, in my schedule, in the world, in my home or even in my head. It really helps me to not have a schedule, though research clearly suggests otherwise. Non-routine is my preferred state though years of education, and now again getting back on the treadmill of education for my son, there certainly is a routine that I have to honour time and again. However much I settle into a routine, I promptly find an excuse to shake things up a bit. This afternoon after a meeting at 3 pm shortly after lunch I realise that some time blocking is actually fantastic. For me solitary mornings with music and nature, followed by a family breakfast, site visit mornings, meeting in the afternoons, winding up with sketches and moodboards at work and then nature evenings followed by hours of reading before catching in those laboriously deep snoozes work best. What about you??
Vedasri Siddamsetty 