Background
- Time Diary: Observe, Analyze, Adjust and Automate
- Tim Ferris’ advice on planning the next day in the evening (not in the morning)
I need to incorporate the Time Diary as my daily routine, I observe in the post and previous journal entries that make me more self aware and reflective for my own behavior and lead to improvement, it doesn’t need to be exact and very detailed, but few important tasks measured and concluded are well worth the time attention and decision for stop, continue or automate.
Obadaa: observe, analyze (Energy: is it working, what increase energy, what decrease ebgery, right time/cycle), adjust (create rules, routine), automate (manual, eliminate)
Next question: how?
What time? Prefer night rather than morning due to reflecting the day is still fresh and energy for analyzing and concluding is also enormous, I prefer not to spend it on the morning, morning energy should be focused on accomplishing the day goals not on reflecting yesterday and also get some upset due to not so good yesterday. What time exactly? Can it be integrated with my test plan of Creating to do list in the evening/night? Yea it should.
What is the format of the activity? There should be a template and archiving mechanism. Template for time diary (date, activity, time spent, result, feeling) and planning for tomorrow (the productivity journal?, somewhere in my laptop) .
Archiving mechanism: paper or online (wordpress, evernote, Google calendar). The purpose of archiving: can be used for reflecting easily, used for today to do, I find it a hassle for reviewing lot of notes in online, imagine going through one year notes in online look like: 365 post or 12 post (1 post = 1 month), preview on monitor or print and then review. Compared with skimming a journal book of a year worth, but will have to sync the schedule with google calendar. Unlike writing to a book, like a feeling of calligraphy and letting thoughts translated to smooth movement and stay in the thoughts longer than the key stroking mechanism of typing with keyboard. Lets see if i can find the same enjoyment with typing in phone or the keyboard, yes, i can, it s just the feeling of doing something trivial, sequential, rhythmic and closurable.
So the winner is? Within 3 minutes to decide: try online first for a week or so and try to find the suitable routine, sequence, template, and media.
So the first try: online in wordpress post, create time journal category, use phone/laptop, use table template with 1 post = 1 month for the time journal and to do list (from the productivity journal).
TEST CARD
Title
Evening/Night Review and Planning for effective day
Due Date / Duration
July 7, 2017 / 1 week
Step 1 – Hypothesis – Critical: 3
I believe that Evening/Night Review and Planning is effective in analyzing today activities, create adjustment for future activities, and increase productivity for the next day by reducing the start of day task of need to plan.
Step 2 – Test – Cost: 1 – Reliability: 3
To verify, I will
- For 1 week: put the notes in this post (including sleep)
- Review today activity from google calendar and memory
- Write down the journal (format)
- Analyze (Energy: is it working, what increase energy, what decrease energy, right time/cycle),
- Write down Adjust (create rules, routine) & Automate (manual, eliminate) decisions/actions
- Determine next to do for tomorrow
- Put in google calendar
Step 3 – Metric – Time Required: 2
And measure
- Feeling of fulfilled: low 1 – 5 high
- Productivity (more things gets done): low 1 – 5 high
- Usefulness of Adjust and Automation decisions / actions
- Number of Adjust and Automation decisions / actions
Step 4 – Criteria
I am right if at the end of the test
- Feeling of effectiveness >=4
- Productivity >= 4
- Usefulness of Adjust and Automation decisions/actions >=4
LEARNING CARD
Step 1 – Hypothesis
I believe that ==Same with above==
Step 2 – Observation – Reliability: 1
I observed
Factor |
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
Feeling Fulfilled |
3 |
3 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
Productivity |
3 |
3 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
Useful Adjust/Automate |
4 |
3 |
1 |
|
|
|
|
# of Adjust/Automate |
2 |
2 |
0 |
|
|
|
|
Time Journal
Activity |
Time |
Energy Level
(Working, +, -, Feel) |
Cycle (Peak/Rest) |
Adjust & Automate |
Friday, June 30 |
|
|
|
|
Sleep |
1-8, 7h |
Wake up feel ok, bloody phlegm on nose (allergen, not brushing teeth, food?) |
Rest |
Vacuum the bed for allergen |
Create Blog Post |
10-12, 2h |
Feels good, on the track to pattern live, making post make me feel having permanent outcome compared to just thinking dawdling in mind |
Peak |
Will try this for night time and see how it goes |
* EA finalization |
14-18, 4h |
Feel Curious, finished the first version, solving problem is fun |
Peak, after nap |
|
Sat, July 1 |
|
|
|
|
* EA review with Pak Andi |
9-12, 3h |
Deal done |
Peak |
|
* EA mapping |
13-14, 1h |
not so sharp, after lunch with carb (rice+beef yoshinoya) |
? |
Reduce Carb
or add VCO? |
Nap |
14-15, 1h |
planned for 20m, but extend to 1h, not so good after wake |
|
Set to 20m only to really measure effect |
* EA mapping |
15-18, 3h |
still curious |
Peak |
|
* EA mapping |
20-22, 2h |
still curious and successfully create a better problem mapping |
Peak |
|
Sun, July 2 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Not so good for today and high heartbeat, and discomfort on side of neck, probably due to food in Lembur kuring |
|
|
Mon, July 3 |
|
|
|
|
Sleep |
1-8: 7h |
sluggish, high heartbeat |
|
|
Tue, Jul 4 |
1-8, 7h |
sluggish |
|
|
Wed, Jul 5 |
|
|
|
|
Sleep |
1-8, 7h |
normal, bloat in stomach |
|
cover using blanket for avoiding cold |
Walk |
0.25h |
set baseline for today mentality, thankful |
|
|
planning |
0.5h |
|
|
|
SDP resolve ** |
9-12, 14-21, 10h |
most small things solved, having many completed items are fun, frustrated why are the small tasks not get done by others |
|
how to |
|
|
|
|
|
July 8 |
|
|
|
|
sleep |
1-8, 7h |
not good |
|
wake earlier, and the 20mins nap routine |
SDP review |
8-15, 6h |
time too long, back and forth communication |
|
auto mechanism for monitoring and proceeding? |
SDP report |
15-20, 5h |
time too long for creating report |
|
already found the variable “Severity” for next reporting |
Research Surveillance |
23-1, 2h |
good progress |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Notes:
Step 3 – Learnings and Insights – Action Required: 1
From that I learned that
- I need specific time and routine for night review. Just planning next are no good because I am accustomed to think about the main goal first to feel fulfillment, doing planning without that felt worthless
- In general doing planning only without getting the big picture dont work for me in term of feeling effective and productivity increase.
- For adjustment Finding, its useful to be aware of time and think over what to adjust
- Writing in blog have some problem in writing and reading them. The retrieval although trivial, not at ease, got to find the pc, sit there or get phone, sit somewhere, open app, search post, search last content. Considering to use book
- Most of the time, at night I am already feeling very tired and want to wind down, evaluating are tiresome, not enough energy to do it at night. If i want to do this, i need a routine for energy recovery or change the time
Step 4 – Decision and Actions
Therefore, I will
- Continue writing down the activity journal
- Still using the blog though, cause book will also require me to bring the book everywhere
- change the routine for night review to get the effectiveness and productivity
- The time should be fixed 30 to 60 minutes
- Routine for restoring energy
- Shower
- Food/drink intake
- Breathing (recovery routine?)
- Playing little games
- Write down goal and sub goal
- Write down activities
- Evaluate
- Plan for next day: big or detail?
- Put in google calendar