Published: Sat 11 May 2024
By Ofer Yehuda
In Life .
Originally I intended to write about a physics problem I did today, but then this turned into more of a journal thing, so feel free to skip it.
More thoughts about sabbatical
After another week, a recurring thought that is troubling me is my productivity. I question myself again and again whether today was a good day. For example, today I spent the majority of the day studying physics, but what I did in practice was solve a couple of exercises, read a section in the mechanics book (about 5 pages). Interspersed within were youtube breaks, checking the news. Now, I don't even know if that is a good throughput, but subjectively I finished with mixed feelings, because on one hand I spent most of the day "studying", but on the other hand I didn't feel very focused.
Some of my urge to plan (which goes un-acted upon) comes from this feeling: if only I would plan the day and what I expect to achieve, plan the week and what I expect to achieve, then I could decouple the decision making from the laziness of the moment that haunts my decisions "in the moment", and have some expectation which I could work against. If it would too much, then I would know to set my standard lower. But what stops me from planning? there's definitely some emotional aversion; it's hard. It also always seems like there's nothing to plan. Maybe that's just a fallacy.
I guess I do plan on a very elementary level, which is simply to write in my journal each morning what my intentions for the day are, like study physics, train this and that. Even this simple action has a positive effect - it seems to increase the chance of me being productive.
Maybe I need to remember that if I'm unhappy during this period then it isn't worth it. I'm not talking about working hard, working hard is okay. But since I am not trying to save humanity then...
Another thing I thought trying was to decide that this week I'll work harder. Last week was very chill, some work, interspersed with yoga and surfing, and a lot of dead time. I wanna see what happens when I'm more driven, would I feel better about myself? The trick is to do that without sacrificing most of my other daily goals. It's very easy to go single-minded on something and ignore everything else, but it expect it will bring it back to the same situation of feeling unhappy and frustrated. Again, planning is probably helpful here.
Just to make it clear: the reason I'm droning on and on about planning is because I'm not a planner. I've always gone by whim, or were totally engaged in something in a way that didn't require balancing of many things. This is why it's a skill I wish to further develop.
One idea I saw while search for blogs about sabbaticals was to look specifically for local github projects which I find interesting and contact the maintainers. A similar idea is to contact research labs, explain my situation and ask if they have anything to offer. This could nudge me out of my comfort zone and also offer some social activity and interesting work.
Finally, something to keep my eye own: friends, social stuff, cool adventures, read non-technical books. Balance is important!