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3 September 2020 18:01I really wish I knew how to properly regulate my attention/motivation/energy across a whole day - it continues to be lumpy and disjointed. It's 6pm where I am now, and my husband won't go to bed before 11pm - so that's five hours to fill, five empty hours, so it's my time of night for fighting off the tug of Reddit and Tumblr. I don't have the energy for something more engaging; you can avoid social media to an extent, by ensuring you've got a proper plan for what you'll do instead. You can't just quit without planning the alternatives you'll put in their place.
But I'm tired. I'm out of focus for sewing, or finishing my papier mache or carpentry; I'm not ready to cook; it's too chilly for a walk; and all my books are ebooks now, all my films online films - so swapping to reading or viewing is really a continuation of Being Online as an activity, and this leads me nowhere good in the evenings when I am tired.
Part of the problem, is that my bodyclock says it's time to rest at around 8pm. I've wrestled with my man for years about this, but ultimately we've sort of come to a truce that - as he's the most effective familymember, we need to follow his 11am-11pm bodyclock. If he's too tired to do anything, it causes more problems than if I am. It's an uncomfortable situation, but an unsolvable one. And a contributing factor now is that he plays D&D three times a week, always in the evening, so it is not like we can spend these hours together - at the moment when I become least able to regulate my behaviour towards my goals, I am alone.
So my body is telling me, time to rest, time to rest, and the focus I've managed to summon is dissipating - let me relax, let me release, let me unwind from this tight-leash I keep it on throughout the day. FIve hours is a long time when you can't do anything but lie in bed, half-watching netflix, half-checking reddit. Even little projects which seem mellow and gentle - planting flowers, making doll clothes - actually take quite a bit more energy once you parcel it out into micro-actions and attention, far more than I have now when it's time to curl up in bed and start to sleep.
It's very difficult.
But I'm tired. I'm out of focus for sewing, or finishing my papier mache or carpentry; I'm not ready to cook; it's too chilly for a walk; and all my books are ebooks now, all my films online films - so swapping to reading or viewing is really a continuation of Being Online as an activity, and this leads me nowhere good in the evenings when I am tired.
Part of the problem, is that my bodyclock says it's time to rest at around 8pm. I've wrestled with my man for years about this, but ultimately we've sort of come to a truce that - as he's the most effective familymember, we need to follow his 11am-11pm bodyclock. If he's too tired to do anything, it causes more problems than if I am. It's an uncomfortable situation, but an unsolvable one. And a contributing factor now is that he plays D&D three times a week, always in the evening, so it is not like we can spend these hours together - at the moment when I become least able to regulate my behaviour towards my goals, I am alone.
So my body is telling me, time to rest, time to rest, and the focus I've managed to summon is dissipating - let me relax, let me release, let me unwind from this tight-leash I keep it on throughout the day. FIve hours is a long time when you can't do anything but lie in bed, half-watching netflix, half-checking reddit. Even little projects which seem mellow and gentle - planting flowers, making doll clothes - actually take quite a bit more energy once you parcel it out into micro-actions and attention, far more than I have now when it's time to curl up in bed and start to sleep.
It's very difficult.
