Noisy Deadlines

100daystooffload

This year I attended the GTD Summer Camp in Denmark for the first time! I first heard about this event on the Getting Things Done® podcast from Vital Learning. It had been on my Someday/Maybe list for a couple of years, and I finally made it happen this summer.

And because it was in Denmark, in a beautiful location, I stayed a couple more days and made it my mini summer solo retreat.

First of all, I've always loved conferences! Whether it's a professional congress or a book-related one (like Scintillation), I love the chance to nerd out about a topic. And the paradox is, I'm a full-on introvert who avoids social gatherings… So how does that work? Well, the good thing about conferences or similar events is that there's a program with a schedule, and I love that structure. A clear agenda reduces my anxiety from uncertainty and makes it easier to mentally prepare for each session or interaction. Also, I love learning! And I feel way more comfortable interacting when I’m surrounded by like-minded people.

And I’ve gotta say, the community at the GTD Summer Camp was phenomenal! Here is a short video of the event.

The GTD methodology has been such huge contributor to my life and wellbeing, and it was great to share that feeling with other GTD'ers.

I haven't met too many people in my professional or personal life who use GTD. Most of my discussions and interactions around it have happened online over the years. So the GTD Summer Camp was like stepping into a real-world manifestation of those virtual conversations. There was a deep sense of mutual understanding and intentionality. I loved diving straight into sharing workflows, troubleshooting systems, and even geeking out over our favorite capture tools or weekly review rituals. For the first time, I met people I’d only ever known through the online GTD Forum community.

And also, something unique happened: I met David Allen himself, the author of the GTD methodology. He is such a gracious and kind human being. He recently mentioned the GTD Summer Camp on his substack and it really resonated with me when he shared that he is a introvert too but that cool things can happen when we step outside our comfort zones.

I enjoyed all the sessions! Since several community sessions were happening at the same time, I had to make some tough choices, but every one I attended was worth it. Some of my favorites included GTD and Neurodiversity, the GTD for Teams workshop, GTD and AI, GTD Story (a personal account of a retreat), and GTD and Higher Horizons. There was also a fascinating Q&A with David Allen and a session on the history and origins of GTD. One experience I especially appreciated was the Walk & Talk, a beautifully simple and mindful activity where you pair up with someone and connect while going for a walk together. I had the honor to walk with Lars Rothschild Henriksen (from the Vital Learning podcast).

The whole experience left me energized and more committed than ever to refining my system. I came away with new ideas, fresh perspectives, and a renewed sense of community. I also found GTD buddies to keep in touch with after the Summer Camp.

What made it even more special was how recharging it felt. It wasn't overwhelming, it was the perfect balance: interesting topics in an inspiring and warm enough space to build real connections.

And when the event was over, I stayed there for a few more days just to reflect, relax and recharge. But that will be a topic for another post.

All in all, this experience reminded me how powerful it is to connect with people who share the same values and tools for navigating life. Another highlight for me was doing the Weekly Review together with everyone on the last day. I’m already looking forward to next year’s camp!

—-

Post 93/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #GTD #Productivity

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  1. The Day the World Stops Shopping: How Ending Consumerism Saves the Environment and Ourselves by J.B. MacKinnon, 384p: I loved the questions this book raised. It is a fascinating look at what might happen if people stopped buying things. I really liked the way it asks deep questions about our world today: how we’re using more energy-efficient technologies but still consuming so much that global carbon emissions keep rising. The book covers topics like planned obsolescence and simple living and offers some ideas for change. But it also shows that many of these solutions are tough to apply on your own. It’s a thoughtful and important read that makes you think differently about the way we live. And it made me feel even more confident about the minimalist choices I’ve already made in my own life.

  2. How to Do Things: Productivity for the Productivity-Challenged by David Cain, 50p: A concise and practical guide inspired by the Pomodoro Technique.  This simplified approach makes it easy to dive in and get started, especially for anyone feeling overwhelmed by productivity systems.  Rather than focusing on organizing tasks, it emphasizes taking action, making it an ideal add-on to any method you're already using. I've always loved the Pomodoro Technique, and I appreciated the fresh perspective this book brings. 

  3. Any Duke in a Storm (Daring Dukes #4) by Amalie Howard, 402p: This was a fun ride. I loved the main character: a divorced countess-turned-British-spy hiding in plain sight as the infamous smuggler called “Bonnie Bess”. She’s bold, mature, and full of surprises. The mix of mystery, travel, and adventure kept things exciting, and I totally enjoyed seeing her navigate life on the high seas. I also appreciated the diverse cast: the hero (Raphael) has Caribbean and French heritage, with roots in Trinidad and Tobago, and Lisbeth is demiromantic and pansexual. 

  4. The Princess Stakes (Daring Dukes #1) by Amalie Howard, 329p: This one just wasn’t for me. It mixes second-chance romance with an enemies-to-lovers twist, and that combo didn’t quite click for me. While the cast is diverse the story didn’t hold my interest the way I hoped. I read this one because I loved the #4 in the series (which I read first) and I thought I would try out the other books in this series.

—

Post 92/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #readinglist #books #reading

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • 🙌 I meant to write these notes three days ago, but I just didn’t have the bandwidth or the energy. I spent a few days in that weird post-travel fog—half-awake, half-dreaming, and fully incapable of coherent thought. After a restorative weekend, I’m finally starting to catch my breath.
  • ⛵I attended my very first GTD Summer Camp last week and honestly, I’m still buzzing from the experience. It was one of those rare gatherings where everything just clicked: the people were warm and welcoming, the sun was shining over Denmark, and the sessions left me feeling lit up with inspiration. I’m so grateful to be part of this community!
  • 🤗 I met David Allen himself and his wife Kathryn!
  • 🤗 And I got to chat with Lars Rothschild Henriksen and Morten Røvik from the Vital Learning podcast!
  • 💜 I met friends from the Getting Things Done® Forums in real life! It was so great to connect with them! I will write a separate blog post about the experience.
  • 🥐 I became slightly obsessed with those poppy-seed pastries (aka tebirkes), they are dangerously delicious! It was my breakfast treat.
  • 🏝️ Once the GTD Summer Camp wrapped up, I stayed in Denmark for a few extra days just being a tourist and embracing some much-needed solo time. I read by the beach listening to the sound of wind and waves, I walked along the shore feeling the breeze, I got on a bike ride to discover the historic Borreby Manor and took my time discovering the charming town of Skælskør. Each day I walked to town for a slow lunch by the harbour and ice cream (lactose free). The weather was simply perfect: warm sun, cool breeze, never above 23°C.
  • 😌 Those quiet days were something special. With no one to answer to and nowhere I had to be, I gave myself full permission to move at my own pace. In that stillness, I rediscovered how nourishing it can be to simply be. I forgot about deadlines. For the first time in a long while, I had space to think slowly, to let my mind wander without feeling rushed. It was a gentle, much-needed pause from the noise.
  • 📁 While I was there, and with the GTD Summer Camp discussions still on my mind, I reorganized my GTD folder structure on my computer. I had some duplication and too many folders, so that was nice to do. But I had other ideas and projects that I want to tackle next. Higher Horizons, I’m looking at you!
  • ✈️ My flight out of Copenhagen was delayed by five hours due to some unexpected maintenance on the aircraft’s exterior. That delay meant I missed my connection, and suddenly I found myself awake for… what, 24 hours straight? (maybe less, but it felt that long …). By the time I made it back to Canada, I was completely jet-lagged and sleep deprived. I only started feeling better today, as I am writing this.
  • 🖥️ I got back to work into a new office space! A long-awaited part of the renovations finally wrapped up and now I have space and quiet. I’m still making small tweaks and adjusting to the new layout, but already it’s making a big difference in how I work and focus.

—-

Post 91/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #weeknotes

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • 🧪 I did some blood work to test out allergies. Now I’m waiting for the results, I wonder what the test will show. I know I have lactose intolerance, and that when I was very little, I had an allergic reaction to eggs, that eventually went away. Nowadays I feel like I start sneezing after eating, so it could be something related to my digestive system. We’ll see.
  • 😷 Talking about allergies, I took the train to Montreal this week and the air quality was not great in the area because of the fires going on the west prairies. I felt my sneezing and stuffy nose symptoms getting worse throughout the day and I had to take antihistamine every 4 hours to get it to a manageable state.
  • ⭐ Which leads me to Scintillation 6 in Montreal! Yes, it’s the third year I attend this event and it’s always great to listen to intriguing panels and meet some authors. It’s a very unique conference: it’s small and cozy. You can never tell if the person sitting beside you is that famous author! Everybody mingles together, it’s great! I saw Ruthanna Emrys, Ada Palmer, Jo Walton, Jon Evans and so many more. Now I have a big list of books added to my TBR.
  • 🙌 Leading up to this event, I had a crazy week at work, with things I had to finalize before the trip and that had an impact on my first day of vacations. I almost couldn’t disconnect from worries on the first day, and the allergy symptoms did not help much. On the first evening of the event, I actually left a little earlier to get some rest at the hotel because I was so tired. And by the next morning I finally felt I was stepping into vacation mode.
  • 🧱 I wandered through Old Montreal without a specific destination, simply letting myself get lost in the moment. I saw that the piece of the Berlin Wall is still standing in the same spot where I first saw it 11 years ago.
  • 🧘‍♀️ I used my brand-new foldable yoga mat for the first time. It worked pretty well, it fits in my carry on perfectly, and I put it on the floor of the hotel room with a towel underdeath. That way I could do my morning routine without fail. It has become one of my essential travel items now.
  • 📒 I met a person during the event who was taking notes in a Supernote Nomad device. He let me try it out, and I really enjoyed the writing feel and its size. I also like that the design allows you to replace the battery and expand the memory with a micro-SD card. I’ve thought about getting a Remarkable device before, but the price and the subscription model are not attractive to me. This Supernote seems like a good alternative, with an Android OS. I’ll do some digging.
  • 📖 I stopped reading a book for my book club: Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames. I got as far as 50% but I wasn't enjoying it. I thought it would be something different, but it didn’t click for me. The overly masculine tone with crude jokes, heroism bravado and this heavy “bro” dynamic wasn’t working for me.
  • I started reading Ada Palmer’s Too Like the Lightning. It’s the opposite of the book I mentioned above: it’s dense and complex and intricately written. I feel ready for something like this now.

—-

Post 90/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #weeknotes

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • 🏠 We had gutters installed in our house!
  • ✅I had a moment that I was second-guessing my to-do list and then I thought about changing tools again. My idea was to move to MS To Do, but I also wanted to do a full capture minds-sweep before that. Which I did, and that was enough for me to trust my Nirvana lists again. So, the issue was not the tool itself but my (lack of) consistency in clarifying and processing what was in front of me. It was just me skipping my weekly review or letting my inbox pile up. Great reminder to reset instead of reinventing!
  • 🔎 It’s been crazy at work again and in weeks like these I really don’t want to look more at computers after I get back home. My evenings are more for exercise, enjoying dinner and reading.
  • ✈️ I’m excited to take some days off this month! I have two trips planned!
  • 🥈 Me and my partner completed the Run for Women – 10K! It was cold (8C) and there was a slow drizzle during half of the run. We almost gave up, but we stayed and finished it! Note to self: always bring a rain jacket!
  • 🙌 I really thought I woudln’t have the energy today to write this week notes post, but, hey, here it is!

📌Around the Internet:

A sunny Spring afternoon

—-

Post 89/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #weeknotes

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

This month was all about high-stakes space adventures, clever humour, some espionage, and romance. In other words, delightful escapism!

  1. Full Speed to a Crash Landing (Chaotic Orbits #1) by Beth Revis, 192p: Super fun sci-fi novella. Fast-paced with heist-like intrigue, and a bit of romance. Ava is such a strong and independent female character, I enjoyed her machinations.

  2. The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz, 342p: This book is extremely ambitious, with long time spans and touching a variety of topics: environmentalism, capitalism, terraforming, access to public services, personhood, gender and sexuality, identity, and corporate greed. It's super creative and has lots of sense of humour interspersed with serious issues. It's truly diverse with bots, animals and non-human species all living together in this terraformed planet (Sask-E). There are cyborg cows, moose, naked mole rats and sentient trains. I didn't like the execution too much; I couldn't connect to many of the characters. It felt like it could have been three books: there was a lot going on!

  3. Defy or Defend (Delightfully Deadly #2) by Gail Carriger, 264p: A quick adventure with espionage: Dimity (spy code name Honey Bee) is assigned to fix the Nottingham vampire hive, which is descending into madness. Her bodyguard is Sir Crispin Bontwee, who always had a thing for her. It's full of Gail Carriger's classy humour involving tea, curtains, and extravagant redecoration of a crumbling vampire house.

  4. How to Steal a Galaxy (Chaotic Orbits #2) by Beth Revis, 122p: I loved this continuation of “Full Speed to a Crash Landing”. Fast-paced space heist with Ada Lamarr doing her thing: misdirection and deception. She's great! All the action happens at this charity gala hosted by the Museum of Intergalactic History on Rigel-Earth. The auction items include Tutankhamun’s tomb chest, a brick from the Great Wall of China, and even the original Apollo 11 Mission Control red rotary telephone. There are twits, smart banter, and enemies-to-lovers tension. I immediately jumped to the next in the series.

  5. Last Chance to Save the World (Chaotic Orbits #3) by Beth Revis, 176p: This one follows directly after the events of the second book, starting inside Ada's spaceship. She has Rian White with her, and we still don't know for sure what Ada is after or what she really wants to do. I love the mystery and the twist and turns in this series. It was great to know Ada's mother and her pigeons; she is a badass! It's hard to say more without spoilers, but I really liked Ada and Rian's dynamic and how she masterly deceives everybody (including Rian).

  6. Notorious Pleasures (Maiden Lane #2) by Elizabeth Hoyt, 391p: I wanted to get back to this series because I really enjoyed the worldbuilding in the 1700s and the diverse characters. Lady Hero Batten, a dutiful daughter, is engaged with a dull man, the Marquis of Mandeville. On the ball when their engagement is announced, Lady Hero finds the Marquis' brother, Lord Griffin Remmington, in a very indiscrete situation involving a married lady. Hero helps both to escape being discovered by said married lady's husband. Griffin is a notorious rake, but he has a thing for Lady Hero, and so we have the reformed rake and enemies-to-lovers trope. Lady Hero is also helping to build the new orphanage for the St. Giles children, which connects to the previous book storyline. We continue to see a glimpse of the mysterious Ghost of St. Giles. I'm still intrigued by this mystery, and I will continue this series just to find out!

—-

Post 88/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #readinglist #books #reading

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • ✍️ Lately, I haven’t been journaling as much. I like to write in the mornings, before I commute to work, but these days I’ve been using that time to tackle some personal tasks that I don’t have the energy for after work. It is a bit ironic, with the longer daylight hours here in the northern hemisphere, you’d think I’d have more time and energy. Instead, summer always wears me down. With daylight stretching until 9 p.m., I tend to stay up later, but my wake-up time hasn’t changed. By 6 p.m., I feel completely drained.
  • ✏️ I’ve been craving for quiet time, and I wrote a reply to one of Joel’s blog post about boredom and focus.
  • 📖 I finished reading “The Terraformers” by Annalee Newitz and had an interesting discussion with my book club. This book has great ideas and cool stuff, but it was bit lacking in the execution.
  • 📞I called my mom on Mother's Day, and we talked about a book she’s reading: “The Anxious Generation” by Jonathan Haidt. I also want to read this book; it’s on my hold list at the library.
  • 📺 I finished watching “The Rings of Power” Season 2. Even though the timeline is all messed up in this series (compared to the books) I enjoyed the show. I viewed as an alternate history of Middle Earth. I loved the dwarves!
  • 🤑 So, I watched “The Rings of Power” on Amazon Prime with a free trial, but wow, what is going on with all those ads? I got through the show, but it was painful to have to watch the number of ads interrupting it! I canceled the subscription before I got charged. Now, I need a break just to recover from the overwhelming ad overload. So frustrating!
  • 🧩 We finished the Iron Maiden puzzle! It was not so difficult because it’s basically 20 mini puzzles in one, with lots of text (the name of the band and album titles) that made it easy to group the pieces together. I had fun putting it together! Now I need to frame it.
  • 📕 I needed some quick win short book, so I’m reading this sci-fi novella: How to Steal a Galaxy by Beth Revis. It’s fast paced with a strong female character in a crazy heist. I’m loving it.
  • 🎮 I had a long weekend, so I played Stardew Valley in an afternoon. It was nice to get back to my little farm and going through winter. I’ve finally upgraded to a steel axe and now I can chop down hardwood. I’ve also built a guest house. Now I need to upgrade my pickaxe.

📽️ I watched videos and I actually put them on a list to share here:

—-

Post 87/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #weeknotes

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

I am still thinking about focus and attention spans and boredom. I read Joel’s post: The constant need for a source of entertainment and that got me thinking even more. I loved that he starts talking about this time in his childhood with no technology around, and he wandered around the fields, playing with bottle caps and imagining they were spaceships (I also loved The Jetsons! 🙌).

He asks himself these questions:

Why would I wash the dishes without watching a video at the same time? Why would I fold my clothes without listening to a podcast too? Why would I have lunch without scrolling away on social media? Why would I go outside without carrying my phone at all times?

And then he asks:

Why would I not try, though?

To me, there are different layers to these questions:

  • True multitasking (doing two cognitively demanding tasks at once) isn’t something we can actually do. We can’t read a text and listen to a podcast at the same time, these are conflicting cognitive efforts. Even when we think we are multitasking, we are not effectively processing information.
  • Multitasking without cognitive conflicts: we can, however, combine two tasks that use different cognitive resources and don’t compete for the same type of attention. For example: listening to a podcast (passive audio input) while folding laundry or doing dishes.

This reminds me of the book “Deep Work” by Cal Newport, where he argues that the ability to focus intensely is a skill that must be trained. His advocates on training ourselves to be able to focus so we can better perform cognitively demanding tasks. But even if we start having distraction-free “focus” sessions every day to train ourselves, we will struggle if we can’t free our minds from a dependence on distractions.

Cal recommends training our brains to tolerate boredom. Habits like constantly checking our phones or jumping between tabs, condition us to avoid boredom and seek novelty. This damages our capacity for deep, focused work.

My concern when I see younger people constantly seeking distractions is that they completely lost their ability to have one moment, any moment in a quiet state without looking at a screen or having something in their ears. And I guess I wouldn’t be too surprised if all this multitasking were done exclusively in their leisure times. But seeing them doing that while they work, for 8 hours a day, that’s concerning.

Personally, I do listen to podcasts while doing dishes or cleaning the house. I even save favorite episodes to listen to at the gym, as an incentive to go. But I don’t listen to 8 hours of podcasts or watch videos on the background while I’m at work, doing cognitive efforts.

So, it’s NOT about ALWAYS doing ONE thing at a time. If we avoid pairing tasks that interfere with each other, like reading emails (language processing) with listening to a podcast (also language-heavy), we should be okay.

That said, I think Cal Newport is right: if we are constantly in this distracted fully excited state all the time, we can’t slow down anymore, even if we want to.

I think that with the amount of instant stimulation we carry in our pockets today, it’s way harder to even realize that we are in that state. Some people might not even remember (or know) what it feels like to be calm, quiet, and simply present—just observing the world or listening to their own thoughts.

And it’s a challenge for all of us; we are all being bombarded with an excess of information and entertainment. I noticed a shift in my ability to sit down and focus on reading a book a couple of years ago when I was still using the main social media apps (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram). I believe that deleting all those accounts four years ago helped me get back to enjoy reading again and embracing boredom sometimes.

I have been curating my online consumption patterns for quite a while now, and this post summarizes a bit my feelings about feeling hacked by the online world.

Anyway, thanks Joel for sharing your thoughts!

—-

Post 86/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #NoisyMusings #internet #attentionresistance

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

  • 👟 It has become warm enough to go for runs outside!

    1. Apr 25 – 4.56km (pace 7:02 min/km)

    2. May 02 – 6.6km (pace 7:04 min/km)

    3. May 04 – 7.14km (pace 6:38 min/km)

  • 🚶‍♀️‍➡️ I'm also doing more walks outdoors which is great after 8 hours stuck in an office with no windows and in those tiny cubicles.

  • 🏢 The renovations at the office are still ongoing, and I can't wait to have my proper office space again! I hate the tiny cubicles situation. It will probably be done in a month or so, fingers crossed.

  • 🛋️ We've installed some shelves in our living room.

  • 📺 I'm watching “The Rings of Power” Season 2. I only watch it to see the dwarves, they are great!

  • 📅 I'm using Cal Newport's Time Block Planner again. I have stopped using it for a few weeks, trying to use Outlook instead. But I prefer doing my daily planning on paper.

  • ✅ The Nirvana app had some updates recently, and the biggest one was that all the interfaces (web, iOS, Android, Windows) are exactly the same now. I liked that now there are color themes, and I switched from the dark theme to the customizable colored one (dark blue is my favorite right now).

  • ✏️ I wrote some thoughts about attention and how I feel so different from younger people nowadays.

  • 📖 I finished reading this amazing sci-fi novella by Beth Revis: “Full Speed to a Crash Landing”. I absolutely loved it! I already got the second one from the library.

  • 📖 I started reading “The Terraformers” by Annalee Newitz for my local Bookclub and it is great!

  • 🧩 I started another puzzle. This one is a collage of all Iron Maiden album covers!

📌 Interesting reads I’ve come across these days:

—-

Post 85/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #weeknotes

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.

I currently work with four colleagues who are between 15 to 20 years younger than me. They're great people, and I get along well with all of them. But recently, I’ve started to notice a clear generation gap. When they talk about things they see online—like YouTube trends, Instagram memes, or TikTok videos—I often find myself completely lost. I don’t recognize the references, and while they laugh, I realize I’m missing the context.

It’s funny, because when I was their age, I was the tech-savvy one. I was way more into computers and the internet than most of my peers.

The other day, we were chatting at lunch, and they mentioned that they CAN’T sit through a full-length movie without also using their phones, tablets, or even playing a game at the same time. They told me they just can’t focus on a single activity. There always has to be something else happening in the background, or they get bored. That completely blew my mind.

I asked them if it’s the same when they’re working, and they said yes. They often need extra stimulation while they work—whether it’s a podcast, a video, a TV show, or a documentary playing in the background. 😱 It reminded me of something I heard on Cal Newport’s Deep Questions podcast, where he described this behavior as “stimuli stacking.” That seems to describe exactly what they’re doing.

I told them I’m the opposite. I need quiet and focus to be productive. The only thing I can handle while working is music, and even then, it has to be a playlist I know well. Familiar songs become a kind of soothing background noise. Instrumental music works too, but anything with new lyrics or surprises will throw me off, especially if I’m doing mentally demanding work. Only during repetitive or mechanical tasks can I manage listening to a podcast, and even then, it has to be one I’m used to.

So, I noticed that this need for multiple sources of stimulation seems most common among people in their 20’s. I have other team members who are in their mid 30’s, and they’re more like me. They say they struggle to concentrate if something like a YouTube video is playing in the background. And they can watch a full-length movie without distractions.

Another thing I notice is that my younger colleagues will complete a task super-fast, they just want to get it done. And then I revise their work and point out things that they’ve missed or mistakes they’ve made. To me all these little errors are because they don’t take the time to reflect on what they’re doing, they don’t slow down, they don’t plan ahead. It could be just because they are young in the field, and they are still learning. But when I think about myself early in my career, I always took the time to read everything and plan how I would approach that task. I always take my time and focus on the details to understand the best way to complete an interior partitions take-off, for example.

It seems like this shift is generational. People who grew up in the 2000s were deeply shaped by the infinite amount of content and stimulation. Our patterns of attention and focus have really changed in the past few years, and now I’m really starting to see how those changes are showing up in my everyday work life.

I wonder if that’s happening everywhere, and if people in their 40’s like me are noticing the change.

—-

Post 84/100 of 100DaysToOffload challenge (Round 2)!

#100DaysToOffload #100Days #NoisyMusings #internet #attentionresistance

Thoughts? Discuss... if you have a Write.as account or Reply by email

By Noisy Deadlines Minimalist in progress, nerdy, introvert, skeptic. I don't leave without my e-reader.