I was stressed out over the weekend because I've had a cold (just a cold!) for a week (everyone else in the household sneezed for a day and was fine, so I guess I'm special) and that meant a lot more time off over the holidays than I was expecting, and I wanted to hit the ground running today. So last night, I cleared out my work inbox and rejiggered my open task list to have clearly designated tasks for each day this week, making sure to leave room for any additional tasks that come in as the week goes on.

Today I was able to start work right away after the morning round of meetings, did all my designated tasks, and completed the last one 15 minutes before the end of my work day. I even had time for breakfast, lunch, and "tea" (usually actual socializing over hot beverages, but there's construction happening in our main room at the moment, so I went into J's room and ate a bit of chocolate and called it good enough). And I did good work without rushing, because I knew what I had to do and knew everything else could wait.

I feel sort of irritated that this worked, because it's exactly the sort of thing that well-meaning people advise one to do if one is struggling with one's workload—divide big tasks into small pieces, do one thing at a time, work smarter not harder, etc.—and I hate well-meaning advice from well-meaning people because it's so often totally wrong for my actual brain and situation. But uh. This time it wasn't. Huh.

(And then I also feel irritated with myself for not trying this sooner.)

As soon as I started planning the next day's tasks so I could hit the ground running, I realized I was doing "spend five minutes outlining the next scene" from Rachel Aaron's 2k to 10k method, so I decided to see how I could apply her other two pieces of advice by evaluating when and how I work and looking for ways to boost my enthusiasm. I actually did the evaluation last month and realized that I do my best work in the afternoons, using my laptop in bed, with minimal interruption, so I blocked out two hours every afternoon for head-down intensive work time and immediately started doing more and better editing—my boss actually PM'd me to ask "What clicked? This is a huge improvement". I also do more and better work when I get enough sleep, so I continue to refine my bedtime protocols. As for enthusiasm, I'm driven by relationships and encouraged by success, so I remind myself of nice things other people have said about me and my work, sign into meetings a little early to chat with coworkers, and save small quick tasks to do when I need the boost of checking something off. I hit a slowdown after lunch today, and doing a bit of data entry got me back in the groove.

Work isn't writing. But I'm the same person when I'm working that I am when I'm writing, and I know a lot about my writing process, so it's interesting to see how transferable that process is. If I get backed up on tasks, I remind myself that I get to edit my outline. If I need a jumpstart, I set a 25-minute timer and ask coworkers to do work sprints with me. It's working better than I expected.