Just used TaskRatchet to make sure I took a nap today. A+, would recommend. 
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Wow. Just tried this, and it was intense. Pledged a cowardly $1 on fixing an SSL issue for my day job by 4:30pm, and I got it solved at exactly 4:30pm. (Blaming my near-miss on Let’s Encrypt rate limiting.)
Confirmed: TaskRatchet will keep you on task. 
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A new day, a new experiment using TaskRatchet to manage my work:
Will let you know how it goes. 
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And the promised update: Worked great! Even though I was pretty tired today, I finished everything and feel like I had a productive day.
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I’ve decided to go back to planning my days in the morning based on a weekly template. I’m hoping this will help me to be more realistic about my time and commitments.
I’ve scheduled 28 of my 62 goals for archive (if I’ve counted correctly). I’ve included actions for many of these goals in my weekly schedule.
I’ve also created three more goals:
- day-plans to ensure I make a plan for the day every morning based on my template.
- plan-results to ensure I stick to my plan. I’ll enter a decimal between 0 and 1 as a rough estimate of how well I stayed on-plan. I’m allowed to adapt my plan as the day progresses, but I should be following the plan, even if its the changed plan. I’m starting with a rate of 0.8.
- plan-result-reports. IFTTT will post a 1 to this goal every time I post a data point to plan-results. This should ensure I actually do the reporting.
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Oooh does this mean we get templates for TR?
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No, but it’s definitely on my list of features to consider. 
Those 28 goals (minus a couple I decided not to archive) will be gone tomorrow.
Today I started wondering if some of the fatigue I’ve been experiencing is due to evening screen time. So I’m doing an experiment.
- I’ve set 7pm deadlines for all my goals, except a few whose deadlines I don’t actually have to worry about.
- I’ve moved my evening routine checklist from Google Keep to a pocket composition book. This has the advantage of being easier to use, too, since I don’t have to keep unlocking my phone to check items off.
- I took @zedmango’s advice and set my SMS goal to use aggday last to make it more compatible with a non-midnight deadline. In addition, I created a new Android Automate flow that does nothing but post a 0 datapoint to my SMS goal at 1am every morning to reset the goal for the day, so I don’t get credit for yesterday’s post-deadline data if I don’t text someone for the rest of the day.
- I had one goal that I wanted to have the option of doing after 7pm, so I changed it to a plans-style goal, as in, “decide when I’m going to do X by 7pm” instead of “do X by 7pm.”
- I added literally putting my phone out of sight to my evening routine.
We’ll see how it goes!
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What if your phone’s dead at 1am?
Ooh I like this - this might help me with deadlines… but what if you decide and then you don’t do it? Do you delete the data point?
I got a lock box with a timer for this purpose - I can put my phone in and set the timer to any length of time, and I won’t have access to my phone until the timer goes off.
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Yeah, then I’m out of luck. 
But I think I’m willing to take that risk for now. If it becomes an issue I can add it to my scripts I deploy to GCP.
I have a few other goals I do this with. No, I just leave the datapoint. The purpose of these goals is to ensure I create an implementation intention, but it lets me be flexible on exactly how or whether I follow through. Which I see as a feature, since most of the goals I do this with require coordination with my wife, and I don’t control her schedule / desires / etc.
Ooh, that’s super cool. Care to share info on where to get that?
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I got this one:
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My wife and I are doing a weird experiment where we try to make screens less engaging by making them all grayscale. So far we’ve both done this on our Android phones, and I’ve done it on my account on the home computer. I haven’t done it on the work computer, and my wife hasn’t done it on the iPad.
How to Disable (or Enable) Grayscale Mode in Windows 10 | Laptop Mag
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Decided to try to get back into journaling here. 
I’ve been using an autofocus-like system in Notion. I’m recording when I last progressed each row, and I also have fields for adding due dates and snooze dates if needed. I sort such that least-recently progressed rows are at the top, and rows with due dates float above that. I filter out any rows that haven’t yet reached their snoozed date, or whose status field is set to “done” or “never.”
I work from top to bottom, updating date progressed as I go. Progressing an entry could be as much as completing it (at which point I mark it as “done”) or as little as adding a couple notes to the document. I’m beeminding time spent using the system.
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I’ve been really enjoying using Atom, an Android app for beginners to mindfulness meditation. I’ve found it to be extremely accessible, and have felt like it’s already been helpful in lifting my mood and helping me to cope with anxiety, to the point that I’m a little worried what I’ll do when I get to the end of the 21 day course.
My biggest challenge recently has been getting to bed at a time that works for my body. It’s easy for me to get sucked into YouTube at the end of the day as a mood correction coping strategy, and of course, the more tired I am, the easier it is to fall into that trap, which can quickly turn into a cycle. I still don’t have a good idea of how I’m going to solve this, though I have been experimenting with rearranging my activities a bit, like doing the mindfulness meditation exercise in the evening instead of the morning as a way to help myself wind down and get into a calm mood without resorting to counterproductive behaviors.
I’ve decided to go back to beeminding getting to bed on time. It’s a simple hard-core get-to-bed by my bedtime goal, with a do-more rate of 1 per day, and fineprint that if I’m not at home derailing is not legit, because this goal shouldn’t prevent me from going to events and hanging out with people. Hoping this will help me to maintain better energy levels.
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This is brilliant. It’s almost certainly what people expect when they first encounter the current ‘supporter’ feature.
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Beeminding bedtime has been working really well. I’ve been getting to bed at a good time whenever I’m at home, and I’ve defined the goal such that derailing due to being away from home is not legit.
I’m also beeminding screen time outside of work now. My rate is 2.5 hours / day, autoratched down to 4 hours of buffer. I’m only beeminding dedicated screen time, so quickly checking my phone is not tracked. This has really helped me be a lot more intentional about spending my time constructively, on-screen and off, and has already improved my sense of well-being significantly.
I have a focus script that I use to track time spent focusing deeply at work. It tells my colleagues on Slack I’m focusing, activates focus mode blocking distracting websites and apps (including Gmail and Slack), and, when the script terminates, posts the duration to my focus Beeminder goal.
Recently I added a whitenoise command so that in addition the script immediately starts playing white noise. I feel like this has significantly improved my ability to focus by giving me an auditory queue that it’s time to focus and blocking out many real-world distractions that otherwise would have gotten through, including my my phone beeping and buzzing. I’ve felt a significant improvement in my ability to get and stay in flow since adding this feature.
I created a Beeminder rsvp goal for RSVPing to events on Meetup.com. I really need to develop more community and find real-life friends now that I’m fully vaccinated, and this goal is giving me the extra push to go out and do it. It’s already proven successful. The current rate is 1 RSVP per week.
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Through Meetup.com I found a fantastic volleyball group that has quickly become the highlight of my week, and after attending three events I’ve already made friends with two super interesting people.
The volleyball group has reduced the pressure I’ve felt to continue trying out new Meetup groups, so I archived my rsvp goal. Today, however, I remembered that I’ve been trying to schedule long breaks instead of archiving goals outright, so I restarted the rsvp goal with 30 days of buffer to prompt me to revisit it then.
At my therapist’s suggestion, I’ve started journaling my headache and anxiety levels. I’m using bearable.app and it seems like a great tool. It lets you customize exactly what you want to track, and when you’d like to have notifications prompt you to report. I’m using the “Gratitude,” “Mood,” “Symptom score,” “Factors,” and “Sleep” reporting sections. I’ve set it up to send me two notifications, one in the morning and one in the evening, and I’ve also set up two Beeminder goals corresponding to the notifications to ensure I actually report consistently. Most of the graphs and analysis tools in the app require that you pay for premium which I’m currently not doing. But if you don’t want to pay it includes CSV export for free.
My screen goal for limiting screen time has been working very well. Having the goal continues to help me be more intentional about how I spend my time on screens, and having a limit helps preserve space for healthy analog behaviors that otherwise would get pushed out of my life, such as housework, exercise, calling my family, and time in nature. I’ve scheduled a change in rate from 2.5 hours / day to 1.75.
Yesterday for the first time I met with a coworker for a “mastermind”-type recurring video call. We created a Trello board and created cards for projects, goals, life areas, etc, that we each want to make progress on, labeling each card as either his or mine. Then, during our weekly meeting, we plan to take turns telling each other what we’re doing on each one, and adding a short summary comment of what we discussed to each card. The meetings aren’t about forcing each other to make progress, but instead just a way to ensure we’re both consistently thinking about how to move forward on things that are important to do so, and get feedback and encouragement on a regular basis. Our first call was super positive, and I’m enthusiastic about the potential of these calls to be very helpful long-term.
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I really like this strategy. It’s much more rewarding and engaging that way. I’m not sure if you work it like this, but it reminds me of the personal sharing in AA meetings in which others aren’t supposed to “give advice” on what you said. It’s just an opportunity for each person to check in and give their own statement, which creates a very safe space for staying engaged, which is important in the long run.
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Right. This is super new and informal, so not really any strict rules. I think my coworker and I have enough of a trust relationship that too much advice shouldn’t be an issue, but, yes, the purpose is definitely not to tell the other person what to do.
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