Addicted to Multi-Tasking May 20, 2009
Posted by shwaldman in Family, Fitness, Politics, Society, Technology, Work.Tags: addiction, multi-tasking, podcasts, Running, tracker
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In the past couple of months, I have come to realize that I am addicted to multi-tasking. In some ways I think this is okay. I certainly accomplish more tasks this way. As I write this, I am watching the American Idol finale with my lovely wife. (Oh, and I am charging my Garmin Forerunner 305.) Today, as I took my lunch break, I listened to music as I ran 45 minutes, carrying hand weights – those 45 minutes complete the activity level for our organization’s Spring into Action wellness initiative as well as keep me in the lead for the overall organization in minutes tracked.
I could go on and on. I workout at home, watching hulu.com. I often do yard work and drive to work, listening to podcasts. At work even, I often have podcasts playing the background, drowning out the sound of the cube-farm I am surrounded by. But as you can guess by the fact that I am putting this out there, I have an element of guilt. I may be getting more done, but is the fact that I am doing two or more things at once a bonus or a detraction?
As the addicted one, I don’t think I can give a fair answer. For me, it depends on reason and things I am combining. For example, I don’t multi-task when I am having dinner with my family or playing with the boys… ok, well, I have to keep Ian occupied as I put away laundry last night…. ultimately, I think it often impossible not to multi-task. There is just too much to get done these days!
Spark to My Fitness Regime May 6, 2009
Posted by shwaldman in Fitness, Work.Tags: blog, exercise, Fitness, motivation, nutrition, Social Networking, SparkPeople, tracker
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A couple of weeks ago, our organization started its third “fitness challenge” since I have been there. It is a program from the Wellness Committee that tries to get people into the habit of a little exercise. Since it is already an important part of my life, this program shouldn’t be a big deal. But it has turned out to be an extra motivator to get me doing a little bit each day. The way it works is that people team up in groups of 5-8 to try to keep each other motivated. Each person earns 1 pt for the team for each 25-45 minutes of exercise each day of the week. Of course, it counts anything as exercise so as to be all inclusive, which I think is great.
A couple of weeks ago, there was a extra bonus. If each memeber of the team signed up for SparkPeople the team got bonus points. This site is a lot like Gyminee. But it has a lot more community and tracking functionality. For me, it adds a little competition to keep me motivated… it is like having someone else to answer to. It adds to the organization’s program, reinforcing that other people are looking out for you to keep moving.
In just the first few weeks, I have jumped to the top of the leaderboard for our organization. It is clear that people are not using this site to track their activities, which is fine. But it is a little disappointing. I had hoped the site could keep me motivated by having people to compete against. Yes, there are tons of other teams, but every other team has people completing 4 times the amount of exercise as me, which ironically is similar to the total amount of the 56 people in our the whole organization that have signed up. I can’t really compete with that.
So hopefully, I can find a way to make this a motivational tool – once I got to the top of the leaderboard, it lost it’s power. If I can’t get that power back, this will fall by the way side like lots of other social networking sites.
Book Review: The Levity Effect by A. Gostick and S. Christopher March 20, 2009
Posted by shwaldman in Society, Work.Tags: book review, creative, Levity, Life-Work Balance, management, The Levity Affect
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Note to all managers: Have fun, relax and laugh at work. I was a little disappointmented with this management book. The first 4 or so hours of this book was mostly the authors saying “have fun” with a little bits of companies that implement programs for loosen up their staff.
I can definitely appreciate the things Gostick and Christopher brought to the table in this book. They have worked with lots of relavent and current companies that are known for both their success and their relaxed business environment. But they spent a large portion of the book talking about companies in creative fields, such as advertising and marketing.
In the last hour, the book finally moved into lots of ways to implement levity. The ideas were listed out which makes for tough listening. And the listening of the book was also made more difficult by the straight reading of the book. While I am sure the book was humorous, the narrator (one of the authors) read the words and did not “customize” it as an audio book. It made listening to some sections seem out of place in a book about humor – they should have lossened it up.
I just thought they weren’t practicing what they preached.
What’s your passion? January 23, 2009
Posted by shwaldman in Family, Fitness, Politics, Society, Technology, Work.Tags: Dreams, Excite, Hobbies, Important, Interests, KERA THINK, Passion, podcasts
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This morning I was listening to one of my favorite podcast radio shows, “Think” from KERA radio. Today was an interview with Sir Ken Robinson, Ph.D., author of “The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything” (Viking, 2009). You can listen to it hear: Finding Your Passion MP3. Whenever I hear conversations about “following your passions” it does make me think. I have lots of interests and I am not sure how to stay focused on one or another.
I enjoy my work – how I pay for living expenses. And I am pretty good at it. But as this author suggests, this is not enough to satisfy your needs. I don’t think he said it this way, but I think the question comes down to: If you had to do any job, and didn’t get paid, what would you do? But I wonder if this is a frivolous conversation. We all have lots of jobs that we don’t get paid for. Maybe the conversation should be about balancing your time against things you have to do and things you “love” to do.
Of course, the point of his book is more about finding your passion. What is it you love to do? Please Comment below!
What to do? October 7, 2008
Posted by shwaldman in Family, Society, Work.Tags: Greater Good, Life-Work Balance, Work
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After catching up on TED Talks wonder how you get to be that much of a contributor. Having switched jobs from one that was fast paced, required moving and travel and the like, to one that was less intense, I kind of knew this would happen. I have switched my personal focus away from work toward family and the true life (of life-work balance). Before, I was always busy doing. I know that there was so much I was missing – there was always something to do and I didn’t necessary grow that way either. But now I really have to work to progress. There are still so many things on my to do list, but less at work and more at home… I suppose that only make sense.
But I guess my point is that sometimes it feels like that we are so busy surviving and keeping up with the lists that we aren’t contributing. Watching people on TED really makes one wonder what else we could be contributing. But then I also wonder what affect these people’s talks really have. How many people have heard of XDR-TB? Or how “important” is architecture and art? What benefit are video games helping our world?
Maybe that is the point, to individuals, some of these things are important. We each have to find our own cause. The problem I have is that there seems to be so much suffering in the world that the potential causes to support are endless. Here are some of the things that are important to me:
Ending War, homelessness, hunger, disease, bad politics….
But “life gets in the way.” going to work, taking care of sick kids, enjoying quiet time with the family, taking care of the house, keep myself healthy. They aren’t chores – they are life. I need to figure out a plan or at least a way to plan these things into each day. When I look around, I feel I have so much and I feel conflicted that I am trying to fit more in. How can that be?
Stubbornness, Work and PC Temps October 25, 2006
Posted by shwaldman in Family, Technology, Work.Tags: PC temperature, stubbornness, two year old, work outing
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