Saturday, April 11, 2020

On my google keep I have a series of flash cards to teach me emotional and psychological good habits.

One of my flash cards is 'analysis paralysis'. Today is my weekend day and even though I got up later than I wanted to today (insomnia), I have a full day pregnant with possibility.

I'm mapping out all of the things I can do, should do, ought to do etc. I ought to do some of my work work for at least 3 hours for example, there's also a nice club night (online) where some dudes on twitch will be hanging out and listening to metal.

I also want to go out and buy a paper, I want to do lots of things and it all intersects in a matrix. A matrix put simply is a bucket full of numbers. It's up to me to organise the bucket so that its best presented.

My flash card on analysis paralysis says something seemingly contradictory: embrace mediocrity and eliminate bad or mediocre choices. I was thinking how that is an exact contradiction in terms, but the ever persistent theologian in me tried to make sense of it. Here's what I think of this contradiction:

Mediocrity is a state. A state of poor decisions with low effort in the execution and low yield in the outcome. Embracing mediocrity means I don't have to go full throttle on everything. If I tried that I might lose the efficiency and successful execution in everything, in so doing I've tried to do everything well but have done everything badly. That's what I need to eliminate. I can embrace mediocrity in the sense that I should work smart, not hard and I should aim for a few things and not a lot. Do them well but not do much is mediocrity in the first sense. But eliminating bad or mediocre decisions in doing quality work.

I'm in day I think 20 of lockdown and I need to think about the things I am appreciative of:


  • Cleaners
  • Shop workers
  • Nurses
  • Healthcare assistants 
  • Hospital porters
  • Filipinos all over the world
  • Mum and dad
  • My family which I still have
  • My colleagues
  • Having a job that still pays me and above average salary yet I still feel I'm underachieving
Anyway I'm going back to being excellent at a few things and overall mediocre. 

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