Yeah, that is fairly consistent with how I’ve been feeling. It’s tricky because you have a huge backlog of things on the hypothetical to-do list.
I’m reminded of an essay I read concerning complex systems and how complexity grows in functional software — the essay used the phrase “habitability” to convey the idea of software that is functional and usable even as it grows. In practice, this means nailing down your core functional requirements and starting with that, adding more features in a modular manner that aims to avoid messing up that core functionality.
What this looks like applied to my agenda problem is that my backlog is weeks if not months of work for multiple people to get on top of, and I can’t pause my life in the interim. Even getting a thorough list of the tasks in the backlog is too overwhelming a task for me at present, in part because new tasks keep coming from just existing. In the past when I have felt swamped like this, I did a big blitz through and got my life in order, but the backlog blob is too large to do that. Realistically, if I can’t give myself a proper clean slate like I usually would, I need to give myself a virtual clean slate so I can at the very least stop adding to the backlog.
I know this is what I need to do, but it’s very easy to become too overwhelmed to do anything. I know what I need to do, I just need to have the fortitude to start small and ignore the backlog for a while. Tell you what, I’m going to try and set a super basic agenda thing up today or tomorrow, so I can capture incoming tasks or notes. I’m going to try and tackle this like I would a software project, which means trying my best to avoid unnecessary complexity, like often happens when I try to consider the backlog blob. Watch this space, I guess :P
Thanks for the prod. I know you didn’t say much and I mostly talked myself into this, but sometimes that’s what’s needed when you’re wise enough to give great advice to yourself, but foolish enough to not take aforementioned great advice.
Yeah, that is fairly consistent with how I’ve been feeling. It’s tricky because you have a huge backlog of things on the hypothetical to-do list.
I’m reminded of an essay I read concerning complex systems and how complexity grows in functional software — the essay used the phrase “habitability” to convey the idea of software that is functional and usable even as it grows. In practice, this means nailing down your core functional requirements and starting with that, adding more features in a modular manner that aims to avoid messing up that core functionality.
What this looks like applied to my agenda problem is that my backlog is weeks if not months of work for multiple people to get on top of, and I can’t pause my life in the interim. Even getting a thorough list of the tasks in the backlog is too overwhelming a task for me at present, in part because new tasks keep coming from just existing. In the past when I have felt swamped like this, I did a big blitz through and got my life in order, but the backlog blob is too large to do that. Realistically, if I can’t give myself a proper clean slate like I usually would, I need to give myself a virtual clean slate so I can at the very least stop adding to the backlog.
I know this is what I need to do, but it’s very easy to become too overwhelmed to do anything. I know what I need to do, I just need to have the fortitude to start small and ignore the backlog for a while. Tell you what, I’m going to try and set a super basic agenda thing up today or tomorrow, so I can capture incoming tasks or notes. I’m going to try and tackle this like I would a software project, which means trying my best to avoid unnecessary complexity, like often happens when I try to consider the backlog blob. Watch this space, I guess :P
Thanks for the prod. I know you didn’t say much and I mostly talked myself into this, but sometimes that’s what’s needed when you’re wise enough to give great advice to yourself, but foolish enough to not take aforementioned great advice.