07/14/2024
A Sabbatical Day In The Life
documenting my ADHD
a friend texted me the following last week:
i have zero structure. i realized i don’t even know what i do, and i do worry sometimes if i’m getting enough done. however, much of my work right now is to follow my curiosity and continue contributing to the thesis for what i’m building.
below is my to-done list from thursday, 7/11/24. i try not to keep a rigid ‘to-do’ list for the day anymore as it tends to stress me out. these days i will set a theme for the week or the day, and try to have enough self-trust in my subconscious that if i continue to do what i want, i will be okay. i do have a mega-list in my notebook that i add to when a to-do, an intention, or an idea that i cannot do right in that moment comes up.
09:00 wake up
09:23 morning pages
10:14 facetimed my mom
10:50 finished reading an essay on anthony bourdain
11:00 finished reading properties of state and path functions (thermodynamics) (felt stupid)
11:03 tweeted about path functions in relation to “living a markovian life”
11:04 thought about buying an SSIR subscription
11:10 organized my tabs
11:15 drank water, thought about making breakfast
11:16 searched the difference between social computing and computational social science
11:18 read about network analysis and knowledge organization
11:21 started to clean email / get to inbox 0
11:24 ate a rice cake
11:30 twitter break + respond to a friend Amber’s text
11:39 finished reading my friend Alyson’s new essay
added anemone by the brian johnstone massacre to my july playlist
11:41 texted Alyson that I loved her essay
11:42 BACK TO EMAILS! FOCUS!
12:08 got through some emails, some cornell bio elab stuff
applied for a reading group
12:18 still getting through emails
started reading sherry ning’s essay on how to write
getting hungry
12:32 can’t focus. need to eat.
12:51 made besan puda (chickpea flour crepe) with cilantro, onion, peppers, green chili
eat and watched with avatar the last airbender
13:01 finished eating. washed dishes. decided to have a mini ice cream cone.
13:20 read jesse eisenberg’s entire discography and how he trolled woody allen as a teenager
went back to reading sherry ning’s essay from my email
13:28 finished sherry’s essay.
reflected on if my creation depends on some kind of self-exploitation
13:46 read an article on karl friston and yann lecun debating at davos,
rabbitholed back into cognitive computing
14:26 read about curiosity-drive theory and tweeted about it #learninpublic
14:30 read about active inference and spatial computing
14:39 read more on spatial web protocol
15:00 twitter break + finished friston vs. lecun piece
15:06 responded to more emails
15:35 followed up with someone
15:39 read some more from my reading list
15:41 ate grapes
16:04 finished the intention for the day: all emails + 8 essays on reading list, felt accomplished
16:13 nap time
16:50 woke from nap, called nb, air fried two latkes, watched avatar the last airbender
15:13 called nb again to talk about tonight’s plan
15:35 watched matty matheson cooking videos on youtube
18:28 went on a walk
19:28 got home
19:30 had a call with my research lead on the paper we’re writing
20:16 finished meeting
20:20 shower
20:40 skincare + tidy apartment
21:00 started on dinner: stir fry + yogurt
21:16 ate dinner with hannah berner’s netflix comedy special
22:00 nb arrived from work, he ate dinner
22:34 in bed
22:48 couldn’t sleep, read joan didion and watched avatar the last airbender
00:35 fell asleep
some days i’ll have one big project that takes up a major chunk of the day, but most days look more like this. i get a majority of my focused work done in the early mornings or late at nights. i also try to have most of my meetings on tuesdays and wednesdays.
something i want to become better at is less context switching and less reacting to every thought that comes up.