So folks who know me know that my productivity systems are pretty core to who I am, which is how I can have over 20 years experience designing and implementing them despite still only being in my early 30s. Productivity systems keep my depression and anxiety somewhat under control. They help me to assess myself and push myself. They allow me to reward myself and limit the amount that I beat myself up to that which I can measure. I recently got a solid reminder of how much my systems help me. I got a concussion.
For those of you who don't know much about concussions, I'll say they are intense and they suck. My work and the majority of my non-work time is spent on the computer. Most of my hobbies involve the computer. When you have a concussion you are not supposed to look at screens. I also really enjoy reading, but, when you have a concussion you should really avoid much of that as well. I also enjoy having deep conversations with people I care about on a wide variety of topics, but my brain could just not handle it. I couldn't even really play board games or card games without feeling symptoms. So already, the state is not very good for situational depression. All my coping strategies are not things I can do. Heck, on a concussion I can't even drink.
This should tip you off to a bigger problem I now had. I couldn't use my current productivity system. It was online, too intense, too complex, and involved too many activities I wasn't allowed to do. I was also in the state of being the least able to make a new interim system. My executive functioning, focus, and reasoning were kinda shot. Additionally, I had no idea what to expect from my condition from which to set expectations.
The first few days I mostly just slept and listened to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine while blind-folded. Soon this was insufficient however. I needed to have a system or I was going to do activities I was supposed to avoid. The system I came up with is one that might be good for some folks looking for a simple system that is somewhat intrinsic and somewhat comparative while providing a lot of freedom.
I took a whiteboard and divided it into 3 parts.
Part 1 was for tracking. Each day I would write the day and under it I would put stars based on how the system was going. The stars don't mean anything and are just an opportunity for me to acknowledge that I was doing something correctly.
Part 2 was for any time tasks. These are ones that I could do as much as I wanted and get a star every time I did it. These were specifically things related to health, self-care, and wellness. This section included: Napping, Socializing, Meditating, Bathing, Walking, Brushing Teeth and Hair, Eating Food and Drinking Water.
Part 3 was for choice tasks. I put numbers down to 10. Next to each number I put a super small task that was acceptable to do while recovering from a concussion. Larger tasks were divided into smaller tasks. So the process of doing the dishes involved: Loading the top of the Dishwasher, Loading the bottom of the Dishwasher, Loading the silverware tray, Running the dishwasher, Unloading the dishwasher. So doing the dishes was 5 of my 10 slots. Any task I completed earned me a star and then that task got erased and I could put in a different task that followed the same rules.
I felt much better having a system in place. I no longer felt lazy in an amorphous way. When I felt lazy I could look at my stars for the day and feel better or I could look at the tasks available to me and try to do one thing and then take a nap.
I'm still not 100%. I feel like I'm at about 75% which is good enough for me to get back to my life but extend myself a lot of grace. I go back to work tomorrow and I started back with my normal system this weekend. I still get a lot of headaches and there are times when I need to just back off but for the most part I can start getting back to my normal life.
