“The Dog” Journal
Welcome to the Dog Journal, a blog where I periodically share my best finds for taming those puppies that gnaw at your planner.
Could be a quick time management tip, a smell-the-flowers moment, a comment overheard on the elevator. Whatever the inspiration, I hope you’ll blog right along with me by commenting and sharing your tips and stories for taming an overbooked life.
Christmas Anytime
Christmas seems like the right time to have an epiphany, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I’m having one.
It finally occurred to me that all of the things I spend time planning for over the holidays – the dinner, the decorating – are not what actually bring me joy.
Instead, it’s the small moments and surprises that happen, shopping list in hand, on the way to someplace else. It’s that moment getting lost in a neighborhood, springing suddenly onto an amazing light display, the last-minute decision to duck into a tavern for turtle soup, an unexpected homemade treat from a friend.
So when the wrapping paper and dried needles are swept off the floor, there’s no need for a letdown. Brilliantly and at will, the other Christmas moments can be recalled and extend the season, even in the dull gray days of January, February and beyond.
The Picture Of Gratitude
Funny how gratitude works. Sometimes. to become truly grateful, we have to regain something we’ve always taken for granted and lost. So it is with Samantha Snyder, canine cousin I’ve gotten to know in Gaithersburg, Md., these past few months. No comment on gratitude in the Dog Journal would be complete without her story.
On and off, I’ve spent weekends with Samantha and my cousins, her owners, while I immersed myself in a coach’s training program. It has not been an easy time for Samantha. She used to have the run of the house, and her favorite digs were in the basement, perched in front of the wide-screen TV. That was before, for an undisclosed reason, she was banned from the lower level.
Her eyes were sad. She whimpered. She barely wagged her tail. It didn’t help that I – a mere visitor – WAS allowed in the basement. Every step I took toward the basement door took her one step closer to clinical depression.
I was thrilled on my last night there to be present when Samantha was finally allowed to return – just in time for a family tournament of Quip-It, a wonderful TV game. Perched on a bean bag chair, looking from one of us to another, she could not have been more grateful to be included at last in the action. Her picture here, taken by Katie Snyder, is going on my desk as a reminder. Take nothing for granted!
Power of Daydreaming
Here’s to the wandering mind. In D.C. over the weekend for more coach’s training, I took a three-mile walk through the Gaithersburg, Md. neighborhood where my cousin was putting me up.
There, drawn in chalk on the sidewalk that ran through a park was a large hand-drawn mandate: Question Anthony!!”
Immediately, my mind imagined this Anthony character. “What was Anthony advocating?” I wondered. “Was he some kid at the nearby elementary school?” “A bully maybe? A bully’s victim? And how did he feel about being questioned so publicly?”
The fascination was short-lived. My walking companions suggested I take another look.
“Question Authority!” the chalk actually said.
A little sadly I said goodbye to this fictional character who had drawn me in. In my mind, he was already an illustration in a children’s book, looking downcast, stubbing the toe of a brown oxford shoe in the dirt. And a reminder that flights of fantasy can be the best sort of vacation from a linear world.
Try Cupcake Perspective On E-Mail
Amazing how problem-solving can take a creative turn when you change your perspective.
That’s what I learned this weekend at a coach’s training session, where we circled a hotel meeting room, moving from space to space outlined with painter’s tape, each space representing a different perspective on a topic.
Mine was e-mail addiction: how to beat back the instant gratification of checking e-mail more than a couple times a day. Why? It’s a habit that just about every organizing expert and even your Uncle Harry will tell you wastes time and destroys focus.
Invited to look at the topic from random perspectives, including from the point of view of random objects around the room, I chose the cupcakes over by the coffee urns.
“What’s the cupcake perspective on this?” my coach wanted to know.
“If e-mails were cupcakes, I would not be able to stop eating them,” I said. I would go back for more every few minutes until my stomach hurt and I got very, very fat.” The thought, fortunately, was revolting.
The solution, we decided, was to tape a picture of a cupcake by the computer. That way, every time I was tempted, I would feel slightly bloated and voila’! not at all interested in e-mail So there. Another way to organize your life. No kidding. It could catch on.
