Blog 1

    Currently I see many miscellaneous items surrounding me on my desk as I am writing this. I have my water bottle to the right of my laptop and a mug that previously had tea inside it on the left of my laptop. My desk is a place that I like to keep somewhat tidy, but I always end up having random items that I cannot seem to find a place for them to stay such as my box of disposable masks, or my massage gun for example. I also have a new pack of pencils that I bought yesterday, and I am still yet to open.

     My phone is laying peacefully on Do Not Disturb by the bottom right hand side of my laptop just below my water bottle. I keep it on Do Not Disturb as my phone is arguably my biggest distraction from work however I feel I must keep it by my side just in case there is an emergency so I check my home screen on my phone periodically. I previously used to turn my phone off completely but now that I am older and more disciplined, this is no longer needed as I can trust myself to work hard and not be defeated by the temptation of going onto my phone and wasting time. As quite a restless person, I often find myself distracted very easily which is not beneficial for my work especially not when I need to concentrate on my writing and this is another reason I no longer listen to music when I need to complete a writing assignment. Sometimes I get too interested in the music and find that it tends to be another distraction and in turn another form of procrastination. 

    An interesting thing that I tend to keep by my side when writing is my Rubik's cube. I like to have this on my desk when writing as I feel like it is a positive distraction, almost a positive form of procrastination. I like to mess it up and then solve it when my mind goes blank and I'm struggling for ideas or maybe when I lose concentration from sitting in the same place for a long period of time. I view it as a quick productive break from my work and it upon completion of the cube, I feel motivated to keep working as I have just completed a mini task that made me feel good about myself. I almost use me solving the cube as a psychological way to boost my productivity and I feel it works really well so I think I will be continuing with this for the foreseeable future.

    As previously mentioned, I do not like to write with music anymore but that does not mean I like to work in pure silence. I like to have slight background noise, nothing too distracting like conversations or loud noises, but something slight like the sound of other people typing or the sound of birds, or cars passing by just to name a few. I feel like it gives me something else to hear and makes me feel less isolated when completing a task like this.