Life hacks, which is a term coined on www.lifehacker.com seems to refer to things people can do to improve productivity and beat procrastination. I have been thinking about my own life hacks that I use every day, just to get things done. Things I might have been too lazy to do otherwise. Here are some of my personal life hacks:
1. I consider my bed "made" if the sheets and blankets are pulled up and reasonably centered on the mattress.
2. If I use the toaster oven for anything, I do dishes while the timer is on. The 4 minutes it takes to toast bread, I've got the dishwasher unloaded. Or that soaking pot wiped down. I've had dirty dishes mould in the past (dirty secret), so this is progress.
3. I try to live near work and supermarkets if possible. I don't like driving so I will walk or bike more just to avoid it. No, it doesn't make sense, yes, that's how it is.
4. Sometimes I leave my socks out on the drying rack to make sure I change them every day. Otherwise I'll wear the same pair a couple days in a row. Which, if I'm being honest, I also think is fine. But, cultural norms and all that.
5. I make the same exact lunch every day for work. I eat the same snacks at the same time every day. I don't care and it makes assembling my lunch in the evenings really quick. Plus I know I get a good nutritional balance and I know what to buy at the store each week.
6. I let myself get emotionally entangled in long term animal shelter dogs to make me go back and walk every day at lunch, otherwise inertia gets me and I don't bother (like today). I waste the chance to hang with a cool mutt and get my vitamin D and some exercise, for no reason. But the thought of my sad buddy waiting for me to take them out gets me over there.
7. I turn the volume off on our alarm clock radios on friday night so when Ludwig walks on the "on" buttons in the morning he doesn't get me up. I win, deaf cat!
8. I buy boxes of little freezies to keep me from binging on candy, and I eat one extra chewy gummy a day, which also curbs bingy candy-a-thons. I make sure to have exactly the type of candy I love in individual wrappers so I have portions and I'm not eating tons of substitute stuff trying to satisfy a particular want.
Do you have any life hacks you use? Strategies or things you do because you realize you can't make yourself like doing something, so this "good enough" trick will work? How do you get around the things you never feel like doing?
People, hack your life. Really. When I realized that I can live to my own standard, things got a lot easier. Yes, all our plates are chipped. I care exactly not at all about this. No more dishes shopping! I win!
Sometimes, doing part of something is amazing. Shine your tap. No the sink's not clean but whatever, incremental improvement! I win again!
3 comments:
So with you on #1. So easy with a sheet and comforter.
I honestly can't think of anything I do.. I think I have pretty low standards.
lifehacker.com is such a great site. There are a million little things that you can do to tailor your daily routine and squeeze a little more productivity out of a little less time. I think I've got 1 and 2 pretty much down pat, and the 'shine the tap' exercise is something that I'm always working on as leaving things half done has always been a bit of a problem for me.
Another favourite lifehack of mine? Pre sorting laundry. We ditched the single laundry hamper in favour of a three-bag system. One for whites, one for darks and one for hand-wash. It takes approximately zero extra time to toss dirty laundry in the right bag. This way it's immediately obvious when laundry needs to be done and you just grab the entire bag and toss it all in the wash. Only drawback? Someone doesn't always remember to take the kleenex out of her pockets :-P
The website http://www.soscuisine.com. They send you weekly meal plans, provide you with the grocery list to do the meals and recipes are goods, cheap and healthy!
Valérie
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