Half-a-brain jobs

The numbered bits stop working after 7pm.

Sometimes my brain is more valuable than other times. To be specific, before 12pm my brain performs its best; between 12 and 3pm it’s pretty good; between 3pm and 7pm it’s passable; and after 7pm it’s basically only half awake. The work I do in the evenings is slower and has more errors that work done in the morning.

But there’s an easy way to manage this. I have half-a-brain jobs. These are jobs that require only 50% of my cognitive function. The list includes:

• Admin for the kids’ school stuff.

• Making small, specified changes to an article.

• Documents that just need laying up.

• Choosing images.

• Posting blogs.

• Paying bills.

• Reconciling Xero.

• Answering emails from people I know reasonably well.

The important jobs, on the other hand, often need my full attention for an extended period of time. Being distracted by having to pay a last-minute bill in the morning knocks me out of a valuable chunk of writing time. I need a sustained period of concentration to write or research an article, so by taking the half-a-brain jobs and putting them in other parts of the day, I prevent myself from wasting the solid chunks of concentration.

 The trick is to do the half-a-brain jobs at other times, for instance:

• When the kids are in the house, I’m the only adult here, but they’re playing happily (I know they’ll want my attention soon, so I can’t really get stuck into something).

• In the gappy bits of time, like after a phone interview when I have another 20 minutes before I need to leave for school pick-up.

• In the evenings, sometimes in front of the TV. Watching TV makes me feel like I’m not working, even if I’m actually achieving something very slowly, one click at a time.

This way I can sit down in the morning and focus on the big jobs, without being distracted by the annoying tasks that still need to be completed.