
And along with them flies the time when one can be productive, useful, super hardworking, and most importantly, very very busy. But when you are not at all like that, and you have plenty of free time (read: I have a lot of free time), being productive just doesn’t happen. Instead, I end up building castles in the air in the form of great ideas and plans, writing them down in my planner or in my Notion, and then constantly rewriting or shifting them to the next day, the day after, and even three days later. I just couldn’t manage to execute them today (or yesterday, or the day before). Sometimes the tasks take longer than expected, but the time just slips away into the void (we all know where time goes when the phone is in hand and social media is open, right?).
Moreover, often something comes to mind that needs to be done, something else, not according to the written plan, and you do it. Time flies, and the list you created yesterday (or this morning) becomes completely irrelevant. These written plans/tasks have already displaced other “spontaneous” ideas/tasks. Although when I created the preliminary plan, all of these tasks seemed important.

But all of this is a game, a game of productivity. And in the end, no one is waiting for the completion of these tasks, nor do they demand it. Therefore, it is easy to “push them aside”; you can simply reschedule them for tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, or any other day…
I have kept a journal since childhood. Since school, I have been planning my days, writing down tasks for the future, and making reminders. Now, I have replaced all paper notebooks and planners with electronic ones. I use todoist for tasks and reminders, and for notes and records (even outlines), I use Goodnotes on my tablet.

So day after day, week after week, tasks in my planner jump from one day to another and often remain uncompleted and endless. These tasks are all mundane, simple, and unnecessary. This is how I live.
However, these actions are necessary to maintain a daily routine. Now, even when there is no work, and I am not engaged in anything, I still get up early. My phone alarm is set for 6:30. And then, my daily routine continues as in a normal life (the past life), breakfast (coffee and porridge), studying until noon, reading and YouTube. Currently, I am studying Data Analytics at Yandex.Practicum, and I have been doing so for six months. Yes, now one might wonder if this idea was a good one, do I really need all of this?! Especially after the emergence of ChatGPT. But this is the only way to keep myself in check and maintain discipline, and learning something new is always useful.

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