Weeknote for 4/13/2025

Productivity

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I began simplifying my notes format into a chronological arrangement grouped under date headings. Up to that point my work journaling had taken the form of topical outlines with the aim of making my notes on each subtopic easier to find, but for longer, more complicated tasks, it turned out maintaining that organization got tedious and confusing. I’d been planning to design an easier format for a while, so that week when I started a set of miscellaneous thoughts pages for some of my projects, I decided to just jump into this chronological approach and figure it out as I went. Writing miscellaneous notes in a chronological format takes me back to my early days of journaling on paper, so there’s a bit of nostalgia in this change.

I began a more focused effort to start key events in my daily schedule on time. The events are my morning routine, starting work, getting home, dinner, and sleep. I find that these particular moments mark key boundaries of activity that both keep my life flowing smoothly and give me enough time to do the things I care about. Targeting these also limits the amount I have to think about my schedule, because I have so much trouble stopping an activity once I’ve gained momentum that just those few goals are challenging enough.

Modeling

😎

Abby Covert’s Stuck? Diagrams Help kicked off a new phase of my modeling project. I ran out of my typical programming and project management books for work-related listening during my lunchtime walks, so I turned to my modeling books, since that topic ends up being relevant to work sometimes. I started with this short one on diagramming I’d randomly picked up in a Kindle sale, and I was struck by the author’s painstaking care for both her topic and her readers. Throughout the book Covert guides her readers through the emotional ups and downs of a diagramming project and through the very human benefits of the whole endeavor: stability, transparency, understanding, clarity, and kindness—the “STUCK” of diagramming. I’m looking forward to thinking through her set of diagram recipes, and I enjoyed contributing author Jenny Benevento’s survey of the history of diagramming, but the key benefit at the time was that the book got my mental gears turning again on modeling.

Spirituality

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My main themes that week were rest and “brass tacks” spirituality. I’d been feeling extra tired lately, and Sunday’s sermon happened to be about the Sabbath, so I took the opportunity to think through what a restful Sabbath would look like for me and to start taking rest more seriously in general. “Brass tacks” was my recurring reminder to find the point in any spiritual activity and get to it. This is mainly a warning to myself that there are plenty of wrappers around true spirituality that make poor substitutes on their own, such as the loveless good deeds of 1 Corinthians 13 or the faith without works of James 2.

Speaking of brass tacks, my activity for that Friday’s Lenten fast was choosing a food charity to receive my meal money. I was looking for someplace local I could potentially form personal connections with. I had an intriguing time raising my awareness through the research, and I was glad to see there were several strong candidates in the area.