Time Containers

Name the projects you are going to do today (“replace the Bundt-cake monologue,” “Outline the battle scene, “ “Build and test the airplane puppet” ... etc.)

Each project wants to be achievable and specific and make a real contribution to your project. So “have ideas” is a bad project assignment. As is “fix second act.”

Assign yourself an amount of time to contain your work on each of these projects:

— build and test airplane puppet. 45 minutes.
— replace the Bundt-cake monologue. 90 minutes.
— outline for battle scene. 30 minutes.

Allow yourself 5 minutes at the beginning of each task to size up the problem.

If there are multiple ways of attacking it, take a few minutes to identify these (or some of them). BUT THEN PICK ONE method and use THAT.

Save a few minutes at the end of the time period to “show” or “document” or “observe” what you have achieved.

At the end of each period, just sit with what you did for a few minutes, before you move on. In this moment of reflection, write about what you did and highlight anything exciting that you discovered (about the work you did, the project as a whole, or about your own working). If you have ideas for how to continue this work or a second approach to it that you would like to try, write about that. This is NOT the moment to enumerate the shortcomings of what you did, or to beat yourself up for anything. Part of the function of this period of reflection is to cultivate the motivation to begin the NEXT project.

If the next project on your list is something you just can’t face, you can skip it and move ahead to the next BUT you need to get to every project on your list.

If you like, you can have a “bank” of “extra time” that you can draw on. So if it takes 45 minutes just to BUILD the airplane puppet, you can take 15 minutes from your “bank” so you have a chance to test it. (If you’re planning an 8 hour work day, you might leave 2 hours in the “bank.”)

You might also take a few minutes to check in with one of your peers, arrange a showing of some of what you’re doing, or to warm up...

Go team.

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