Help! I'm Dying from Bits!

I woke up very early. Of course, I’m an early bird. I was feeling so rejuvenated and ready to take on the challenge presented by another new day.

I stretched myself and turned on the telly to catch up on the latest. Then I started with my daily ritual of 100 press-ups first thing in the morning. Feeling more than rejuvenated now, I walked to my desk and I pulled my seat from under my desk, sat down in front of my laptop.

I was set, ready to start from where I stopped yesterday. You see, I got an inspiration to write an article last evening. I started working on the skeletons of the article immediately.

This morning, it’s now time to put some flesh to the bones so I fired up Microsoft Word.

While waiting for the program to come up, I absentmindedly connected to the internet… and that was my first mistake!

I just felt the urge to check up on my Facebook friends’ updates. And my emails. And my favorite blogs. And my favorite forum too.

Feeling so powerless to resist the urge, I clicked on some of those links I could see there and started checking their contents. In the process, I encountered some very interesting articles with interesting links in them.

Before you know it, I already had a sea of tabs opened.

My article now completely forgotten, I kept on sweeping over pages and pages of bits of information. I was lost but I didn't even notice.

Then a WhatsApp notification came in. I checked my phone. My friend is now up. We have to continue our conversation from where we stopped last night. I also noticed I have four other unread WhatsApp messages.

Time to switch.

I quickly replied those unread messages too. Like expected, it wasn't long before the senders started coming online with their own replies too. And so we continued to discuss, mostly frivolities I must confess, I really enjoyed the continuous stream of conversation, arguments, videos, emails, Facebook status updates, etc. as I effortlessly divided myself between cycling through the bits of information on my laptop screen and also staying tuned to replying my friends on WhatsApp.

I wasn't bothered. I was even enjoying myself, sort of.

Then my other phone rang.

I picked up the TV remote to turn down the volume of the TV before I could answer the call.

Then I saw the current time displayed on the TV channel I was watching.

Oh shït!

I groaned.

It has happened again.

And I know it will still happen again and again and again…

Dear Lord! I need some help. Someone please help me! These bits are killing me!

As I regretfully looked at the abandoned Microsoft Word Document I opened two-and-something hours ago, I rued the missed opportunity again because I knew that it will take another bout of inspirational wave to hit me before I will start working on that article again!

Which—if I know myself well—is not going to be anytime soon.

But that’s not even the problem.

The real problem is that my workload has just increased.

And that is what is killing me.

Now, do you know what I'm talking about? Are you facing the same problem? Are you suffering from information overload, or rather from the consequences of such overload? Are these bits of information killing you too?

Chances are, your answer is yes.

And if so, what can you do about it?

Okay, are you ready to fight the battle?

I don’t know about you, but this is what I’m going to start doing as from now…

Prioritize

I will start to prioritize on the things I want to finish in the order of most important first. That is to say, I will be priming on my tasks as from now.

According to Parkinson’s Law, I might be able to save a lot of time for myself by prioritizing.

Who knows, I might even save enough time to perform those those tasks that will be ranking low in my list to my utmost satisfaction.

Timing

I just have to learn how to time myself in any activity I engage myself in.

From start to finish, I have to be able to specify the amount of time the activity is supposed to take and how much time I am willing to dedicate in getting any particular task accomplished.

They say time is money, which means I have to also start checking on how much man-hours I might be saving in the process.

Who knows, I might even end up saving enough time worth billions in kind.

Hibernate

Yeah right. Just like my laptop, I just have to learn how to hibernate my own system.

In fact, not only hibernate. I will also have to shut down completely. I will have to learn how and when to walk away from these bits.

No Facebook. No tweeting. No emails. No blogging. No nothing.

I pledge that these bits shall no longer prevent me from getting enough sleep. These bits shall no longer prevent me from acting upon and working on any of my inspired moments again.

So help me God.

Fight to finish

I will have to start fighting to finish whatever task I have started. Nothing will come in between again…

I know I love distractions. I know I do enjoy absorbing a huge amount of varying and diversify information all at once.

But as from now…

It’s official. It’s going to be a fight to finish with everything I started.

Decide

Above all, I will decide to cut off from certain forms of entertainment.

I know it’s not going to be easy so I’ll so much try not to deceive myself on this but I’m going to motivate myself to gain this strong-willed mentality required to do this.

If I decided to allow these endless bits to confuse me, logic follows that I can also take my powers back and stop these same bits from completely taking control of me.

Again, it’s not going to be easy but then, it’s not impossible!

You will agree with me that when I do these things I have mentioned, I am no longer going to be a slave to these bits but rather I will be killing the bits myself.

And that’s exactly what I am going do to.

So wish me luck.

Oh… I almost forgot, you are free to join me to kill your own bits. Of course, that’s why I’m writing this and you know what…?

Yes, we can!

Ciao.