One of the things I’ve made an effort to get good at is to do the little things as I notice them. As soon as I notice something that needs to be picked up, or put away, or moved, or done, I do it. I don’t think about doing it, or make a note to do it later, I just do it. A surprising amount of brain power is freed up, and a surprising amount of anxiety is eliminated, when you don’t have to think about stupid little things you need to do, or should have already done. There’s no opportunity to beat yourself up about the 3 day old cereal bowl on your desk or last week’s socks on the floor if you just bus them the first time you see them.
But, for creative or mental tasks, like writing, Hemingway offers the opposite advice to prevent losing momentum:
The best way is always to stop when you are going good and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day … you will never be stuck. Always stop while you are going good and don’t think about it or worry about it until you start to write the next day. That way your subconscious will work on it all the time. But if you think about it consciously or worry about it you will kill it and your brain will be tired before you start.
This is a nice little trick. It means you’ll never sit down to a blank piece of paper. You’ll never start out lost, not knowing where to begin or where to go next. You might get lost, but you’ll be able to keep the momentum you built before you stopped, and at least get off to a strong start. Psychologically, that’s pretty valuable.
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