Avoiding The Rot
Note
The following is mostly just a stress-test of this bearblog software a friend introduced to me, so forgive me if this isn't my best work. I just wanted to get some ideas onto paper.
Abstract
The rot, the bedrot, rotting; wasting your time away in bed or on the couch or on the floor. The rot is ultimately accomplishing nothing with the little free time we have. It's pathetic, but it's no ones fault either. It's too easy to allow yourself to simply fall into a routine and become content. Furthermore, committing to actually doing something might not pay off. It might not be fun, and you would feel better doing the same as you've always done. Playing a video game on one day may feel significantly better than another, and that's a truly harrowing thought. Most people already understand that bedrotting sucks, yet it's something I'll witness every day. I find myself falling into on occasion if I'm not careful. As such, the following is both a pass-time to break out of my ~1.5 hour rotting session, as well as the techniques I use to help mitigate these instances.
Planning
One of if not the best techniques for mitigating the rot has been planning my free time. A weekly anime night was my first idea, and it went well for a really long time (3 years). Every Friday, at a scheduled time, I'd stream anime for my friends. Just for a couple hours, nothing extraordinary. But it made it so that every Friday I was busy. I had something to look forward to at the beginning of every week, as well as something to motivate me to try to finish chores and busy work prior to the occasion. It gave me energy throughout the weekend as well. Especially if I could plan even more things to do with my friends. Whether it be a game, or studying, or tutoring a friend (in a more casual sense), or even just wanting to get something done. Having something in my head that I both want to do but also need to do because either someone else or my own patience is waiting on me really puts me into action. And its often fun too.
Maybe this concept of planning stuff with friends seems blatantly obvious to most of you reading, but I don't get out much. I'm often very happy in my own space for extended periods of time, and I don't get to make plans with irls as often as most people would. Its more of a treat for me. Managing some sort of way to hang out online was vital for me to figure out in the past couple years. Perhaps something as simple as this can be helpful to hear for someone like me. Currently its in the form of me showing a friend something on Saturdays, while they show me something on Sundays. Usually an anime or visual novel of some sort.
Projects
I'm fond of the P words, clearly. I always like to be running some sort of project in the background. Either they help me express myself, or its a vessel for learning something new. I study engineering, for example. There's always something new or interesting or niche within the field, and giving myself the excuse to engage with them is something I can add to my experience and skillet. It's really valuable stuff. Even the stuff that isn't as educational, such as my digital playlists or cassette projects, allow me to tap into my creativity a bit more. Furthermore, I get to collaborate with friends on things like art and graphic design and composition. Its a shockingly good excuse to catch up with some old faces, and takes up at minimum a day of work (and often weeks with the cassettes.)
Purpose
I'm a sucker for alliteration. I think a lack of purpose is one of the leading factors for allowing yourself to enter the rot. If you have nothing to do, its a no brainier you wouldn't do anything. It can be hard to know where to start. It can seem like a lot, with the way the internet loves to tout about lists and numbers and metrics. None of that matters though. Sit down, and make a list. A simple .txt file can suffice. And on that list, just write down things that interest you. It can be media, it can be hobbies, it can even be Wikipedia articles. Doesn't have to be fancy, doesn't have to be organized by a specific medium, and it doesn't have to be a website purpose-built for doing so. When you lack direction of how you want to spend your 3pm on Saturday, reference it. Now you have direction. Direction to multiple things you either know you already like, or new things you're willing to engage in. And even if that time spent ends up sucking, if the movie you watched was bad or the article you read was boring, at least you can complain about it. Always something fun to do with the right person.1 Footnotes are a really cool feature.
Conclusion
I think this mostly covers my bases regarding strategies. Humans aren't perfect. There will always be times we want to simply lie down and do nothing. Better yet, think of nothing too. And that's fine. The goal isn't to be at your 100% all the time every waking moment γΎγγ«γ‘ like a machine. Taking it slow is very human. But the opposite isn't healthy either. I don't think we're built to be doing a majority of nothing. Nothing being literally nothing: doom-scrolling, rotting, etc. You know what I mean.
If you read till the end, I hope you gleamed something, if not reinforced your own beliefs. I wouldn't exactly consider reading a blog to be rotting, so good on you. If you're curious, I really like this bear-blog software. Neat stuff.
ily whitt <3↩