1. I exercise mindfulness in the act of locking the door, as a result of which I not only lock the door, but also carry away the assurance that I have done so.
Anecdote: A former postgrad student where I work went to work at GCHQ. He was an obsessive whiz at mathematics, exactly the qualities that a place like GCHQ wants, regardless of any psychological difficulties they might also have. Think autism, Aspergers, OCD, etc. GCHQ has support systems to handle such people to get what they want out of them.
But in the end they had to let him go. In the room where he worked, there were about 15 computers, and one day a notice went up saying “Would the last person to leave please ensure all the machines are shut down.” If he was the last to leave, he couldn’t, because he’d check every machine, get to the door, and have to check them again. And again and againandagainand...
Well, something was broken in his brain, I suppose. He was physically unable to both shut down the machines and achieve the assurance that he had done so (and also unable to just decide, “sod it, I’m leaving anyway”).
So, I don’t do that.
2. Filing card in my pocket for all such notes. There are various peg memory systems that I sometimes try to use, but I haven’t made them work very reliably.
3. I put some sort of visual reminder on the fridge door. I put another on the front door, so that checking the fridge when I go out is one of the things I do whenever I go out.
4. If the directions received are definite enough to enter into the GPS, do that. At any rate, remember at least enough to make some progress, then if necessary ask again. Write stuff down on that filing card.
5. Key points on a notecard, and lots of rehearsal, declaiming to an empty room. Mindfulness during the actual talk, so that I always have part of my attention on the structure, instead of attending only to the words coming out of my mouth right now.
6. Just look at the ID every time. If I don’t look, I don’t know, and the trouble is less trouble to me than the uncertainty. For numbers there’s a standard mnemonic mapping digits to consonant sounds that I find effective. It maps (dropping the leading zeros) 458789625 to RLFKFPJNL, which one can turn into words with vowels. Does “Ralph cough up channel” help? But I find turning that back into numbers time-consuming, so I only use it for numbers I never write down, like PINs.
7. Write them down anyway.
8. I don’t do parties or networking, so I don’t have a solution to this one. But again, the filing card in the pocket listing everything I want to do at the event is the way I’d go, to be discreetly consulted from time to time.
9. Panic some more. Sleep on it. Panic again. Then decide I’m in the wrong profession.
For “filing card” one could substitute “notes app on a phone”, but I can scribble on a card far faster than poke a tiny keyboard.
1. I exercise mindfulness in the act of locking the door, as a result of which I not only lock the door, but also carry away the assurance that I have done so.
Anecdote: A former postgrad student where I work went to work at GCHQ. He was an obsessive whiz at mathematics, exactly the qualities that a place like GCHQ wants, regardless of any psychological difficulties they might also have. Think autism, Aspergers, OCD, etc. GCHQ has support systems to handle such people to get what they want out of them.
But in the end they had to let him go. In the room where he worked, there were about 15 computers, and one day a notice went up saying “Would the last person to leave please ensure all the machines are shut down.” If he was the last to leave, he couldn’t, because he’d check every machine, get to the door, and have to check them again. And again and againandagainand...
Well, something was broken in his brain, I suppose. He was physically unable to both shut down the machines and achieve the assurance that he had done so (and also unable to just decide, “sod it, I’m leaving anyway”).
So, I don’t do that.
2. Filing card in my pocket for all such notes. There are various peg memory systems that I sometimes try to use, but I haven’t made them work very reliably.
3. I put some sort of visual reminder on the fridge door. I put another on the front door, so that checking the fridge when I go out is one of the things I do whenever I go out.
4. If the directions received are definite enough to enter into the GPS, do that. At any rate, remember at least enough to make some progress, then if necessary ask again. Write stuff down on that filing card.
5. Key points on a notecard, and lots of rehearsal, declaiming to an empty room. Mindfulness during the actual talk, so that I always have part of my attention on the structure, instead of attending only to the words coming out of my mouth right now.
6. Just look at the ID every time. If I don’t look, I don’t know, and the trouble is less trouble to me than the uncertainty. For numbers there’s a standard mnemonic mapping digits to consonant sounds that I find effective. It maps (dropping the leading zeros) 458789625 to RLFKFPJNL, which one can turn into words with vowels. Does “Ralph cough up channel” help? But I find turning that back into numbers time-consuming, so I only use it for numbers I never write down, like PINs.
7. Write them down anyway.
8. I don’t do parties or networking, so I don’t have a solution to this one. But again, the filing card in the pocket listing everything I want to do at the event is the way I’d go, to be discreetly consulted from time to time.
9. Panic some more. Sleep on it. Panic again. Then decide I’m in the wrong profession.
For “filing card” one could substitute “notes app on a phone”, but I can scribble on a card far faster than poke a tiny keyboard.