Conflicting Interests
I have so many things I want to do; I get stuck not doing anything.
Being conflicted isn't new for me, and is related to my recent post titled Overlapping Tech. I have a lot of interests which lead me to buying a lot of gadgets that share some of the same tasks, but are impossible to use all at once.
Paul Alvarez
For example, I have an iPad Mini and a Kindle. I can read books on either one, but if I pick up the iPad Mini to read, I can get distracted and want to do something else like catch up on the news or check in on the crazy rap beef going on, and I don't end up reading.
I also have a Nintendo Switch and an Anbernic RG35XX. I can't play the same games on both consoles (mostly), but I have been recently playing games on my iPhone more since Apple has now allowed emulators in the App Store. I have been playing Pokémon FireRed, and it has been a fantastic experience dipping into since I am usually on my iPhone anyway.
I have accepted the fact that I have a lot of gadgets which provide me access to a variety of different interests that I am into right now. The problem really lies in how I get stuck not doing a lot of things because of decision fatigue.
Greg Morris, a really great blogger that I have been following and reading for years now, had a post that encapsulates my feelings on this topic perfectly:
Over the last few months, it has been challenging to balance my interests and focus. Indeed, I have wasted a lot of time moving things around and messing with my websites, but along with this, I have found it difficult to do more than one ‘thing’ at a time. There’s something to be said about putting all your effort one way, but I enjoy lots of different creative things and don’t like neglecting other areas.
In Greg's post, he is mostly talking about working on his blog versus writing for it, but I still feel like it is still representing the same problem I have when it comes to having a lot of interests but not being able to focus on one thing at a time. Instead, I want to do everything and then end up just doing nothing.
Well, not really nothing. Lately, I have been watching a lot of TV shows and movies. I am watching Silo on Apple TV+ and just finished watching Ripley on Netflix. I also just watched the horrifying yet brilliant movie The Zone of Interest. My finger also hovered over the buy button for Dune 2 recently because, even though $19 is a lot, I know I will watch it enough to get my money's worth.
My point is that I want to get back into Zelda BOTW and TOTK, but I also have 5-10 books that I have backlogged to read. I am enjoying playing Pokémon on my phone, but I also want to finish Foundation on Apple TV+ that I never finished. I also want to finish writing a novel, continue to write more blog posts for Techuisite, and have been tempted to get more skilled at Swift and SwiftUI on my shiny new MacBook Pro.
I have so many interests, and focusing on just one thing is difficult. I know to get good at something like building up Link to be more powerful, or learning just a little bit of Swift every day will do wonders in the future in terms of skill. But just getting started can be hard to do when you have so many options.
Some people use extensive Notion templates to track and organize all of their interests. Others use Time Blocking to plan out their days, whether professional or personal, to allow them time for multiple tasks in a single day or week (or even months and years).
But with two kids, a long list of house chores, and an 8-5 job that requires a lot of my time, these tools have never worked for me. I like my weekends to be flexible and a little more relaxing instead of trying to plan everything out like I do during my work week.
So on top of all of these interests I have, I also have a lot of more important responsibilities, my family and home, that make it hard to focus on one thing or cause me to change interests depending on the time and mindset that I am in when I can pick up a certain gadget.
For this season, my iPhone and iPad Mini are the main tools for fulfilling my interests. Movies, TV Shows, the Delta emulator app, and social media are the things I am spending my time in and this is okay. Maybe once my kids are older and our house slows down a bit, I will be able to dip into Swift more, or finally finish that novel.
But for now, I am going to go hold my two-month-old and finish another episode of Silo before I go to bed.