[n.yumikim]

Can you guys get stuff done when you're happy? I feel like I have to ruin my mood to actually get stuff done. I enter my work everyday smiling, only to then force convince myself that I'm incompetent to get myself to actually work.

Thoughts?

 

[LimeDegree]

Being in a content state increases how long I get distracted by something or someone else.

I do my best work when I am red-lined irritated, furious, etc., and I morph into a task-accomplishing juggernaut for a while. I'm not suddenly upping my work efforts to accomplish a task better though, I am merely 'getting in the zone' in order to release frustration. It really helps when you have a job were you get to shove heavy objects with all your might. Good times.

 

[Boxter9]

It depends on the nature of the work. If it involves other people, I'll probably get better result if I'm happy; otherwise, it's best if I turn into Hulk for awhile.

 

[n.yumikim]

It depends on the nature of the work. If it involves other people, I'll probably get better result if I'm happy; otherwise, it's best if I turn into Hulk for awhile.

Yeah, I totally forgot to mention the nature of the work. Mine is simple, menial tasks, like writing lesson plans, logistics, data entry. Indeed when it involves people and sales, our electrifying happiness is an ultra plus

 

[Devin87]

I'm a 2nd grade teacher, so it depends. When I'm doing lessons, the kids seem to learn more when I'm in my uber-ENTP happy, inventive, spur of the moment mood. You know-- when I can throw my lesson plans out the window and say "We're not gonna read our Science books! We're gonna.... Go outside! And... I'll be the Sun and you can be planets and you can orbit and rotate around me! Yeah! That'll be fun!" Of course, other times I've got to be all serious to get things done because too many fun activities in a row, while I'm happy with them, tend to make the kids too crazy. In that case I've got to calm myself down.

My summer job, otoh, I need to be serious most of the time. Our job is to help people have fun, so we're supposed to be outgoing and fun-loving, but we've got to keep people safe first and foremost. Sometimes I have trouble balancing those things. I get on the ego high BusinessMan was talking about in another thread and I'm walking around interacting with everyone and having a good time and feeling like the most awesome guy in the world until the end of the day comes and I find out I was so busy running around being king that I forgot to do some essential thing and get chewed out by three different people. That'll bring you down off your ego high pretty quickly. So with that job I try to first get everything done and then I let myself get a *little* fun. But I really have to keep myself in check or I start forgetting things and everything goes to hell and I've got a manager twice my size crawling up my butt. So yeah...

 

[aef8234]

Have you tried getting stuff done while you're happy?
It's highly contradicting.

 

[n.yumikim]

Have you tried getting stuff done while you're happy?
It's highly contradicting.

I feel intoxicated and high when I'm happy.
I dance and dance and blabber with my Ne.
The paper remains unfinished.

 

[aef8234]

I feel intoxicated and high when I'm happy.
I dance and dance and blabber with my Ne.
The paper remains unfinished.

Exactly.
It's... like when you're high...
And you have this.. awesome idea about this awesome thing, and you suddenly realize you should write it down.
-a couple of hours later-
*sees note*
"Don't forget to remember not to forget about that awesome stuff we need to remember not to forget just now"
-drawing of.. some egg thing-

Exactly like that. You can get ideas sure, but how are you going to use it when time all around is going all wibbley wobbly timey wimey and stuff.

 

[n.yumikim]

Exactly.
It's... like when you're high...
And you have this.. awesome idea about this awesome thing, and you suddenly realize you should write it down.
-a couple of hours later-
*sees note*
"Don't forget to remember not to forget about that awesome stuff we need to remember not to forget just now"
-drawing of.. some egg thing-

Exactly like that. You can get ideas sure, but how are you going to use it when time all around is going all wibbley wobbly timey wimey and stuff.

heh. i like your word jumbles. very representing.

 

[aef8234]

heh. i like your word jumbles. very representing.

Don't forget the reference, can't get enough of the reference.
It's just a shame people don't get it when it's used out of forums.

 

[chittychitty LightNING]

Can you guys get stuff done when you're happy? I feel like I have to ruin my mood to actually get stuff done. I enter my work everyday smiling, only to then force convince myself that I'm incompetent to get myself to actually work.

Thoughts?

This is interesting. Bear with me here, but what if it's possible you are in a state of self-sabotage? In other words, you do not believe yourself deserving of task completion. I notice fear similar to this on occasion, like I fear being held highly for getting work done, so I do not do it. If I don't do the work, there will not exist the potential for my mood to be affected negatively. Catch-22 suggests it will happen anyway, and usually as a direct result of not doing it in the first place.

 

[SlowPoke68]

This is interesting. Bear with me here, but what if it's possible you are in a state of self-sabotage? In other words, you do not believe yourself deserving of task completion. I notice fear similar to this on occasion, like I fear being held highly for getting work done, so I do not do it. If I don't do the work, there will not exist the potential for my mood to be affected negatively. Catch-22 suggests it will happen anyway, and usually as a direct result of not doing it in the first place.

That's an advanced understanding showing maturity. Most of us are happy doing basically nothing, as long as there is someone to talk to about it.

 

[n.yumikim]

This is interesting. Bear with me here, but what if it's possible you are in a state of self-sabotage? In other words, you do not believe yourself deserving of task completion. I notice fear similar to this on occasion, like I fear being held highly for getting work done, so I do not do it. If I don't do the work, there will not exist the potential for my mood to be affected negatively. Catch-22 suggests it will happen anyway, and usually as a direct result of not doing it in the first place.

If you're referring to the situation where you don't do anything at all to avoid doing something and then failing, that's not me. At least much anymore. Let me know what you actually mean.

As for my situation, I do get a lot of things done, but chiefly when I am in the mindset that in order to get this done, I must be a better person (deserving of this task completion), and because I need to be a better person for this task, I am currently not as competent as I should be, and thus I am incompetent, and thus I must buckle down, forego the complacent, happy thoughts, and get to work.

 

[BusinessMan]

I find an emotionally blank state works best. But as always, I thrive best when under pressure.

 

[n.yumikim]

I find an emotionally blank state works best. But as always, I thrive best when under pressure.

Yes! I forgot to qualify with that. I get indignant/negative first--urging me to get to work. Then, I use that energy to zone out of emotions and into a state of pure information processing and analyses.

 

[Psyphon]

I try not to ever get mad. I do need a trigger to get into that zone though. I spend most of my day at work goofing off actually. People ask me how I get anything done while I'm fooling around. I tell them "because I need to add some pressure to the situation".

The way I figure it I have about 10 hours of the day to fit my work into. If I work at a slow steady numb pace it might actually take that long. So instead I do a little math. I inventory how long I think my work will take if I go at top speed. Lets say for the sake of explanation that I think I can do everything I have to do that day in 3 hours. Once I figure that out I just goof off for 4.5 hours, do a bunch of prep work for about 30 min ... and then goof off for another 3 hours, leaving me with about 2 hours to get done with my last 2.5 hours worth of work. Then I get to have fun for the rest of the day seeing if I can beat my estimate. I don't usually lose.

 

[n.yumikim]

Don't forget the reference, can't get enough of the reference.
It's just a shame people don't get it when it's used out of forums.

LOL coincidence. I stumbled upon what you were saying today on a page of favorite quotes.

"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint - it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly... time-y wimey... stuff." -The Doctor

 

[bellisaurius]

I use anger if I need to make myself face up to some concern regarding other people. I hold back from expressing it, but I find it useful to get over the hump of worry about hurting possible relationships. Otherwise, anger and frustration are too close for me to be able to use it.

For work, if it requires focus, I find sadness to be more useful (if I make the emotion myself, it's more like emptiness, or feeling sick). My theory is that in my normal emotional state I have a couple lines of thought going on, and I could jump into any of them at a given moment, thereby derailing my work. If I'm kinda sad, though, I only have one train of thought ie whatever's making me feel down; so in some sense, less distraction in my head.

 

[n.yumikim]

I use anger if I need to make myself face up to some concern regarding other people. I hold back from expressing it, but I find it useful to get over the hump of worry about hurting possible relationships. Otherwise, anger and frustration are too close for me to be able to use it.

For work, if it requires focus, I find sadness to be more useful (if I make the emotion myself, it's more like emptiness, or feeling sick). My theory is that in my normal emotional state I have a couple lines of thought going on, and I could jump into any of them at a given moment, thereby derailing my work. If I'm kinda sad, though, I only have one train of thought ie whatever's making me feel down; so in some sense, less distraction in my head.

The disillusioned state? This is amazingly worded and thought out. Seriously. Makes a lot of sense.

When I was inputting data the other day, it was really tedious and boring but I was working as fast - while double checking - as I could. Then I heard some girl finished some task quickly and people were congratulating her; I immediately threw myself into some disillusioned state that I was incompetent and was disappearing into some abyss of nothingness. For every student, I repeated virtually exactly this, "Name. Grade, School. Move Forward. Student Email, Mother Email, Father Email. Don't be slow. Student Number, Mother Number, Father Number. Don't let the world pass you by. Birthday. Mother Name. Father Name. Sibling Name. Keep going. Due diligence. Dont let the world pass you by."

It was more of an unemotional, empty state with a tinge of sadness rather than frustration, now that I think about it.

 

[bellisaurius]

The disillusioned state? This is amazingly worded and thought out. Seriously. Makes a lot of sense.

When I was inputting data the other day, it was really tedious and boring but I was working as fast - while double checking - as I could. Then I heard some girl finished some task quickly and people were congratulating her; I immediately threw myself into some disillusioned state that I was incompetent and was disappearing into some abyss of nothingness. For every student, I repeated virtually exactly this, "Name. Grade, School. Move Forward. Student Email, Mother Email, Father Email. Don't be slow. Student Number, Mother Number, Father Number. Don't let the world pass you by. Birthday. Mother Name. Father Name. Sibling Name. Keep going. Due diligence. Dont let the world pass you by."

It was more of an unemotional, empty state with a tinge of sadness rather than frustration, now that I think about it.

Good writing, btw; very evocative imagery. That was a bit like reading an excerpt of an existentialist novel. "I have become Sartre, destroyer of happiness..."

Also, next week: The uses and abuses of ennui.