Over the course of Sunday and Monday, I sought to measure the times that I would do anything that didn’t contribute to my happiness or my goals. This included scrolling on Instagram, laying in bed, staring off into space, etc. This is a behavior that I often have but don’t enjoy, so I wanted to measure it.
Over Sunday and Monday, here are the times I noticed myself ‘rotting’, or doing nothing:
Sunday morning around 9am: laying in my bed for an extra hour before my clean shift
Sunday afternoon around 1pm: scrolling on Instagram for around 2 hours before cook shift
Sunday evening around 7pm: scrolling on Instagram for half an hour before meeting with friends
Sunday night around 11pm: not focusing while working around friends for around half an hour
Monday morning around 7:50am: laying in bed for an extra half hour before my run
Monday evening around 7:30pm: scrolling on Reels for an hour before starting urgent psets
Monday night around 11:30pm: scrolling on Reels for 15 mins after finishing work
What I noticed is that a lot of my rotting time is during transitions: the transition between waking up and getting out of bed, the time in between or before scheduled events, and the time after finishing a chunk of work or an event.
Next time, what I would do differently is define what I mean by rotting. After all, if I spent 15 minutes on my phone but not on Instagram, this might be necessary phone time to catch up on notifications. By having clearer definitions, I can measure myself more accurately.
Below, I’ve drawn a connection circle that shows that several types of rotting (including laying in bed and scrolling on instagram) are connected to causes like underestimating my work, feeling like I have an empty schedule, etc. These causes are also related to each other.
Below, I’ve drawn a fish diagram to dissect four major causes of rotting, including people, measurement, environment, and method.
