RetirePrep, month 1b: What worries me about declining?

The PolyBlog
September 16 2024

I already addressed spiritual stuff, but this next area is a doozy. It combines a combination of three inter-related questions:

  1. What do I value most as I approach the end of my life? (Mentally and physically)
  2. What would make prolonging my life unacceptable and in what ways?
  3. What worries me about my body declining and in what ways?

In my opinion, they are all variations on the same theme. At what point does the life I have become a life I no longer want to continue?

A side quest into my mind

I’m going to go sideways for a minute. There is a TV episode I saw some time ago, a procedural of some sort. Something like Castle, Mentalist, or Bones. I can’t remember and can’t find it. Anyway, they go to a scientist’s house, investigate an apparent murder, and eventually discover that the scientist essentially committed suicide. The man had set up a computer that controlled all of the house’s basic functions, plus some scientific ones, and he gave the house the power to run it on its own if certain conditions were met. The conditions? If the scientist’s mind degraded far enough, and he could no longer solve some basic math problems, the computer would trigger the suicide pact. He set a very firm set of rules whereby if his mind deteriorated to a certain point, he wanted to end things. When he failed the math test, the computer killed him. Call it CAID — computer assistance in dying.

That episode resonates with me really strongly. I have always defined myself through my mind. I was never the athlete, never the handsomest, never the most popular. I couldn’t build things with my hands. But I could reason the sh** out of things. I was lucky to be born with a first-class mind, and if something is theoretical, I can likely understand it. Maybe not be top in the field, but my mind has almost never failed me. It’s been tricked a few times, but not a source of failure for me.

My brain is me, I am my brain. And it is the most terrifying thing in the world to me to think of a time when that brain is no longer there. That the “me” that relies on that brain to define me would no longer be there, because the brain function would be gone. Yet the decline and/or the impact of a decline is almost impossible to quantify easily. Would a 10% decline be enough? 20%? 32.758%, averaged over a repetitively tested 30 day period? The computer in the TV show did it through a failed math test for one day. What if you have an off-day? How often should I apply it to myself? I don’t know.

And equally, what about memory? If I can still reason, but don’t recognize Andrea or Jacob, what’s the point of continuing? If I no longer know the two most important people in my life, I’m also no longer me.

These are really hard topics to reason through. For example, am I saying by extension that if someone is scatter-brained and forgetful in their old age, they should be euthanized? Of course not, I’m not saying that at all. I have no views on other people’s lives, how they define themselves, what they think is important, how they view their end-of-days.

But I know that my sense of self — a combination of cognition and memory — is incredibly important to me. If I’m not me, I don’t want to continue being a bag of mostly water, either.

I just don’t know how to test that status in some quantifiable way. I don’t think it’s fair to ask Andrea, or Jacob, to make that decision for me. “Oh, Paul is a bit dotty today, that’s it, off with his head.” Yes, I know, I’m being glib about my end-of-days. Sue me, my last name is Sadler; that’s what we do.

The simple act of breathing

I also have a really strong phobia. I hate the idea of a ventilator. Like on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is okay and 10 is having my flesh slowly removed by red ants while being digested over 1000 years in a Sarlacc pit, a breathing tube down my throat probably hits about an 11 or 12.

I was extremely anxious about COVID. The stories of people who went in the hospital early on, the ups and downs of breathing tubes to keep them alive, etc. I honestly felt that if I got COVID and was hospitalized, I would say goodbye to Jacob and Andrea before I went. There’s a scene in the Matrix where he pulls a breathing tube out of himself, puking up water and stuff, etc…for me, that’s Stephen King territory. Now, I know that it isn’t meant to be permanent, and if it was, well, I’m happy to have the machine turned off. But my fear isn’t so much the tube as being conscious with a tube. If I’m knocked out completely? Go for it. Do whatever. Just don’t ever wake me up with it in.

That is likely the same for all general life-support machines. I don’t want machines keeping me alive if there is a low likelihood of any change. I’m not a wait-and-see guy. I can understand someone wanting to give it 30, 60, or 90 days to be sure, but I need to be out for it.

If I’m conscious with a tube, I think my limit is 72h. I think I could make it three days. My brother used to like to say from his time in the military that anyone could stand on their head in a pile of sh** for six months if they had to, but I think I could only make it 3d with a tube down my throat if I was conscious. After that? I’m pulling a Neo.

The odd part is that it is partly about communication, too. If I had something going on where I couldn’t speak, but I could still communicate, type, sign, write, or something, then that would be a bit different. I still couldn’t do the tube, but if I’m able to communicate, that’s a far cry from being locked inside my body. If I’m locked inside, and I can’t communicate out, even if I can hear, I’m willing to go 30d max. Even then, I don’t know if I would make it without losing my f***ing mind. But that’s about all I can imagine.

Maintaining some dignity

It’s funny, the idea of “losing one’s dignity” and it being somehow terminal. Something weird about it, when you think of “my dignity is going to kill me.” And yet, it absolutely will. I find it partly weird because I have gotten used to other things.

I got fat in my teens, spent my whole life that way, and got used to it. I have goals, but I can live with it. Compression socks and all my leg issues knocked me on my ass. It was not serious in the grand scheme of things, but it pushed me hard. I don’t know that constant/chronic issues like leg sores would let me keep an upbeat morale. On its own, an issue like that wouldn’t equal pulling the plug. But how many issues would have to happen before you decide? Or if it was chronic pain with constant nudging or impediments to enjoying life?

If I’m incontinent and have to wear a diaper, I could likely get used to it. It likely would go hand-in-hand with a significant reduction in mobility, sure, but if I was still lucid and had my mind, I could likely cope. But only in some sort of assisted living situation. I would NOT continue to do so if it meant Andrea or Jacob were the ones burdened with my feces. A week or two in an emergency? Yeah, okay, sh** happens, literally. But longer than that? It has to have a reasonably short end date, or I would need one myself. I would need that dignity and not to feel like I was burdening them, even if they were okay with it. I won’t do it.

My overall mobility is a trickier situation, though. If I lose my driver’s license, it’s annoying, but I’m not stepping in front of a bus. Being in a wheelchair likely would need some sort of assisted living arrangement, again, just to be functional. I think I would need to feel like there was still some element of independence. If I’m in hospice, and the end is nigh, I’d rather it was sooner than later.

Oddly, though, I feel relatively unconcerned about being alone. If Andrea is gone, or Jacob isn’t around much, but I can still function, can still watch TV, still write perhaps, that might be enough. I’d rather NOT be alone, of course, but I also don’t want dozens of people around. Mostly I think I would want Andrea and Jacob, and someone who could support them both.

Where do I want to die

This isn’t much of a surprise, I suppose. I know lots of people who want to die at home. I absolutely do not. I’ll be cranky, I’m sure, but I want to be in a hospital room or hospice or clinic or drifting out to sea on an ice floe. I hate the idea of burdening anyone with my passing at home. So much involved, it has no attraction for me. Which isn’t to say it’s easier for everyone if I’m in a hospital. My parents both died in a hospital, one quick and one slow. Quick was hard, slow was worse. I’d love to be able to dictate the timing, through MAID or something similar. And I accept that Andrea or Jacob or others might not agree with my decision. I could hold on, I could fight something, there might be a change, there might be an aurora on the weekend. There will always be other things that I will miss. That happens when you die. And on some level, I already accept that. I think. I am not ready to depart yet, and I hope I have another 30 years-ish. But I want them to be good years. If they’re not, then I don’t want them.

I wonder if at the end, my choice of “where” will be predecided. There are many things that would lead me to say, “Okay, I’m done”. But that’s not the way Canadian medicine works. There’s MAID, but some of the things I have in mind as dealbreakers would not fit most of their definitions. Does that mean I would have to go to Oregon? Vermont? Europe? An alcohol-fueled ride through a battery of saved-up pills? I hope not. I hope it’s civilized and can be done in Canada. If I even have a choice.

I know I don’t want heroic measures if my life would still be severely limited after “recovery”. That will take some time to spell out for Andrea as my likely substitute decision-maker.

Can I create a mental test?

I think I can, in fact, create a quantifiable scale for myself. Not a test that would work for everyone, but one that would work for me. Obviously, if it was points for each element, and a dealbreaker was 50 points, for example, then a breathing tube would be > 50 all on its own. Other aspects from above would be able to be rated and assigned points too. At some point, that collection of “declination” points would add up to some threshold that would say, “Okay, pull the plug”. Or at least that I’m getting closer to that point. Something a bit arbitrary that someone could point to if they had to convince a doctor or a judge or a lawyer that this was, in fact, reflective of my wishes.

I still have a gap though. One that I can’t wrap my head around. My brother Don suffered from a series of mental health issues in his final years, maybe his whole life even. Depression was a regular dark companion. I have it, too. Some darkness, some anxiety, some introversion perhaps. If I’m in pain, will my judgment be clouded? Would I make a different decision if the chemicals in my brain were not leading me deeper into darkness? Do I need to consider what I would consider tolerable not only if I’m bareknuckling it but also riding a cloud of meds? I don’t know.

ACTION ITEMS:
– Identify the 4-5 areas to be part of my “list of concerns”
– Research quantifiable scales that already exist for those areas
– Create a sample test and rating system and field test it
– Consider the “ratings” from PoV of a) unaffected, b) affected, c) affected but medicated for mood

I feel like I haven’t completely nailed this set of concerns, nor did I expect to, I guess. It’s a start. In future posts, I’ll see where some of these link into legal instruments, too, and I’ll have to revisit them to make them more definitive for Andrea to understand.

Retirement Preparation (RetPrep), month 1a: My spiritual needs at end-of-life

The PolyBlog
September 15 2024

I mentioned in my previous posts that I would be addressing 12 aspects of my life over the next year to help me prepare for retirement in three years. The general premise is that most people plan for their finances, but not the other areas of their life to the same degree, and I want to mentally prepare myself. This month’s series of posts will cover one of the most important groups of issues in preparing for retirement — the big three, if you listen to some organizations. End-of-life plans,

I confess that I assumed as I went that I would have the answers for each topic by the time I finished each month. Or, more pointedly, that I would have the exact plan for the remaining time up to my retirement and thus be fully ready for my big day. Yet, as I have looked at the topic this month, and even some of the future topics, I realized that I may not be quite as solution-oriented as I expected. Instead, some of what I’ll come up with may be simply a plan-to-have-a-plan to get to my retirement plan. I may not have the full answer or even a good action yet.

I don’t know why that surprised me, but it does. Some questions may take me several months, or even years, to truly decide what I want to do. Anyhow, on with the show. Today, I’m starting with end-of-life planning.

As mentioned, most people think of retirement in terms of how they finance their life, not in terms of how it is all going to end. I started doing some reading on what end-of-life (EoL) discussions should look like, the areas that it might cover. Some of the readings were from governments, focusing mainly on getting your legal affairs in order; others were broader in focus, making sure you have the social, emotional and religious aspects of dying covered. Still others focused only on the health side or others focused on the practical side for those left behind, with binders of important numbers and documents.

Almost all of the sources talked mainly about pre-death and after-death issues, and generally argued that the best way to handle all of it was to know what you want and to have a candid discussion, however hard, with those who will manage your affairs when you’re gone. I did like the idea that they collectively suggested of talking to various groups for information and perspective:

  • Family
  • Friends
  • Substitute decision-makers
  • Health care providers (to get accurate medical info)
  • Financial advisors (to have an up-to-date and accurate financial picture)
  • Legal advisors (to ensure all the instruments are in place, if/when needed)

Yet, therein lies the first rub for not having a full “answer” to my questions. That is not a one-and-done exercise. I can’t say, “Okay, let’s blast through everything on Tuesday” and schedule my family at 9:00 a.m., my friends at 9:45, etc. That’s not the way that will work. Nor are the questions small. Let’s take a stab at the first one, as it may help contextualize things for everything else (spoiler alert — it doesn’t for me, but it does for a lot of people).

Q1: Do I have any religious or spiritual beliefs to address in the EoL process?

This includes my ongoing care, pre-death, or for my actual funeral. I initially thought, “Not really”. However, once I picked at things a little bit, there were things I would like and others to avoid.

For my ongoing care, I can’t think of any, that’s still true. I don’t need regular visits or to attend mass, nor do I feel the need for regular spiritual comfort or guidance. If I struggle with my mental health near the end, or more mood to be more specific, it might change.

For pre-death, my thoughts turned a bit broader than I expected. I am somewhat comforted by the idea of signing off from this mortal coil. In Catholicism, that would typically be a final confession and the administering of last rites. I am long lapsed from Catholicism, and I don’t believe in the literal idea of a Father, Son and Holy Ghost in any form that our brains have conjured. I believe in the possibility of a higher power, but if it exists, to me it is more like a collective consciousness of the universe or a higher plain of existence. I doubt it exists, but it’s the only thing that makes sense to me. I confess that I still pray occasionally. Not to a deity of form and shape but to that larger universe. More like sending out good thoughts into the void. I don’t pray for specific things, I offer my gratitude for the life I have lived and the people in it, and a hope for strength. More of a mental bargain with the universe than a prayer, if that makes sense. And yet, I like the idea of some sort of final reckoning. It’s not a religious judgment day but a personal one. To look back at my life, to accept that the end is coming, and to be at peace with what I have experienced. Hopefully, it would be a mental preparation to allow me to say goodbye graciously to those who have improved my life by being part of it.

And I guess I would want a professional to help guide me through that conversation with myself. Maybe it’s the ritual aspect, an enhancement to the thought process. Maybe it’s the formality of it. But I think I would like that. Ideally, it would be someone I know, but that’s not likely. I’m not looking to go back to church or start my own cult. 🙂 I suspect, though, that I would be willing to have a spiritual advisor in a hospital stop by for a chat. The only person I can think of at the moment for an individual would be a friend of a friend, Hope, who is a military chaplain. I’ve chatted with her before when I struggled with the concept of faith and a life well-lived, but she’s not in Ottawa, nor are we close. But someone “like” her? There’s a book by a chaplain in the US called “Here If You Need Me” about her experiences dealing with state parks, accidents, rescues, etc. Someone like her, I think. But it could equally be a mental health professional, a social worker perhaps, instead. I used to talk regularly with a social worker who retired from CHEO, but that relationship has mostly run its course. She’s aged out of the therapy business. Or it could even be some form of simple toast ceremony, like a classic Chinese tea ceremony. A way to honour my passing while I’m still alive and that I can take a sip of something and something broader people could participate in. I don’t have an actual answer, just an inkling. It will take some more thought in the coming years/months.

For the funeral stuff, that’s easier. I know that I don’t want a religious ceremony with a service. I haven’t yet fully decided on cremation (my leaning) over burial (there’s probably some form of transubstantiation phobia going on tied to being worm food for eternity), but I like what we did for my mom at the funeral home in terms of a small get-together and some form of eulogy or at least a toast to my memory. It doesn’t have to be a full eulogy or anything, I know how hard it is to do them. And I will have already written my own, of sorts. I will have a goodbye message ready to upload and share after my death. My own obituary, perhaps, along with perhaps some goodbye messages. Regardless, I love the idea of a small event, some happy music. A playlist of the 70s and 80s. It should not be a sad mourning, but hopefully something more upbeat with jokes and laughter. An Irish wake, drubbed downward to be less about the drunken brawling and more about the smiles. Like the PandA wedding, without the photos, ceremony and elaborate planning. A cruise on the river would be perfect, or at least somewhere near water. (The water theme will return in future posts.) But in the end, that “event” is not about me, it’s about comforting those that are left behind. They will be the final arbiter of what it should look like and what would make them feel better.

For actual funeral arrangements, Andrea and I will still have to figure out some funeral plans, whether we buy plots, etc. But the more we can plan it out in advance, the less work for Jacob, I hope.

Finally, on organ donation, I’m totally open to anyone harvesting anything useful. What’s left won’t be me; it will simply be raw material to be reused or recycled.

These initial thoughts have given me six action items on my retirement to-do list. I can write my goodbye messages and obituary, and sign organ donation forms. Those are easy and concrete. The sign-off ritual, funeral arrangements, and wake options are less direct though, as I mentioned at the beginning. It is not so much a plan as a plan-to-have-a-plan. And I won’t nail them in the next month. Those may be part of the last two years before retirement aka the pre-retirement plan. I’m still in the planning of the pre-retirement phase. 🙂

ACTION ITEMS:
– Design an EoL “sign-off” ritual
– Make funeral arrangements
– Write goodbye message(s)
– Write own obituary
– Suggest options for wake/visitation
– Sign new forms for organ donation

And if you’ve read this far, I’d be happy to hear any ideas for pre-death / “live” ceremonies or suggestions for a wake/visitation!

Planning for retirement: The next 12 months

The PolyBlog
September 13 2024

I mentioned in a previous post (or ten or twenty of them) that I’ll be retiring in approximately 3 years. August 2027 is my expected date. Some things may change between now and then, particularly on the finance side, but that’s the current goal.

I have found that most retirement guides generally discuss financial investments as their primary focus. It’s the obvious part of the question—when can you afford to retire? If you could retire now and not have to work anymore, wouldn’t you do that? Not necessarily. Some people love the feeling they get from their work. But obviously, finances are perhaps the largest component for almost everyone.

Yet I know that there are just as important questions for me to answer on the health side. One of the various resources that I looked at framed it this way:

You know how much you need to invest financially to retire. Have you made the same health investments or social network investments? What about learning investments?

I have a decent idea of what I want to do when I retire. I am going to use the next 12 months to see if I have the right investment plan for those other areas so that when I reach my magical date, I will be ready in all spectrums. Here’s the plan, but I haven’t quite figured out the order:

  • Financial and legal issues
  • Health and fitness
  • Writing
  • Travel
  • Astronomy
  • Reading
  • Learning
  • Games and gaming
  • Cooking
  • Crafting
  • Volunteering
  • Social network

Twelve months and twelve headings is not a coincidence, but I could probably list a bunch as simply subheadings under something like “hobbies”. Except there is a bit of a legacy question, maybe an identity crisis buried in there too.

One question I liked in one resource was, “What do you want people to say about you when you die?”. Aside from your various interpersonal qualities (talking too much, telling lame Dad jokes, etc.), is there something you want to be remembered for aside from your “job”? Is it simply father, husband, son vis-a-vis relations with others, or something more intrinsic / internal to you, like being a painter or a runner?

If I am honest with myself, I probably wish that people would have seen me as a writer first, followed by a lifelong learner, and then somewhere down the list, add in astronomer, reader, and perhaps a crafter in multiple areas. Not an athlete, not a handyman, but maybe some basic abilities too.

Month 1, I’m starting with financial and legal issues. Feel free to tell me your own thoughts on my plan, I’m doing this openly in the hopes it might spark feedback from others too. Tally ho!

Struggling a bit this week…

The PolyBlog
September 12 2024

Recently, I’ve been doing a bunch of pre-planning work for my preparations related to retirement in three years, and that was going pretty well. In addition to my new list of rituals to add to my “execution”, I have a list of about 12 topics that I want to work through one per month over the next year. In effect, figuring out what I need to figure out before I retire. The obvious one is finances, but I also combine that with legal, and it encompasses things like wills, powers of attorney, and even some end-of-life planning. That one may seem more like health, but I’ve lumped it with legal. More like long-term health and what I need to put in place legally to support those outcomes. And that is generally going well. In typical PolyWogg fashion, it’s a plan on how to pre-plan my retirement plan. 🙂 My happy place.

Which is good as the rest of my life is going bonkers.

On the positive side, I managed to start my 3D printer up yesterday. Printed two small test prints, didn’t turn out perfect, but they printed at least. Now I just need to dial it in more. I felt like I needed a win or at least a break-through for trying it. I didn’t even know where to start, to be honest. I bought the printer 28 months ago, and paid someone 20 months ago to set it up for me, get it all going. It has sat in my basement ever since. I knew generally how to print stuff, but I had no idea how to get it to the point of actually being ready to print. No manual, no instructions. Apparently, there was an SD card that came with it (I did know there was one but just thought it was for transferring files from computer to printer) and that little SD card has all the instructions on it, as well as the software I need. Found out from the vendor, opened the SD card, and voila! There are the instructions in nice little folders named 1-17 for different “stages” of using the printer. 1-2 were for the initial setup and testing, 3 was a test file you could print directly, and 4-6 were different software options to try. 7 and beyond deal with various aspects of maintenance and more advanced setup options. I followed 1-3 and printed two test prints! 4-6 gave me the software to do new stuff of my own! It’s not rocking and rolling fully, but I’m lightyears ahead of where I was. Which feels like the end of the positive side.

In the meh category, work is fine, nothing exciting. I’m finding it hard to establish a good rhythm for work, and it has been this way for months. Between some short-term leave, summer holidays, acting, etc., I haven’t felt like I was doing my normal job since May and it’s taking a bit of a toll. I have a French test at the start of November, and while I am normally nervous going into the tests, my confidence is really low at the moment.

I was really stressed back in May trying to juggle working at the office, my schedule, Andrea’s schedule and Jacob’s day-to-day schedule changes for his concussion stuff. We found a scheduling solution, he got through June, and I really thought we would have some improvements for September. They even seemed to be working. Jacob did more classes last week than almost the entire second semester last year, annnnd this week he’s back to missing 3 days out of 4 so far. So frustrating.

I’ve been trying to adjust to the new schedule and found an option to ask for an extension for some extra flex right now, as I thought he would be back to a normal or regular schedule in a couple of weeks. But this week was nothing resembling a promising sign.

I’m generally copacetic about return-to-office changes for me at work. We all have to upgrade from 2d/week to 3d/week, with some extra rigour attached, and that was generally okay with me. It’s a challenge to adapt, sure, but better than 5d/week, and most of the complaints I see are of the “suck it up, buttercup” variety. Whether we like it or not is irrelevant. It could be worse, could be better.

But then Andrea took over an hour to get home from a local office from which she could have walked and made it home faster. Stupid transit delays, which is just a nightmare for everyone. And with the unreliability, more people are driving. For me, it will be a challenge. The offices are more packed, and we don’t have assigned seating at the local office, so you reserve in advance to have a guaranteed space, but which space is open depends on when you get there. If you’re there at 6:00 a.m., like a colleague, she can sit anywhere she wants. If you’re there up to 8:00, lots of choice. After 8:00 a.m., it gets decidedly less and less flexible. But I can sit almost anywhere, just annoying to worry about. And for me, if I’m driving Jacob to school still, then I won’t get to the building until close to 9:00 a.m. Not great.

Every other week, we are supposed to go into the mother ship. Which was fine. When I was there 5d/week, I had indoor parking. Expensive, but with Andrea and I usually commuting together, the convenience balanced out the cost. They switched to daily parking which was perfect. But as of today, they announced that they’re cancelling all daily parking and going back to monthly only. The problem with this is that for anyone who is not going into that building at least 3d / week, it’s not worth it. $200 to park once or twice a month? I don’t think so. Sooo, no problem, just park in a nearby lot. Except if you get there at 9:00, there are no spots anywhere. Over the last 7 years, they’ve removed about 50% of the parking spots in the area. People trying to park after 8:30 this week have already said, “all the lots were full”, and they ended up going back home. With the building parking switching back to monthly, this means another 1500 commuters vying for the lots that were full by 8:30, and will now be full by 7:30. In other words, I literally will have no option to drop Jacob at school and go to the office unless I can drop him by 7:15 at the latest.

On band days, that might work. If he can stay in band. If he can attend regularly. If we can find something that will f***ing help him. Cuz we thought we had some stuff working and it’s stopped.

Then, just for fun, my health has sucked this week. Monday was the start of my big plan to fix my back, get it back in proper functioning order, and I started with osteo & massage treatment at 9:00 a.m. Great. Except it wasn’t great. He did some work on my stomach which has been upset of late, and it messed me up royally for Monday and Tuesday. He worked on my legs and the joints hated it later. I did chiro last night, and it helped my upper back, but my lower back was screaming at me most of the day.

Today? My mental health took a giant dump on my body. I’m really stressed about the RTO stuff suddenly, as I’m going to have to adapt my work times considerably just to comply, which is fine generally. I don’t care about that much. I care that it means I have to adjust my support for Jacob quite a bit. Some of the flex that I had that was working for him is gone now. I don’t know what to do about it, and I don’t know how to help him.

I took 3d sick earlier this week with the osteo impact, and today I’m taking a personal day. Great. So much for getting a routine going.

I’m considering just taking 3m sick leave for mental stuff, but the problem with that is that it just delays the problem. 3m from now looks no different than today does. There’s no indication it will be any different. I don’t have a solution, or to be blunt with myself, I don’t have any solutions I like much.

The likely solution is that I’ll have to start going into work for 7:00 a.m. or so to get a parking spot and be able to leave on time to get Jacob from school. Which means Jacob will have to get himself to school which will add a lot of friction to him going at all and increase his absences. Great. But I don’t have an option to handle getting him there and still have any options for commuting. On days in the mothership, I’ll likely have to switch to transit and Jacob will just be on his own for commuting, which again means he likely won’t go.

FML right now. It’ll get better, but it’s annoying me a lot today.

Goal-setting and rituals — a summary of techniques

The PolyBlog
September 8 2024

So, at the end of my previous post, I noted that I would do a quick summary of the techniques, and I have a very specific reason for doing so.

I struggle to achieve some of my goals. I’m committed to them; they’re important; but I get overwhelmed and lag. I need something more to help kick my butt. A checklist isn’t enough for those ones. So, I’m making a list in this very pedestrian fashion so that I can then pick and choose which “enhancements” / “rituals” I can add for specific goals that are challenging me.

Here’s my list:

  1. Simple rituals
    • List the goals
    • Include checkboxes when completed
    • Schedule the activity
    • Add a duration element
    • Add a quantity element
    • Gamify to be a “chain” of achievements (the Seinfeld method)
  2. Social engineering
    • Public announcement
    • Tribal (join a group)
    • Informal accountability (buddy)
    • Formal accountability (paid professional)
  3. Participation and completion rituals using gamification
    • Performance / high score / personal best
    • Completion / participation element
  4. Certification and combination rituals
    • Validation of completion (external)
    • Validation by test (standard)
    • Combination (through point systems)
  5. Reward rituals
    • Simple
    • Combination

I’m a little shocked, to be honest. I knew that I hadn’t paid enough attention to rituals in goal-setting, hence my desire to work through this. I did NOT expect so many choices when I was done with my curation, and I’m sure I haven’t thought of them all. I know, for example, that I focused on ritual over ceremony, leaving out options where part of a “reward” or “completion” might be some form of party or ceremony to acknowledge that I’ve achieved something.

It is a good list; let’s see if it can help me prepare for retirement.