The Work Lens

I finally finished one giant paper to find out that I have another one similar to it due in a week. It's still a ways off but man my classes give me no time to detox after a blow like that. I worked on that thing probably 20 hours in the last week.

Human abilities are often very contingent on our ability to focus and concentrate. If I spent 4 hours doing unfocused work, it's not even as good as 1 hour of focused work. I am so unfocused now that I realized that I had forgotten to submit my paper online, which I am now doing.

But focus and concentration does not necessarily mean that our mind is wholly consumed in the process.

In my Christian Education class, we recently discussed that the way to tell if you have truly learned something is to be able to do it competently and unconsciously. The example he used was playing an instrument. A master of an instrument plays music out of habit and with excellent muscle memory. He focuses by remembering what he did in the past instinctively.

So, in the same way, I focus my work by instinctively honing in on what I am doing, and then just let the work flow out.
It all sounds very kung fu, I know.

But, I think there's something to be said for it.
Where else would we come up with phrases like "He loses himself in his work," or "hatred consumed him."
Out of those habits, we develop skill (even though hatred is not a skill) and with skill we develop diligence.

All that to say that it's really hard to force myself to sit down and write a paper. But if I instead think of it as applying my focus unconsciously, it sounds a little better.

I basically have to trick myself into doing homework, but I'm good at it once I do.