five more minutes

The alarm clock goes off, signaling a day of busyness that's about to begin. In your grogginess, you reach for the offending machine, hit the snooze button and enjoy five more minutes of escaping reality.

Today, I thought about what would happen if we changed our "five more minutes" snooze mentality. Instead of something that will feed our laziness, maybe we can think about 5 More Minutes as a test of our resolve and as a tool towards single-mindedness and hopefully improved productivity. This is a habit that many successful ones already have, but like many others, I struggle with it. Hence, this effort at a little shift in perspective. I hope it helps :)

Thanks to the brownie test, I've become quite addicted to testing my determination. The latest episode happened at work during a relatively light day. I was tempted to go on Facebook quite frequently. One time, I glanced upon the clock and instantly thought, "Wait, I'll test myself. I'll go on Facebook in 30 minutes." After 30 minutes, I got on the site but thought to myself, "No, five more minutes". And I've been giving myself five more minutes, and yet even five more minutes. After giving so many five minute sets, it started to seem silly to not go full throttle and just give it 30 more minutes, or (gasp!) an hour. In the process, I was freeing up time for myself to do work and little errands for myself. Bonus: I wasn't thinking about Facebook that frequently anymore, and I wasn't cluttering up my friends' feeds!
 
I couldn't help but think that maybe redefining the "five more minutes" snooze mentality to 5 More Minutes of hitting the snooze button on the unimportant is the way to go. It's like a strength-building exercise. Imagine yourself hitting a snooze button every time you're tempted or distracted, the 5 More Minutes won't hurt. Try it and let's build our anti-distraction muscle together!

a boy in the house

There is a boy in the house living with us at the moment. He is the grandson of our kasambahay who says she had to take the boy away from immediate family members who are not good influences. He is a wee boy, tiny for a four-year-old. He is cross-eyed on the left and his beautiful black and shiny hair is in a classic bowl cut. 

I took to him immediately. I love kids, but there are special kids who just capture your heart. When he plays, it's like he's making movies, complete with dialogue, sound effects and premises. He makes up songs in a snap. and he tries valiantly to help his lola around the house. 

His name sounds rich, Giancarlo, but he likes to be called Dagul ("big guy").

A few days ago I got him a banana-caramel treat from a coffee shop. When I looked for him when I got home, he was already asleep. His lola said "Ay kaya pala sabi niya uuwian mo daw siya (That's why he said you were going to bring him something)". The next morning, while he was playing on his play banig, I gave him the slice. He peeked into the paper bag, held it, and just looked at me for the longest time, at least long enough for him to blink several times. I thought he was going to cry or something (glad he didn't). He didn't say thank you (and I'm not sure he knows how to), but the look he gave me said it well enough. He took a bite and smiled at me.

The other day I asked him for a hug, and it's like he didn't know what to do with his arms. His lola said "Nakalimutan mo na kung paano yumakap (You have forgotten how to hug)". It broke my heart. How often did he get hugs where he used to live? And I couldn't help but admire his spirit--still bright despite not getting everything a child should be getting. I've a mind to send him to school (but will need to make inquiries). For some strange reason, I want him to have a good future, or at least a fighting chance. 

I knew it, falling for a boy is always trouble, the good kind. 

Dagul, my favorite big little man

the brownie test

I love brownies. I love them to death. Chocolate, with nuts, with oatmeal, with cream cheese... as long as they are fudgy and sweet and crumbles and goops, please, put them in my mouth.

I have a minor personal crisis today and so decided to order one. It arrived 2.5 hours ago. I had just finished a salad, yet I wanted to finish off the brownie immediately in response to the mini-crisis. I was having a hard time convincing myself to wait. I paused from all the rationalization, which gave me precious seconds to realize I could change my internal script.

Instead of "How and why should I resist this treat when I'm feeling so low", I thought "This is a chance for me to challenge myself. If I can succeed in this small thing, I can succeed in other small things that will build up to bigger things later". And there's nothing more motivating to me than a good challenge and the thought of growing the ability to go through even bigger challenges.

I gave myself until 3pm to eat the brownie, and I'm surprised to know that, in 3 minutes, i will nibble on this tasty thing and know for certain I can have more delicious experiences in the future.