Freedom!
Yesterday on the train to meet Erica for a dinner/movie date (Korean food + Harry Potter IMAX = fantastic date night) I was reading the NY Times magazine from last Sunday. The reason I was reading it was because I had forgotten to bring pens with me. Totally unheard of. I am always awash with myriad Sharpies and whatever pens I forgot to remove from my ponytail at the end of my bar shift at Superfine, so it’s super, super frustrating to dig in my bag and find not one thing to write with. And, it’s been happening pretty frequently these past few weeks. For some reason I’m off my writing utensils game lately and I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the cold weather.
Anyway. The point is, I bought the magazine expressly with the intention of struggling with the Sunday crossword on the way to Manhattan and when I realized there was no pen in my bag and I couldn’t locate one rolling around on the floor of my subway car, I was reduced to actually reading the content. And boy, am I glad I did.
Inside the magazine there was an interview with Nora Ephron and in that article she mentioned what is now my new, all-time favorite software application: Freedom.
Switching Off Online Distraction
Freedom is a simple productivity application that locks you away from the internet on Mac or Windows computers for up to eight hours at a time. Freedom frees you from distractions, allowing you time to write, analyze, code, or create. At the end of your offline period, Freedom allows you back on the internet.
Brilliant, eh? I don’t know about you, but I am AWFUL at staying focused and keeping myself on one task at a time. And, the busier I get with all this freelance writing (yay!), the more I need to make sure I can get assignments done and turned around in a timely manner. The thing is, the busier I get with all this freelance writing (yay again!), the more frequently I get emails coming in and and the more frequently I find myself being pulled away from the work I’m working on. It’s blowing my efficiency and is leading to me spending a lot (a LOT) more time on projects than I can actually bill for. Not good and not the point of invoicing by the hour.
So. Freedom. It may seem drastic to have to resort to a gimmicky software program to force oneself into discipline, but facts is facts. I need it and now I have it. Thank you, Nora.
As I was looking into Freedom and watching the associated videos, I learned that there is a whole world of gimmicky software out there for slackers just like me! There’s Rescue Time and Anti-Social and all sorts of other programs you can download to either shame yourself into using your time more wisely or prevent you from having any extra-curricular online fun at all!
With the trial version you get five free sessions, after that it’s only $10. CH-eap and, if used properly, totally worth it.
Freedom enforces freedom; you’ll need to reboot if you want to get back online while Freedom’s running. The hassle of rebooting means you’re less likely to cheat, and you’ll enjoy enhanced productivity. If you need to be productive, Freedom might be the best 10 dollars you’ll ever spend.
However, researching and downloading and writing about all these time-saving products has kept me from doing any real work for over an hour. Hopefully, if I can actually bring myself to enact the timer on my Freedom, I will regain that time in the massive amounts of work I get done when I can’t get online anymore.
