Finally, I finished knitting my dress in cotton yarn. I had to knit, unpick and knit again a few times because I am a lousy knitter. It is finally done after 9 months. Gee... come to think of it, I could have made a baby in that time!
My next project is in cashmere! In Italy, I walked into a shop selling cashmere woollen wear. One scarf was 350€. The pullover was 1000€. I can knit my own for under $60.
As we age, we lose muscle mass. To counter that, I cycle 12.5 km to 18.5 km daily on a stationary bike. It is quite boring so I watch drama series. However, I am also easily affected by the emotions in the drama. When there is too much blood or too much sex, the only way I can continue watching is to knit and listen to the drama, instead of watch.
The Last Madame was hugely popular on Toggle. I could only finish following the story by knitting and cycling furiously away. There was too much blood and sex. I like happy stories. I love romances where the protagonists end up together. These days, I will watch the last episode to ascertain whether it is a happy ending. If it is a sad ending, I simply won't even watch.
Where the stories have laughter and joy, I put down my knitting to watch and cycle. I wallow in the happy feelings. All stories have complications. When these complications get too emotionally painful, I pick up my knitting to help me regulate the strong emotions within me.
I reckon that such practices expand my time. Instead of spending 1.5 to 4 hrs cycling, then another 1.5 to 4 hrs watching drama and another 1.5 to 4 hrs knitting in a day, I get 3 things done in 1.5 to 4 hours (which would normally need 4.5 to 12 hrs to complete if I did them separately). This effectively adds 4.5 to 12 hrs to my 24 hr day!
Haha! This means my day has between 28.5 to 36 hrs, instead of just 24 hrs!
If I wake up at 6 am, I am done cycling by 9 am, and I can still put in a half day of work, plus have extra time to cook, garden, visit with friends and mosey about Chong Pang Market for interesting things to buy! Even then, compared to when I was working full time, I am already a lot less efficient. When The Son and The Daughter were small, and I was homeschooling them, I used to do something like this too. I cooked or cleaned whilst asking the children questions about their learning.
If you ask questions, the children are forced to focus to a higher degree. Best of all, they were so pleased to be able to answer my questions. The trick is to ensure that one asks easy questions that help them discover and think about the material bit by bit. Success motivates. How best to ensure success than to ask easy questions that build upon previous questions so that the child levels up without even knowing he is leveling up to a very high difficulty level.
I used to sit inside McDonalds at The Science Centre 2 afternoons a week, typing client reports, and requiring The Son to come look for me every 15 minutes to report what he had seen. Then, I would smile and look interested, even though sometimes, I did not understand the scientific principle he was explaining. It did not matter. My role was to look enthusiastic about his discoveries and infuse him with my mirrored enthusiasm. The result was that by P5, The Son was downloading and reading actual bio genetic research papers from my university's e-library.
In the times when we had a maid, I could expand my day to 40 hrs a day, doing 3 things at the same time:
- supervise an apple pie being made
- ask the children questions
- type up work reports.
When I realised that I had to help The Son master 6 yrs of primary school material in 2 years, I made him do tingxie whilst eating lunch on the way back home in the car. We were THAT short of time and I refused to work The Son beyond 7pm every night. I also refused to work him all of Sundays and the Saturday afternons. It took 30 minutes to drive home. I expanded 30 minutes into 1.5 hrs for him and gave him the extra hour to do unstructured play.
I need 9 to 12 hrs of sleep a day. That is why I have to expand my hours.
No comments:
Post a Comment