Back to blogging and working without a clock

It’s that time of year again. That time, late in the year, where I start wishing I blogged more often. It actually started earlier this year when I rewrote this whole blog1 back in March. So what got me back here in a text editor writing a blog post? Really it came down to that weekly feeling at the end of the weekend that I’ve finished very little. I guess if I can finish at least one small blog post, I can start feeling like I’ve finished something.

Last night, I stumbled upon a post about working without a clock by developer Zach Waugh. It got me thinking a lot about how I spend the whole weekend looking at the clock, fretting about how little time I have left before the week begins. The idea is to remove the clock from your mind and just work. You may work late or have to take a really late lunch, but removing this one more thing from your mind frees you up. This isn’t new either, this famous quote leads to the same conclusion:

“I owe my success to the fact I never had a clock in my workroom”

– Thomas Edison

I’ll be trying this now. Most days, I don’t need to know the time. I rarely have meetings. Mornings at work become a countdown to lunchtime. My laptops now have no time displaying, and I’ll be making this change on my work machine as well. I guess if it helps me get more done by focusing on the work and not the clock, my posts will be more frequent than once a year.