![]() ![]() If you enjoy the work you're doing, but still find yourself put off by the thought of starting, I'd definitely recommend examining your start-up processes to see if they are candidates for optimization. ![]() This stuff may seem obvious, but for me, I've found that if I don't consciously make my workflow ultra-convenient, work isn't nearly as likely to get done. Walk up, flip two switches, press record (I'll talk about this in a bit), and I'm off to the races. To keep the start-up time minimal, I set all the lighting and tools on two power strips, and my camera stays powered up, configured, and ready to film at a moment's notice. The rationale here is the same one behind setting up bills to automatically draft instead of having to mail a check: fewer monotonous barriers to meaningful progress means less fuel for our procrastination engines. Since I knew I would be working on Jittery MacGyver with tiny amounts of time left over after working a fulltime job, occasionally traveling for speaking engagements, being a "present" husband, and being a dad/co-pilot/gelatinous monster/climbing tree for my two year-old daughter, I wanted to make sure the amount of time I'd have to spend between sitting down at my workbench and being able to get stuff done was as minimal as possible. Ten minutes later I was staring at a blank spot on my office wall and thinking about how many lives would be ruined if we ever find a way to reliably interpret and display what cats are thinking in real-time.ĭespite that immensely successful planning session, I did manage to come away with three pillars for my overall workspace philosophy: Before I started configuring my workspace for Jittery MacGyver-a project which entails dismantling Keurig coffee makers and repurposing the parts to build other stuff-I spent some time pondering the unique processes and challenges I would likely encounter along the way, and how to best tailor my workspace to perform commensurately. However, much like the ratios on a vehicle's gearbox, a workspace should always be tuned to most effectively deliver the desired output. With basic furniture and lighting squared away, my workspace is starting to come together, but it's still pretty boring and unremarkable. That, in combination with a few garden-variety desk lamps, provided an acceptable amount of distributed light across my work area. I fastened a few of the pucks to a 1"x3" poplar board, and used zip ties to secure the resulting fixture to the horizontal crossbar of a variable-height photographic backdrop system. ![]() ![]() To illuminate my workspace, I ran every object in my house through a unified filter: "Does $THING light up? If so, would anyone immediately notice if $THING went missing?" One of the items in the resulting set was a string of puck-shaped lights that was designed for furniture manufacturers to install inside various casegoods, or to serve as undercabinet lighting. I believe a whole box of these things was abandoned after one of our local, semi-annual High Point Furniture Markets. Since I'd pay $45 to watch a monkey smoke, I can unceremoniously strike worrying about damaging my bench off my list of concerns, which frees me up to experiment and discover new ways to get stuff done. In my humble opinion, time spent stressing about whether or not to drill that hole to make way for a bolt or to screw down a jig, or to otherwise cause irreparable damage to your workbench, is time completely wasted. I paid a princely sum of $45 for the pair, which, by the way, are absolutely rock solid. My wife found the workbench and shelves on a Facebook community swap group, which we later discovered were comprised of cast-offs and scraps from a bored carpenter's day job. Your workspace will look different, but the practices I chose to follow here can be used for anyone looking to match their setup to their brain.Īt its core, my workspace reflects the cobbled-together and quasi-functional approach I take to problem-solving in general. With this assertion firmly in place, I'd like to share a few things I've implemented for creating my workspace that have worked well for my brain. At this point, the odds are good that I'm just trying to rationalize why my office is an unmitigated disaster most of the time, but since you've made it this far, let's make one more assumption: No two people are exactly alike, therefore no two workspaces are exactly alike. If this holds true, it stands to reason that, more often than not, our workspaces are always naturally trending away from being tidy and highly-functional. Like bits of knowledge stored in the brain, tools and assets instinctively find themselves organized in a way that feels right to the individual. I firmly believe that in the absence of any intentional organizational strategy a person's workspace becomes a reflection of their mind. ![]()
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