Yesterday was the last day of the first five weeks of training. It’s the end of terminology, the first phase of the training program. It was somewhat of a help. The next part is an introduction to Windows (no choice there). Thankfully it’s only a week long. Then comes the actual hardware training.

I’ll be spending all my time in the A+ book, taking notes to learn and retain all I can. I’ll be missing the third class day of the A+ training to move. And filling in any spare time I carve out to write or do website work for money, as it comes up.

moving in the middle

This week I will have my packing done so that I don’t have anything to do but study and write, for the first two days of the A+ training. If all goes well, on June 23, I will move first thing in the morning. I will have a quiet celebration with me and my mom, and offer a not-so-quiet prayer of thanks.

Lately, I’m so overwhelmed by looking at everything on my plate, that I get stifled. I’ve taken more than a few deep breaths trying to return to my center. That’s the best place to operate from. To help with this centering, I return to my staples, blogging, journaling, and meditating. And I continue.

keeping my focus on class work

Unpacking and anything else that comes up, will be secondary to completing the training. Dealing with that will be a breeze, since the biggest part will be over. Really, getting ready to move is the biggest hurdle to jump—even if you don’t have much, like me.

Throughout the preparation and moving, working and writing, I’ve got to keep my studies at the forefront. So, I review my notes and take more notes, and research things I have questions about. Writing helps a lot when I’m trying to internalize new information.

Beginning with the next session, on Tuesday, we’ll be in a new location. I have to find it on my own since I didn’t go with the class, yesterday. I’ll Google the address over the weekend and ask any questions I have on Monday. By the time I am moved, I will be able to relax on two fronts: no thoughts of moving for a long while, and no new class locations.

For a minute, that should make all the balls I’m juggling seem pretty easy. I’ll take that.

Often times when I’m working on a project, I’ll get distracted by another idea that intrudes. Why does this happen? Well, it seems to be the way creativity flows.

Based on great posts and books I’ve read and my own experiences, once you prime your creative pump, it flows toward your project at hand and can overflow to other subjects.

Sometimes I find the ideas that come to me are tangentially related. And that’s not so problematic. Other times, though, the new fodder seems completely unrelated.

What difference does different make? The challenge with unrelated fodder is the distraction it can present because of how much it pulls you away from what you’re doing, so you can record it clearly.

Did you ever write down just a phone number only to realize later that you forgot who left it, and who should get it? A similar problem occurs with corralling ideas. You need to capture it quickly and adequately.

You want to be thorough enough in the notes you take to accurately capture what revealed itself to you. Whenever you get back to the idea, you want to be able to return yourself to the moment and revive the inspiration. For that, you need sufficient information to stimulate the memory.

Take Good Notes

It’s great to have ideas. It’s an indication that you have enough material to keep going. But what’s the point if you don’t finish what you start? In order to get to the finishing point of any task, I take notes about the extraneous ideas.

When my next brilliant idea surfaces, I don’t want it to get away from me. So, I try to capture it in words and images if I can. My goal is to record enough information to be able to develop the idea at a later date. I keep a tablet next to my computer most times, or I’ll snag paper from the printer, whatever it takes to get it down because writing makes things stick for me.

What Good Does it Do?

I have to tell you, just because I know these helpful tips, doesn’t mean that I ALWAYS apply them. Sometimes I will let myself get pulled away from a project, indefinitely if not permanently. Problem is, I have lost some ideas permanently. They run cold and I don’t know where they were headed, and I can’t seem to restart them.

But, when I do it right and take good notes, there are several good things that come of it. Two things you’ll find:

1. You’ll be able to focus on your current project without having to worry about losing your new idea
2. More ideas will begin to come to you when you give all of them room to surface and be cultivated

What do you do when you get distracted? Do you capture your ideas or just let them go? I’m interested to know what works for you.

When You Can’t Blog About It

While I was swamped at work I was still saving random thoughts. So, now I’m going back through them to mine for post-able material. As I researched for work projects, thoughts would pop int my head about my blogs, in spite of my dedicated focus.

Since I am a believer in tracking tangential thoughts, I always have at hand something to write on. I have used many different papers through the years and have come to really enjoy writing on blank pages. Since I’ve discovered Moleskines, I have the variety to suit my tastes.

• pocket ruled reporter – goes pretty much everywhere and collects whatever comes to me
• large blank hardcover notebook – catches my poems
• large squared reporter – records/plots business ideas, plans and implementation

My daily journal is a composition notebook.

Software and Browser Addons

Online is another story. I am a WordPerfect user since the days of its DOS-based version. I have Word to accommodate business communications for those who are “WordPerfect-challenged.” I wanted to find something more closely integrated with the internet, so I added a few applications this year and experimented with them. Here they are in the order that I tried them.

Google documents: I like it well enough for ideas and starting posts, journaling progress of ancillary tasks, when I don’t want to pick up a pen, or leave the internet. It’s only a tab away.

Google notebook: It did some things that were really interesting. Like, when you highlight and clip content, it automatically snags the website URL. The great thing about that is it makes returning to the site later a snap—or a click, no re-searching or address-typing required required. It stays out in front of the screen so you can work right from the site you’re on. Or you can pop it out in a separate tab. Or, you can put it in a separate tab, which gives you access to more of the capabilities.

What I like about Google Docs and Notebook:

• They’re portable. Wherever you log in, there’s your work, in the corner, or on a tab.
• They offer a place to capture live links for one-click returns.
• Docs pages are printable from the app, so I can edit manually whenever I feel like it.
• Docs offers a spreadsheet application and that’s a big plus for me.
• Notebook offers tabs capability which offers an alternative way to filter notes.

What I don’t like about them:

• One thing that gets in my way is that it gets in my way. Sometimes I have to actually close the Notebook, or put it in another window, to get it out of the way of my content.
• The Docs page is always on a separate tab, which means no side-by-side viewing.
• Notebook pages are only printable in full tab view.

They’ve served me well for a few months now. I kept an eye out for different applications to research.

I’ve Discovered Scribefire

For a while now, I’d been noticing a new application. I am skeptical about adding techno gadgets, but it kept nagging me that this might be the add-on to eclipse the others. Finally, just before my vacation ended, I decided to try one more thing. I went to Scribefire from ProBlogger.net because I kept seeing it there. The application is quite stunning! I haven’t used all of its capabilities. I didn’t even integrate it with any of my blogs, yet, and its usefulness is undeniable. I’m not dismissing my Google additions, for now, but I’m definitely making use of Scribefire.

What I liked right off:

• The download was really easy.
• When it’s closed it’s quite unobtrusive.
• It’s fully integrated with the browser window.
• I didn’t need an email account.
• You don’t need a blog to use it.

What I’m hoping for in future versions:

• Live link capture – it’s a help especially for double-checking information on the fly
• Portability – so I can work from whatever computer I’m near, if I choose

My brother was looking for an application to collect information while he surfed. I told him of the different applications I was using. After the first couple of days I used Scribefire, I shot him an email to let him know about it. And I thought I’d share it here. I’m glad I finally tried Scribefire. Now, I think I have all bases covered. Really there’s no way I’ll miss an idea unless I just don’t make the effort to capture it. It happens, but I try to keep that to a minimum.

Tell me what you use to capture your thoughts. If you’ve found something that you really love, that you think does everything, let me know.