Sunday, July 29, 2012

Three buttons that can change your life...

The computer and I do not get along.

For whatever reason, I have a mental block when it comes to comprehending all things electronic.  I've never had to take a computer course, believe it or not.  I graduated from nursing school the very year they decided to make that class a requirement.  Whew.  Something tells me my "A" average would have swiftly dropped.  Now, don't get me wrong, I love email and Facebook.  I enjoy blogging, obviously.  Pinterest is simply fabulous.  I like the conveniences of computer technology, and I know just enough to get by.  But when I encounter a problem with it, well... patience ceases to be a virtue.

My poor husband, who has a degree in programming and who is a computer guru, has tried to help me out a few times.  Remember my previous words... mental block.  But one thing he has shown me actually stuck, took root, and remained implanted in my crowded and disorganized brain.  Three beautiful key combinations... and don't laugh, yes I had to learn about this... "Ctrl+Alt+Del".  Wow!  What an amazing, wonderful, beautiful thing that happens when those keys are pushed together...  END TASK!!!  This laptop I use is notoriously slow, and many times it will freeze up, for lack of a more educated word, and it Drives. Me. Insane.  Ah, but I have a solution!  A few keystrokes, and I can stop the things that are slowing it down.  Amazing.

Wouldn't it be marvelous if we had those keys to push in our lives when needed?  Especially us women.  We've got SO many things going at once.  Talk about overload.  How many little "programs" do we having running at the same time?  How many "windows" do we have open at once?  And I'm not just talking about the many things crowding our everyday lives, vying for our precious time and attention.  What about all the things in our minds?  What about all that stuff that we don't talk about with anyone else?  All the problems we're trying to solve on our own, all the worries weighing us down... we could all probably use a little "end task" time.

There's got to be a way that we can push those keys, point and click our mouse, and stop some things that are hindering our progress.  Things that might have seemed important at the time we started them, but have actually become a weight.  Things that take too much energy from us.  Things that pull our focus and attention away from the more vital things going on around and inside of us.  Things that slow us down and stop us from running smoothly.

Have a few of those things popped into your mind?  Can you visualize that list of things that would come up if we chose to end a few tasks?  Go through that mental list.  Which ones are the most important?  Which ones could be deleted to help lighten the load?

May God help us all to prioritize, rearrange, and give us the knowledge of when and how to end some tasks.

(A must-have for every living room, haha...)
   

4 comments:

  1. Love to read yout blogs... You remind me so very much of your Daddy in your writing.
    Love you,
    Edie

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    1. Thank you, my Edie. I love you more than peanut butter.

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  2. The mouse seems convenient and makes sense to people, but taking charge of the computer with speed and efficiency requires a knowledge and use of the keyboard and shortcuts. In Windows, Ctrl+Alt+Del provides one possible path to Task Manager; however, Ctrl+Shift+Esc directly opens Task Manager. So many shortcuts exist for the operating system; and then, there are shortcuts for specific programs. Something that takes minutes to accomplish with the mouse can be completed in literally seconds with keyboard shortcuts. With a quick search online, you can often find lists of keyboard shortcuts for whatever operating system, or program, you're using. Wouldn't it be nice if there were a list of shortcuts for life? We may not have a list of shortcuts, but we do have a guide.

    I believe that some things within ourselves are handled as simply as ending a task. We may not know how to deal with something in us, and we may say that it's not as simple as flipping a switch. Certainly, flipping a switch is an oversimplification for many things; but I think there are issues within our own lives (maybe, more than we realize) that are much like flipping a switch. Nike's slogan, "Just Do It", may seem cliche; but I think there's some wisdom in it.

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    1. It has taken me many years and much pain to finally buy into the idea of "flipping the switch". I didn't believe it could really happen. I am not saying it applies to everything in life, but it most certainly has it's place. There have been many times that it was exactly what needed to have been done. There is much wisdom indeed in Nike's slogan.

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