I have what a psychiatrist might call very minor focus issues. It’s probably just the tiniest touch of the familial ADD coming through, and it manifests most in extreme distractibility. If we’re talking outdoors, I might stop in the middle of a sentence to listen to a bird chirping nearby. I’m often incapable of ignoring background noises, so other people’s conversations have a tendency to drive me to… well, distraction.
This also means I can’t listen to music while I work. This is terrible, of course. Everyone should be able to listen to music while they work. But I end up spending half my attention on the music and half my attention on the work, and nothing is done well. And I get frustrated, and no one likes She-Hulk Kelsi. They just don’t.
However.
However.
I now work in an open office plan, and share a large cubicle with someone who is a… mutterer. More than a mutterer, a talk-to-him-selfer. A talk-to-him-selfer who is full of general rage at the world. This means that all day long, we have full voiced narration of his day as he goes, responding verbally to emails as they come in with expostulations and frustrations and it is making. me. bonkers.
BONKERS.
In a fit of seething (my fits are low-key and mostly turned inward,) I pulled out my ipod and tried to figure out the least distracting music that I can use to drown out his ferociously loud negativity. The man even types loudly, I don’t even… I just…
So, I’ve narrowed it down to instrumental music that can be enjoyed at low volumes. I have a ton of Mozart and a good amount of Beethoven, both of which are appropriate. (Mahler is too crazy to listen to while working, and I’ve eliminated opera by virtue of the fact that words are involved and even though they’re not in English I will be trying to understand the words… so…)
Anyway. Internet! Do you have any good ideas for what I should be listening to that fits into the category of soothing instrumental music I can use to avoid a fit of seething turning into something more dangerous? Please advise!
Vitamin Hound 