EUGENIZATION.

Are you the type of person who’s not a self-starter? Do you need someone breathing down your neck, constant reminding, a push to get the ball rolling?

For clients who’d chronically forget to eat, miss workouts, or not drink their water, I used to suggest creating an “event” in Outlook (if that’s what you use for scheduling) or in Google Calendar, so an e-mail alert would pop-up on your desktop, PDA, or cell phone at the specified time.

“It’s time for your 10:30am feeding, Mrs. Jones.”

Today I Stumbled on a neat site that proposes to do the same thing, except it’s express-built for that purpose (and if you’re a tech-phobe, even better - it’s easier to figure out than Google Calendar’s reminder feature). It’s called HassleMe, and it’s exactly what it sounds like.

This site would work best for an office worker who finds it difficult to execute “the little things” on a daily or weekly basis (i.e., drink sufficient water, go to the gym, etc.) Unfortunately, it appears that they don’t yet support recurring daily nagging (such as bugging you to eat a snack every three hours or dinging you at 4pm to take fish oil - Google Calendar’s Event Reminder feature stills reigns supreme for this as far as free public software is concerned). I think the best part is that HassleMe’s reminders are given at random times, so as to reflect the unpredictability of a well-meaning friend or loved one nagging you about something.

HassleMe still appears to be in the beta stages, so its options are limited to a random daily, weekly, or longer reminder. If you need more structure or a shorter time frame, an application like Google Calendar’s Event Reminder or Outlook Reminders is definitely superior.