Day 5… I’m not working.

I mean that in the “can’t function” way, not the “not at work” way. Ugh. I hate these sorts of days. I have a tiny head cold… but otherwise, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to function. M and I are in a good place… I had a mega relaxing weekend… the house is a hair or two cleaner… money is not an issue… I sat at work all day today unable to come up with anything for a design. I hate that. I move so slow… and hate all that I do. I think the issue might be that I can’t ever just be where I am.

I can’t be at work, even part time, without thinking about how much I’d rather be at home working on something creative. Not designing. I can’t be at home without thinking how much I’d rather be hanging out with a friend… I can’t be out with a friend without thinking about how much I wish I was doing something else. I can’t just block off my mind for chunks of time to focus on one thing. I also know the issue is partially that I want everything right now. I feel like there’s no time. No time to not be making my poetry book. No time to not be running my successful business. No time to not be doing whatever. There is no time to waste… when I’m actually wasting tons of it.

This is an ongoing issue.

I would really love to make some of the things I learned in Refuse to Choose work for me. Like the scheduling time for things. What I also really need to do is prioritize things. For instance… it’s really not that important that I get an etsy shop up and running. That’s not really a priority for me. I took a writing class awhile ago and the teacher helped us make an action plan. We listed out the things we wanted to write. Then we put a star next to the ones we wanted to work on in the next year. Another star next to those we wanted to work on in the next 6 months. Another next to the ones we would work on in the next 3 months… and finally another next to the one(s) we’d work on this month. Then we asked ourselves the following questions:

1. What is one thing I can do right now?
2. Why is this one thing important?
3. What do I need to do this?
4. By when will I accomplish this?
5. How will I hold myself accountable?

In another book (I seriously forget which one), I read about planning backwards. I think it was also Refuse to Choose. I just remember that you plan backwards, each step you’ll need to get to the finished point and all the way until you get to something you can do right now. I need to do these sorts of things. What is a priority to me and what can honestly wait. I need to schedule as well. Schedule and stick to it. I’m thinking one way to save time and gas/money is to workout in Boulder in the mornings before work. I can roll out of bed at 6am and head up there traffic free. The gym is like 3mins from work… so I can get ready there and head over. Then I’m done with workouts unless I choose to go again later and no extra gas or time has been used. Okay. So tonight I’m going to reread Refuse to Choose, the good parts, and make my priorities list.

How are you all? I miss you terribly.

–

So I did some reading in Refuse to Choose again… I think the issue is that I don’t know what I want to work on. It’s the same issue with the rest of my life. I don’t know. I can easily write out a list of all my projects. I can just as easily check boxes next to each one of when I’d like to work on them… but it’s routine, it’s whatever I’ve done before/think I should be doing. I reread the chapter on the type of “scanner” I am. A cyclical sybil scanner. I come back to the same interests over and over… I enjoy working on the same things and wish I could be 20 people so that I could get them DONE. Instead, I overwhelm myself and get stuck doing none of them.

Then I read back through the part that was about an artist. She would get interested in making her sculptures for a few months and would turn out some amazing pieces because she was so excited and worked hard on them… then one day she couldn’t look at them anymore and would start writing songs and music and playing at clubs… until that bored her. Then she would do something else… she would return at some point to these things and so on… Barbara Sher talks about how if you’re that type of scanner you should allow yourself to dive into things as they come about. If you really feel like giving your all to one thing… do it for a day, a week a year. Then when you’re done, go back to what you were doing, or follow the next thing.

So I thought, maybe that’s me. Maybe I can’t focus because deep down I really want to be doing something else. So I thought about what I want to do… and I don’t know. I wish I could shut off my brain sometimes. Not looking at other people’s creative outlets is hard, but I think it will help. I hope that at some point I will realize what it is I want to be doing. Whether it’s one thing… or several. Maybe I need to try dedicating a day, days or a week to something. Every extra moment will be poured into the project. Maybe I should pick one. One I know I’ve been wanting to do forever… let everything else sit on idle. Dive into it, get my hands dirty and work my heart out on it. Tell myself it’s okay to not work on the others, there time will come. And then let my creativity take over and guide me from there.

So I’m picking my poetry book… because I’ve wanted to do this forever and ever and I still do and always will. So I’m rolling up my sleeves… pushing everything else aside (for now, because there’s time) and getting to work.