Category: procrastination

Today is the Day Part 2

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 11 Comments

How is your “Today is the Day” going?

Last June, when the sun was high and the breeze was warm and the windchimes twinkled in the trees, I wrote a blog called Today is the Day about making a day to finally do something you’ve put off, forgotten about, or waited to do.

Often Today comes and goes and we haven’t done one thing to better ourselves. Well, it is now 2021, and it’s time to start making Today the Day. Are you ready?

I have made some forward movement towards a few of my Todays. I decided that while I was stuck inside (Covid and winter) I’d start a craft project. And I did. I’ve made dozens of Angel Tears, and have contacted two craft fairs to see if I can get in. It’s a start. I also have come up with an idea for a second novel to follow my book about my “trip” to Paris. I love writing, and have missed the bug biting me every time I turn around, so I’ve started my research.

I also had vowed to clean out my refrigerator big time. And my medicine cabinet. And my dining room buffet. Last weekend and this weekend were the days. The cabinet is shiny clean, I can see the glass shelves in my breakfront, and we are getting a new frig tomorrow, but that is neither here nor there. I made these days THE days.

A lot of the time I’d rather be a vegetable than do anything productive, but fortunately my curiosity and A.D.D. won’t let me sit around for long. 

Sometimes moving forward is awkward. Hard. Slow. It’s easier to put off until tomorrow what can be done today. But it feels so darn good once we start moving forward, doesn’t it?

I believe in encouraging others to move forward, too. I know how they will feel once they get the procrastination monkey off their back. Moving forward allows for new ideas, new chances for discovery and growth. That feels so darn good, too.

Take baby steps if need be. Do one thing today, a second step tomorrow. Keep track of your progress. Show yourself you really can move forward towards what you want. Make a list of what you’d like to accomplish. Don’t make any task too daunting. Just make it doable. 

You will feel so good when you can check something off your list. 

My medicine cabinet hasn’t shined like this since I put it in 15 years ago! Woot Woot!

 

 

 

 

Putting On My Big Girl Pants

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 7 Comments

db6600a576463299e6df8b2d18f0a78fFirst off, a dreamy thank you for hanging with me during October and visiting the land of dreams and nightmares. My dreams thank you for checking in on them.

But now it’s November and although it’s 63 degrees in Wisconsin, nature is warning us that the kick-back-lazy-summery-buttery days are just about at their end. Thunder and lightning streak the skies this morning — much like the beginning of my first novel.

I am one of those complainers I can’t tolerate. I want to be a published author, but I have 3 novels sitting in my computer gathering dust because 1) I don’t know what genre they really are; 2) are they really any good; 3) there are a zillion published and self-published books out there, what’s one more on time travel/murder/fear of being caught/romance or maybe-romance book?

I don’t feel like I’m a procrastinator — it’s more like I don’t do the things I really need to do to get my work out there. Which, in reality, is a form of procrastination. Plus my confidence has been hiding under a rock somewhere lately. I mean, I have written two  novels in one series, another in a different series, and am in the middle of a follow up for THAT book, so you can’t say I’m not doing the work. Of course, that work has been over 10 years in the making, so that probably says something, too.

What about publicity? What about asking for advice from someone who is trying to get published too? Or who is already published? Why do I hesitate to ask for help? Am I afraid they will say no? And so what?

No doubt that as I get older the window of opportunity closes quicker. I can’t keep up with a full-time job and write too. At least that’s how I feel at the moment.  Which is not true, either. I know there are those of you who have done just that. Juggle family and kids and illnesses and setbacks and divorce and moving and still knock out great poetry and books. They — you — do not let your surroundings become your crutches.

When you are a ditz (I say that lovingly), it’s hard to stay focused all the time. I try. Its not the big responsibilities that throw me off balance — it’s the time inbetween. It’s the time between visiting the kids and driving home or vacuuming all the dog/cat hair so that I can sit down and write that I fall between the cracks. It’s the daydreaming while I’m driving that could one day cause me an accident. Its the noticing I need to sew a button on a shirt for tomorrow that readjusts my free time. The coming up with a plot twist at 1 a.m. when I have to get up at 6 that leaves me drained and sleepy all day and night.

It’s not always that dramatic, of course. It’s the moving from point A to point B in a hurry that causes black and blue marks, or hitting the wrong button and wiping out a whole chapter that sets my psyche afire. I misplace my phone all the time and put things in a safe place only to forget where that safe place is. Even when I have the time to sit and write or research, I find disorganization everywhere. I find myself organizing images or sorting written files or deleting a hundred pointless emails and before I know it two hours have gone by and I’m too tired to write.

It’s about time to put on my big girl pants and hit my secondary world with dogged determination. Make a list with a hundred bullet points if that’s what it takes, and do one organizational thing before one creative thing. That’s how I will move forward. And no one will notice the unicorn slippers that I wear when I put those pants on.

If only I can find that other slipper…