Tag: planning

Cleaning Up Your Act

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 13 Comments

My friend Chrissy over at Chrissy’s Fab 50’s has been blogging about going through her closets and drawers and other places of secret stashes and cleaning out, rearranging, and thinning out her house — and life.

I love it.

Over the last few months I have been cleaning up and straightening out too. I am so proud of my (finally) thinned out and organized closet, and am eyeing the buffet in the dining room as we speak.

I have also been cleaning up, straightening up, and re-evaluating my Sunday Evening Art Gallery blog. I’ve been checking links and spacing and image sizes, trying to make it more esthetically pleasing.

That may not sound like a big deal to most. That is because most take care and time the first time around. 

I just feel like I didn’t take enough time with my work. With my presentation. Like I ran helter skelter around the woods looking for violets when if I would have just followed the path I would have found them.

It’s not that I didn’t pay attention — I did. I loved the art, I loved the showcase. But these days I can’t help but wonder — where was I going when I was in such a hurry to post in the first place? What was so important that I couldn’t have used a little more time to make a precise, pleasant presentation?

This is the funny thing.

The older I get, the more precise I’m becoming. The more organized I’m becoming. The more thorough I’m becoming.

Maybe that’s because the older I get, the more I’m forgetting. The more I’m knocking things off the shelf and knocking things over. The more I lose things, break things, forget things.

Cleaning up my blog or my closet or my pantry are ways to take back what control I still have over my body and my mind.

The positive thing out of all of this is that you’re never too old — or young — to pay attention to anything you do the first time. Or the second time. There’s always time for cleaning up your act. 

Don’t be in such a hurry. Take pride in everything you do. Everything. It sounds so simple, but in reality it’s quite hard. We all have places to go, projects to finish, schedules to keep. 

But our personal space, our personal Art, is just as important as keeping precise spreadsheets at work. You don’t need to be perfect — you just need to pay attention. Take your time. Do it right. Clean it out. Straighten it up.

You’ll love your outer space — and your inner self — when you’re finished.

 

 

Slugs Gather Here

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 5 Comments

444This evening I should have been editing my novel, tweeted about my latest Art Gallery post, done a little research, read some great blogs, and writtten a poem.

Instead, I spent this evening laying around like a slug, watching TV, washing a dish here or there, watering a wilty plant, and giving my dog an extra cookie or three.

Does this mean I’m not dedicated to my craft?

I know several people who signed up — and finished — the National Novel Writing Month challenge (NaNoWriMo) where they write a novel in one month. Others have done the National Poetry Writers Month (NaPoWriMo) where you write a poem a day for one month. I just saw someone on Twitter say they were digging in and writing 800 words — I don’t know if that was per day or per session. Another friend devotes at least an hour a day painting. Yet another schedules scrapbooking dates with daughters and friends. I know fellow bloggers that find time to sculpt and do wire works and probably take ballet lessons, too.

I am a failure.

Every morning I have the honor and pleasure to drive the back roads to work, my mind allowed to wander and plan all the fun writing and art gallery adventures that will take place once I get home. After packed days doing data on a computer, most of us come home with headaches and carpel tunnel, not inspiration. Add a dog yakking on the floor or a sink full of dishes, and all those dreams come crashing to the ground pretty darn fast.

Maybe I shouldn’t want a writing career so bad. Maybe I shouldn’t obsess about new twists to my blog or new artists for the Gallery or art fairs I’d like to wander through or jewelry I’d love to make or the tree branches I want to paint on three canvases for my bathroom or the beads I want to sew on the new top I got from Good Will.

Maybe I’m not a failure.

Maybe I’ve just got too much want.

Do you feel that way? You should. Are you a member of the 10/5 Sack Club? You know — trying to shove 10 pounds of stuff into a 5 lb. bag?  Are you a lets-change-our-days-to-34-hours-instead-of-24-hours member?

How do you get it all done? Are you ever really satisfied with how much personal time you have?

Damn, it’s frustrating, isn’t it? All the stuff you want to do, all the stuff you plan on doing, dream of doing, and all you can muster is a slug on the rug routine.

I know it all will get done sooner than later. Between the grandkids, the maddening work load, between mowing the lawn and brushing my teeth.

I know my characters will wait — they’ve waited this long, fooling around in a parallel Etruscan time zone or in 1885 Clairmont or at a writer’s gathering on the shores of Lake Michigan. They know their stories are good, their purpose clear. The morals have already been written, the points made. The artists continue their unusual creations until I get them in the Sunday Evening Art Gallery, and the fairs and fests await my arrival.

Until then, there’s nothing wrong with a good ‘ol SlugFest now and then.

 

 

Start Your Strategy Now

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 5 Comments

militarycatStrategy.

A powerful word. A plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim. It could also be coined for military operations, but that’s not where we are today. (At least I’m not…I dunno about the cat on the right, though).

Sounds so easy. Set a major or overall aim. Write out a plan. Follow the plan. Achieve the major or overall aim.

Why is it we start out with such good intentions on getting to that “policy” yet find we are wandering down the Yellow Brick Road?

I know a number of you out there are creative souls. You write, you paint, you go to art fairs and gardening seminars and are speakers at conferences. You know what you want to do, make a plan, and carry that plan out. That is why you are successful.

I am not. Yet.

It seems that every time I turn around another light bulb goes off, lighting my way to fame and famine of the writing kind. This is not the 70s — you must be a part of what confuses you in order to be a part of the bigger confusion. I must say I love those light bulbs going off, though. It’s like the Goddess has smiled down upon my pudgy body and says, “Hey girl! You done BoHo-ing for the day yet? I’ve got an idea here! ” And somewhere between all the confusion of my life I find  time to listen.

I had an idea for a new novel. Exciting, challenging. A lot of research, a lot of medical stuff. I used a prologue from a different story I started a few years ago (and never finished), and adapted it to the New Novel.

That’s the last I’ve worked on it.

I have so many other projects that fit into my time schedule that writing Gone With The Wind Book 4 just isn’t in the picture. And that’s just the fact, Jack.

You all have projects in different stages. Some are realities, like actually finishing a novel, or entering a writing contest, or finishing the painting or sketch you’ve worked so hard on. But time isn’t the same across the universe. Where you have time to do an art piece with mosaics, you don’t have time to  write a blog. What started as a three-section painting now may have to be reconditioned as a one-piece masterpiece. We just can’t do everything we set out to do.

And the sooner we “get” that, the easier our strategy becomes.

As you know, I am a BIG advocate of getting out there and putting your Creative Mark on the world. Whether you are 20 or 80, if you’ve got a goal, a gift, go for it. That’s where strategy comes in. Figuring out the pros and cons of your forward movement.  What would it hurt if you e-mailed or Twittered a favorite author/columnist/blogger and asked them to take a look at your work? What harm is there in sending off a letter offering your presentation skills or your gourmet talents?

All they can say is NO.  All they can do is ignore your efforts.

BUT THEN:

Last July I went to the Art Fair on the Square in Madison, WI. There were hundreds of different artists in hundreds of different venues. I found the artwork that I thought would work in my Sunday Evening Art Gallery; took their cards; and e-mailed three so far. They all were honored I liked their work so much and had no problem with me highlighting their work and their website.

All that angst, that fear, walking around the art fair, telling myself I’m not a curator or a famous art critic, was for nothing. These people were friendly and open … and said YES.

So now my strategy is to produce what I promised.

And how much fun is THAT?