I heard a term this week, fake busy. It got me thinking about the different stages in my life and what I might have mistakenly assumed was out of my control and how it changed me personally. If I look back at the times in my life where I was the most cranky, anxious, and unhappy, they’re also the busiest times in my life. We are all products of our environment, right? The truth for me is that I hate being busy. I need room to breath in my day. I need time to stretch my imagination and feel free. The busy bug puts a nasty kink into my creative well being.
I’ve learned a few things in the past couple months. First I could have delegated a few more things and I could have said no. You better believe the next time I’m placed in a similar situation, the pain of the last many weeks will rise, and I WILL SAY NO. Some lessons are hard to learn, while others are pounded in with a sledge hammer and will be impossible to forget.
The light at the end of the tunnel is glowing brighter. The new gal is back from vacation starting tomorrow and my evil day job schedule can finally get back to normal, well, my new normal.
The Goals – week-5 results
- Spend at least 1-hour a day with my characters- done. I didn’t make as much progress this week in my daily sessions, but I’m pleased that this goal is a part of my ingrained routine and at least my characters said hello.
- Weekly progress in word count, editing, and/or plotting- 1/2 done. I’ve received edits back from my CP and from the crit group. I’ve reviewed all the comments, but have not yet begun making changes. There are a couple areas I’m contemplating changing and I want to get a handle on them before I dig in. I need more of goal #1 for sure.
- Finish reading current craft book- I spent no time with Margie this week. boo. WEEK 6 PRIORITY.
- Workout a minimum of three times a week and round it out with plenty of water, sleep and my calorie limit- done.
- Study one of the Nia 52-moves each week- Head and Eye Movements. Look in any direction with your eyes and then follow that direction with a move of your head. Use your eyes to seduce your head, through natural curiosity, into moving. To enhance relaxation, keep your lower jaw slightly open, and let the tip of your tongue press lightly into the roof of your mouth. Benefits: the practice reminds you to look where you go.
- Finish the Nia Sanjana-routine bars and start the Nia Opal-routine bars (i.e. studying the song/movement structure)- Just yesterday I started charting out the next song in the routine. I didn’t make giant progress, but it’s something.
- Stay on top of my co-op preschool Treasurer responsibilities- done. This week I handled payroll, bills, monthly reporting, invoices, filed the tax return, and handled the change for a large event. This week will be easier, just a parent meeting.
- Organize something in the house each week- I took a pass here this week. I had company in the house everyday this week. Everyday. And I still have company. My mom leaves tomorrow, the last in a long string. WEEK-6 PRIORITY.
My house was full of family this week and it was hard at times, but such a joy. My husband’s cousin is nursing her broken heart and doing fantastic. She’s in that point in her life where she wants to be single for some time and figure out exactly what she wants. Once she starts dating again she will stand her ground and not forget about who she is. I’m pretty happy and excited for her. The little jerk may have hurt her, but she will come back stronger and in a better place.
Hope you all have a fabulous week.
What you might have missed here this week:
Cover Reveal: Mystically Bound by Stacey Kennedy
Spotlight: Hear Me by Skye Warren
S.J. Maylee 
I’m with you – too busy=stress and being unable to do what I really want, and boy do I get cranky. But hey, you still managed to accomplish quite a bit! Keep up the good work, and wishing you a saner week ahead.
Looks like a halfsies week–about half beautifully knocked out, and half that simply couldn’t get done. Some weeks are like that! You’ll still making great progress!
By the way, since I keep seeing this phrase, I think we should just make it one word: “evildayjob.” 😉
I also have an “evildayjob” problem, so I know what you mean when it gets hard to do everything we want and we just don’t have the time… You still managed to do a lot this week, keep it up! Hope you have a great writing week 🙂
I totally understand what you mean about “fake busy” and needing space and freedom to just be, sometimes.
I’ve made a lot of progress, over the last few years, in eradicating the types of busy that don’t nourish my soul and my purpose. I loved my day job as a toddler teacher, but, after a time, it spread me too thin, and so I left it.
Now my “day job” is in strewing joy and facilitating learning for my own, unschooled children, which, as they grow older, leaves me more and more freedom to pursue my own lifelong and new passions.
I am finding much more time to write, these days, but I still struggle with an entrenched idea that there is something else I ought to be doing, and that writing is a luxury I need to defend and account for with productivity…
But, this weekend, while the children and I were visiting friends in a neoghboring state, and I kept writing in the background of the visit (our friends are very supportive of my writing, so I did not stop altogether), I was writing at the kitchen table while my dear friends prepared a large meal for all of us as well as some extended family members. When I asked if she needed help and that I felt a little guilty for writing and indulging myself while she did all the work, she gestured at her homey and stocked-to-bursting kitchen, and then at me and my little laptop, and said, “Don’t. This is my thing, just like writing is yours. We’re both doing just what we want to be.”
My view of writing in my life has been shifting ever since…
You seem to be doing very well, and making progress in lots of areas. I also like how you seem very realistic about the effects of things like an extended period of company, and how you have prioritized things you couldn’t manage last week. So much better to do that, than to count it as a discouraging failure!
I am enjoying reading your progress, and the insights you gain along the way! =D
Thank you for sharing your experiences with me, I totally get it. No wonder writers like to hang together 🙂 oh, and thanks for stopping by.
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