I know. I’m always busy. And I also know that there are people who think that I’m doing this and talking about it the way I do so that I can feel superior, or important.
The thing is that when I turned 40 (ten years ago) I realized that there are a lot of things in my life that I want to achieve, and by 40 I hadn’t achieved a lot of them. I found that there were mistakes that I kept making, and things that I had wanted to learn or master but my daily life didn’t reflect any of them. I wanted to become a real musician who made her own music in front of people but what I did was sit around reading novels or blog posts while whining that I didn’t have the time.
So I decided to change things.
I’m still not where I want to be, and you might have noticed that „making my own music“ is no longer high on my list but I’m very aware that time is limited, and if I want to live the life I’m imagining I need to start here and now.
That doesn’t mean I’m one of those productivity people who claim to only produce things of value every waking hour, I cherish time spent just talking with my family, or re-watching a TV show. I don’t want to be an efficiency machine. But I also know that my time and energy is limited, and if I don’t direct it in a way that helps me achieve my goals I won’t achieve them.
So eating delicious food, exercising, and restful sleep is high on my list because a) it makes me happy, and b) it will keep me healthy (I hope) so that I can enjoy life for longer.
Making a little music every day is also high on the list because it makes me happy. It’s also a good thing to show my students that music is enjoyable and something you should do every day.
Writing every day (like on this blog) also makes me happy, and working on my novels the same, also if I want to be a writer (which I want to) I need to learn how to finish things. And earning money with something I do every day anyways would be the icing on the cake. The way things are looking now I might have to work until I drop dead. I really hope that I will want to continue working for the sheer fun of it but I’d rather have the opportunity of deciding if I want to work or not.
The crafting brings me a lot of pleasure, and it’s one ofthe few things I do where I get to hold a tangible product in my hands. Also the fashion industry is not a nice thing so I’d rather be somewhat independent in that regard.
And then there are the mundane small things that need to be done every single day: the dishes, signing papers for school, calling students on the phone, vacuuming the house, doing the laundry and such.
Which means that I need to get moving. Not in a massive stressful way, just in a „one step at a time“-way. Doing a little thing each day to get things moving in the right direction.
Sorry. This post was brough to you by a „Don’t always put so many things on your to do-list“-remark. My to do-list is actually rather short from day to day if you look at the list of things I should be doing as well but that don’t fit into my days. And I’m so restrained that I’m actually refraining from starting another podcast because I know I don’t really have the time. (But I really want to.)
On the daily grind, I did manage to not drink a beer yesterday. There was a pretty big temptation to break out the champagne even because I managed to finish revision on novel two. I still have to read it through again but most of revision should be done. Phew.
I didn’t get a lot done yesterday. I had a list, and couldn’t cross anything off. But then I told my husband things like, „I finished revision on the novel!“, and „I started working on the author website!“ and „I started researching genres for my trilogy!“ and found that, um, yes I had done a few things. (Also managed to get a prescription renewed, found out how to access voice mail from the new phone, and re-scheduled a lesson. And ran 5K.)
So not a completely wasted day.
A completely wasted day for me would be lying around on the beach doing absolutely nothing. The horrors.
Manchmal ergänze ich meine to-do-liste um die (relevanten) Sachen, die ich gemacht habe. Damit ich sehe, dass ich doch was Sinnvolles geschafft habe.
Das mache ich auch immer wieder. Und in letzter Zeit schreibe ich in mein Bullet Journal auch oft, was an dem Tag so war. Nicht so aufwändig wie richtig Tagebuch schreiben, aber nett zum Wiederlesen.
Das habe ich auch irgendwo als Done-Liste gesehen. Hilft immer wieder weiter, wenn man das Gefühl hat, nix hinzukriegen, Keine Zeit zu haben oder sonstwas. Ich muss halt hin und wieder unproduktiv neben meinem Kind auf dem Boden sitzen oder es herumtragen, wenn es nölig ist (bei Ersterem geht zumindest noch meist Handarbeiten) – Taxidienste gibt es auch schon, hoffe, dass wir nicht irgendwann alle 4 fast täglich irgendwohin bringen müssen. Aber so macht mal halt Dinge, die “zu nix führen”,die aber gemacht werden müssen.
Grüße,
Katrin (die gerade neben ihrem Kind im Bett liegt, damit es einschläft)
Das kenne ich natürlich auch. Fühlt sich an, als würde man nichts tun oder erreichen, aber das stimmt natürlich nicht. Um die Kinder kümmern ist ja nicht unwichtig. Und auch wenn es sich manchmal so anfühlt, als würde es immer so weitergehen, tut es das nicht. Mein Sohn ist fast fünfzehn, der schläft schon seit Jahren komplett selbständig ein…
Listen zu machen von dem, was man gemacht hat, ist oft sehr hilfreich. Auch an Tagen, wo ich das Gefühl habe, nur rumgehangen zu haben geht meistens doch irgendetwas weiter. Letzte Woche hatte ich zum Beispiel das Gefühl, gar nichts erreicht zu haben und dann habe ich mal überlegt, was alles war, da war mir dann schon klar, wo die Woche hingegangen ist.