By Liz, feeling chilly already
So, it’s almost my birthday (yay!). One of my friends always said that she looked at her birthday as the start of the new year, instead of Jan. 1. This year I decided to adopt that practice because I need to get some good habits going STAT.
And I thought I’d start with ditching this all-or-nothing mindset I somehow developed along the way.
I could spend some time on where this came from, but that would probably be its own whole blog post. Suffice it to say, it’s probably related to the notion I’ve had since I was a kid about perfectionism, feeling unworthy unless I was succeeding, terrified to fail. So as a result, I’ve been stuck in this idea that I have to do everything within the construct of some false idea I have about time spent or success achieved or some other wacko metric that I came up with in my own flawed mind. Usually followed up by It’s not enough, I’ll never get it done/right/fill in the blank.
For instance, some of my blocks in the past included things like:
- Unless I can devote four, five, eight hours a day to writing, there’s no time to write, therefore I do nothing.
- Unless I can work out for an hour, why bother.
- If I don’t have exactly every single ingredient that’s laid out in the recipe for the healthy dinner I was thinking of making, I can’t do it.
- If I can’t save xxx dollars a month in my investment account, what’s the use of saving anything.
And on and on.
I’ve started to recognize this in myself and how it’s been holding me back. Because the truth is, it’s the little steps, the few minutes, the $20 you save, that is going to add up. I realized I’m not going to get anywhere if I wait for the perfect time block to work on that next book. The time is going to pass anyway.
Instead, I’m going to do it now.
While I’m waiting for my coffee to brew, I’ll do 10 squats. And if I have 10 minutes this morning, I’m going to write a few words.
I’m guessing it’s going to add up real fast.
What about you, readers? What can you do with a few spare moments, dollars, or other asset you have? Tell me in the comments below.