I'm sitting outside a Starbucks in Culver City, Lynn's got the day off and she's in a meeting across the road. I drove her here, because I knew she'd be a bit stressed with the meeting and driving is still a pretty new thing to her. I also thought I'd be able to just sit a read some of those library books I got recently.
My problem is procrastination, I think. Or maybe it's indecision, I'm not sure. One of the challenges of not having a day job is knowing what to focus on any any particular time. I used to think that was tricky when I was working, but at work it can be quite easy and totally unemotional. Your boss says jump, you say ok. If your boss isn't saying jump, then you look at what you said you'd achieve and then make it happen. I know there's intricacies in my argument, like if your boss is an overly ambitious idiot, with no clue whatsoever as to how to achieve anything and keeps overloading you with tasks that are counter to your agreed targets / logic / common sense / reality.... Hmm, I like not having a day job a lot.
Still, the issue exists. What to do first and how long to do it for? At the moment I juggle websites, graphic design, event planning, child care, family chef'ing and there's this blog of course. Somewhere in that I want to make time to research and write a book.
I spotted a book at the library that was all about procrastination, but I didn't take it out. No, I wasn't procrastinating. When I skimmed the book, it seemed to be saying that procrastination is all about shame. It said shame holds everyone back from taking action, that if you search your mind for what made you feel unworthy and ashamed, then you can put those feelings to bed and start to take action. It seemed to me to be a book of self justification. We all have a childhood that was not our choice, but once you're an adult, it's time to move on and make your own choices. It annoys me that I procrastinate. Sometimes it annoys me enough to take action. It doesn't annoy me enough to feel like I'm a victim and I don't need seek out someone or something in my past to blame.
What I should be doing, is designing postcard flyers for Lynn's show.
What would like to be able to do, is read those library books to help inspire me to start sketching out my book.
But I sit here outside Starbucks in Culver City, with a backpack full of library books, typing this blog.
I can't hang around with you, you are bad for me.
ReplyDeletePart 1:
ReplyDeleteWow, too funny. Not your post, really, but my reading it now. I'm in a profession that involves working on my own most of the time. Although there are a lot of specific tasks, the big stuff is self-directed, so I know your predicament very well. Here's one of the problems: when you don't have a job with a clear "at work" / "not at work" schedule and/or space, you're mentally always at work. You always feel like you should be doing work. This is increasingly true for people with more traditional jobs too, as gadgetry makes us increasingly "tied in" to our work. Cafes now have wifi; 3G lets us "work anywhere." So we think we should be working everywhere, and all the time. But your mind needs to play too... it just feels guilty doing so.
Which brings me to what's funny. I've been asked to write a text about play. And I don't have much time - both due to circumstances beyond my control and to some degree of procrastination. I've written about the work/play battle before, so I thought it would be easy. But it's more work than I expected, and the writer's block's being a bit of a bear. Although I've been told I can write it in a playful/experimental format, there's one restriction: the length. So that makes it work.
People who've read my comments on this blog before might be surprised to think of me having trouble filling space - some of poor Mark's blog posts need to go on scrolls by the time I get done commenting on them... but that's because writing a text on play is work, whereas blog-commenting on work is play. And that's got something to do with what I'm writing the text about. Or trying to. Think I just wrote some of it in this blog comment. Much safer to write in these little form boxes than on a word processor. After all, how much trouble could one get into in a tiny box?
Part 2
ReplyDeleteThere's another thing too - I always want to do what I'm not supposed to do. If I were supposed to write this blog comment, I'd be writing that text. Sometimes I also do things like swim or play the drums. Ah, but those are exercise, good going, Übergeek! You're doing what you're supposed to! But if I did them for that reason, I probably wouldn't do them. Please don't let me know they're exercise; I'm having too much fun playing.
So back to playing. And your conundrum, Mark. (Thanks for another opportunity to say, "conundrum.") Your mind really does need to play, so let it. I know you don't have time, and neither do I. But I find a lot of times I can do work faster and get started more easily when I let myself have play time too, even in short bursts. If that doesn't convince you, then consider that your urge to work all the time comes from establishment conditioning, and your punk ethos requires you to fight the power! :-)
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