So I’m back on track now after playing catch up. I did my brain dump pages five out of the seven days. I find that if I don’t do them soon after I wake up in the morning, I find other things I need to do more that prevent me from doing them. Then, by the time I get around to writing the brain dump pages, I’m running low on writing time for the day so it’s the only thing I get accomplished.

I had a conversation with a friend not too long ago about “chasing rabbits.” Chasing rabbits is where you start to do something, then get distracted by something else and something else and something else until all you’ve haven’t gotten anything accomplished. Not only do I suffer from pouring myself into one thing, I also suffer from chasing rabbits. Sometimes, if I don’t remain focused, I’ll sit down to write and remember that I need to start a load of laundry. So, I start sorting laundry and remember that I need to make a grocery list so I can go to the store later. Half done sorting the laundry and in the middle of making out a grocery list, I’ll remember that I need to call my mom about something. An hour later, when I get off the phone usually forgetting what I called about in the first place, I remember that I need to pull the meat for dinner out of the freezer. On the way to the kitchen, I see a present from one of the cats in the form of a hair ball and clean it up, completely forgetting about the meat until it’s time to make dinner. And so on and so on. In this example, out of the five things I was sidetracked with, I only got one accomplished. I cleaned up the hair ball.

It doesn’t happen all the time, but it seems I usually do one extreme or the other. I either get really focused on one thing or I become completely unfocused and accomplish nothing. So where’s the happy medium? I’ve tried making a schedule, but that never works out. Things always take more or less time and something always happens to completely invalidate the schedule. I’m just not good at adjusting when things I didn’t schedule for are thrown in my path, I guess. I’m still working on how to fix this. I need to get into some kind of routine and stick with it somehow. I’m going to have to force myself into one even if it means leaving the house to write where I cannot be distracted by other things I need to do. The only problem with that is my laptop doesn’t have a very long battery life. If I can do it for just an hour and a half every day, maybe I can start to condition myself to a happy medium where I don’t work too long on one thing and I don’t get distracted thus accomplishing nothing. If anyone else has had these problems and solutions that worked for them, please let me know.

This week was reading deprivation week. This is an excellent exercise, but I’d have to argue with the author of The Artist’s Way that anyone can go for a week without reading. College assignments, work duties be damned! Any creative can creatively wriggle out of reading for a week? I’m sorry, but not completely. Not in this day and age. I did manage to cut it to a minimum. I didn’t feel one bit bad about not completely cutting out reading because I have to read to answer emails and fill orders if nothing else. It wasn’t easy, but without the distraction of reading, my own imagination jumped into overdrive within a couple of days. I made some large strides in the plot of one of the projects I was working on and it was exciting.

I understand now why many of the tasks in The Artist’s Way feel like a waste of time for me. I didn’t really need help with creativity, I needed help managing my time and getting my butt into the chair. Doing these exercises will help further down the road and so I keep doing them even though I’m itching to pour more time into the projects I’m actively working on. The biggest thing I need help with only actively writing can fix. I need to get better at writing again. I need to be at the point I was ten years ago and then surpass it. I can only do that by writing and writing and writing.

I made the mistake of showing a few people what I was working on even though The Artist’s Way explicitly says not to at this stage. It didn’t matter what those people said about what they read. Some of them were positive and some of them were critical, but I wasn’t to the point where I was comfortable enough and confident enough to really show anyone. I started feeling self-conscious before I ever received a response back. I wished I hadn’t done it. I will not make that mistake again, but hopefully I’ll know when I’m ready.

• Is there something nasty going around? Seems like everyone is getting sick recently. #
• Making Chicken Alfredo with broccoli and garlic bread… since everyone is sharing and making me hungry I decided to share, too. #
• And Red Velvet cake for dessert. I'm 'splody now. #