It took another two weeks to get one weeks worth of The Artist’s Way finished. I felt bad about it last time, but not this time. We had to put one of our fur babies to sleep and got a bit accomplished in the house, so it’s not like I didn’t do anything while I wasn’t writing. I should have found the time to do it anyway, but the time was well spent just the same.

The reading this week actually caused me to take a look at how I handle my everyday life and commitments. Many times I feel like The Artist’s Way is suggesting that I should put myself first and everything else second, which is a foreign concept to me. People that do that seem self-centered and pompous, but I know there’s a happy medium there somewhere. I’m not saying I only do for other people and never myself, but there’s rarely a time when I put myself first.

Quite a few of the tasks this week involved gathering pictures for an image file. I enjoyed this more than I expected. Scouring the internet to find good pictures to represent places I wanted to visit and things I would like to have was fun even though I felt a twinge of guilt. I’m not really sure I can put my finger on why I felt guilty. Obviously it felt selfish to me, but it’s not like I’ve never had the “if we won the lottery” conversation with people before. Maybe it was because I was putting time and effort into the project. I’m not sure. Either way, I enjoyed the exercises and hope there are more like them in the weeks to come.

I know I need to work on saying no. Several times recently I planned on getting some writing done, but when I was faced with something I could have said no to so I could write, I didn’t. If someone wants to spend time with me or talk to me or chat with me or play a game with me or my help with something, I have a hard time saying no to that. This was also something in this week’s text of The Artist’s Way, so I paid more attention to what I was doing without actually changing my habits. Needless to say, I was surprised how many times I could have said no and didn’t. Several times I should have said no, but this is another happy medium I need to find.

I didn’t do my artist’s date on purpose. I did wind up doing some work in the house I’d been putting off, which made me feel like I accomplished something even if it wasn’t the something I wanted to accomplish. I’m hoping to do something a little more creative next week.