Can’t Stop Procrastin-eating?
Oh man, I’m with you. Let’s commiserate (commiser-eat?).
I’m staying alone in a friend’s home for a few weeks, for what I intended to set aside as a solo writing retreat. It’s been a lot of solo snacking, with brief writing breaks in between.
For the last year and a half I have been working on a book which, in my disorganization (see: scattered) and excitement (“I want to write about everything!”), is essentially a mess of papers and post it notes and ramblingly incoherent files on Scrivener. I tried to make order of it, and ended up with half finished spreadsheets and entire folders dedicated to the ‘About,’ without any content added. I knew I needed to sit down to look through what there is, and begin to pull pieces out from the mess and bring them into the world. And I needed to get out of my own space, especially once COVID restrictions ended and the things around me burst back into action.
So I am here, alone in a home with piles of papers and a pantry of snacks.
Here are some things that have become clear:
- I am afraid of this project
- And I’m meeting internal resistance.
- Plus perfectionist tendencies that amplify anxiety.
- Shaming myself or feeling guilty is like hitting myself. Yael, stop hitting yourself.
- It’s okay to procrastinate. And it’s okay to eat.
- This is a learning process. It’s a practice.
- How can I be kind to myself?
- Pause, breathe.
- Listen to some music. Do a little dance.
- And if you eat, enjoy it. It’s a wonderful thing to have something delicious.
&& slowly slowly, the writing beats onward.
Back to the book! For now, this has been twenty five minutes.
