Getting Started

I’ve been making excuses for NOT writing a new blog post, for staying away, for allowing my perfectionism to get a foothold in my life.  AGAIN.  I don’t care what project you’re struggling with, most of the time, 99% of the problem is getting started.  Once you get started, things usually have a way of working themselves out, but getting started…AKKKK!!!!!!!!

I think we’re all capable of AMAZING things if we just get started.

Want to write a novel?

Start with one sentence, and keep adding more.

Need to organize a room?

Pick a starting point and work your way around the perimeter.

Break it down into manageable steps.  Don’t try to do EVERYTHING because you can’t.  Baby steps.  Baby steps.  BABY STEPS!

Easier said than done, right?  That’s the problem.  Deep down, we all KNOW what we need to do.  But it easier to make excuses than to take care of ourselves.  And for some screwed up reason, we like to beat ourselves up for being human, which leads to MORE procrastination, and less doing.  Oh!  And if we can’t do it the right way, we don’t want to do it at all.  Why bother writing if you’ll never be published?  Why bother getting started when that snarky voice in the back of your head is telling you, “You’re going to fail!  You fail at everything.  You never finish your projects.”

I know this voice!  I know it far too well.  What it doesn’t tell you is that it’s OK to fail.  It’s OK to give up the small battles if it means taking control of your life again.

Those unfinished craft projects?  It’s OK to donate the components, or even to throw them away.  Just because you started a project 10 years ago, doesn’t mean you’re shackled to it!  If it’s no longer resonating with you, if it’s not bringing you joy, if you’ve moved on to a different place in your life, it’s OK to start something new.  Those tangled knitting projects, random quilt blocks, and unfinished scrapbooks are THINGS, not people.  You’re not abandoning them, you’re moving forward.  And that’s OK.  Just because you were into porcelain unicorns when you were 8, doesn’t mean you have to hold onto them when you’re 80.  Oh!  And the opposite is true as well.  Just because you’re a grownup, doesn’t mean you have to give up all your toys.  You want to collect replica toy cars?  Go ahead!  That’s OK.

The point is, we’re all works in progress.  We’re never the final draft of ourselves.  We change, we grow, and periodically…we have to prune away the stuff that’s not working for us.

As I write this post, a work crew is fixing the potholes in our neighborhood.  At some point, a neighbor tried to fill the hole with bricks.  A+ for creativity, but not really effective.

I’d like to fault this person, but all of us have done this, metaphorically speaking.  We fill the holes in our lives with “stuff.”  Sometimes it works.  Sometimes it doesn’t.  And if it’s not working out the way we hoped it would, it’s not a fail.  It’s OK to try something new and to change it if things don’t work out.