Day: December 11, 2024

The Plan

LynnLeave a comment

I have a plan for today’s writing that I’m just going to call The Plan. :D

1: Begin the day with a 5 minute sprint as I wait for my decaf coffee to brew. I set this up because I realized yesterday that brewing my morning coffee is pretty much the one keystone habit I have.*

2: I’ll have a break for food. Then return and warm up with another 5 or even 10 minute timed session.

3: After that one, I’ll aim for 500 words before a break, and I’ll run short timed sessions of 10 minutes to keep me on track. I need the check-in to be sure I haven’t wandered off to do something else on the computer. :D

4: Between sessions, I’ll update my word count tracker to keep aware of my progress. Hopefully, my word counts will be going up and it’ll be a little hit of motivation to keep going. :D

5: The aim is for 500 words before a break, but if I’ve gone for 90 minutes and still haven’t reached it, I’ll take a break anyway to try to reset my inner critic and get out of whatever mindset is causing the slowdown.

6: I’ll take a break at 500 words, for 5 to 60 minutes, whatever is calling to me, and then return for another 500. I WILL need to set a timer for the break, but like nearly everyone else in the world these days, I have my phone with me most of the time and it will work great as an alarm. :D

Now: I’m going to make coffee and will return while it’s brewing to immediately write for 5 minutes. I’ll update this post before every restart instead of when I start a break. That way I feel some need to get started again or face the public humiliation. LOL. (How many people are reading this? Zero probably.) ;D

    *My understanding of keystone habits comes from The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg which I read quite a few years ago.

    Daily revisit of an older post: Daily post – Jan. 23, 2020 – Thursday – Part one. How did that day turn out? I don’t know. I didn’t read it. But part one was interesting! ;D

    My new year

    LynnLeave a comment

    I’m always trying to figure out what I want to do with this blog–how to make it work for me.

    But it already does. I just forget sometimes that it’s okay for it to simply exist in the way that it does. I start to feel pressure when I notice that (nearly) everyone else in the blog business is trying to run a business.

    Look, this is a blog. If you learn something here, it isn’t because I taught it, it’s because something I’ve said about my own journey and life resonated with you, and you did the work to apply it to your own life.

    I ramble. I talk about my own struggles. This blog is like my body double so I can get closer to reaching my own goals. I need that accountability. I like writing about my failures. Maybe I’m too introspective. Maybe it slows me down. What I do know is that if I don’t write out these things they start to billow up inside me and make me feel like I’m ready to claw my way out of my own skin.

    And I enjoy writing the blog for whatever reason. But I hate structured writing. Don’t like putting together essays or articles. It feels hard. It definitely isn’t fun.

    This–stream of consciousness writing–is easy. It feels fun, and it relaxes me.

    So here I am. It’s time to reset for 2025, a little early, I know, but is it ever really too early to do better? No, I don’t think so. :D

    Welcome to my new year.

    See you around.

    P.S. If you have a blog that’s just a blog, let me know and I’ll share the link, for other writers who just want to read about someone else’s struggles with writing and publishing for a break from their own.

    5 minutes of writing

    LynnLeave a comment

    I don’t like intentions. They feel like a set up for failure. What they really are for me is a hit of dopamine that takes away the push I need to actually do the thing I intend to do.

    Counterintuitive since I need real accountability to get things done if I’m basically not obsessed with it already, huh?

    So, no intentions today. No stated intentions ever if I can control myself past this little rebellion.

    But…

    Yesterday, I tried out writing for 5 minutes while I let my (decaf) coffee brew and that worked surprisingly well, so of course I’m going to try that again today.

    Uh oh. Is that a stated intention? Erase it. Pretend it doesn’t exist, because I actually want to do this 5 minute thing. :D

    (Yes, I’m typing this blog post on my phone while I sit up in bed thinking about my day and try to motivate myself to step out onto the cold hardwood and get it started.)