Monday, April 9, 2012

Update from the Procrastination Front ...


When I started this blog on April first, I vowed to stick to each of these rules for thirty days in an attempt to overcome my tendency to procrastinate and undermine my own sanity. I have done pretty well with most of them, not perfect, but pretty well, but some have proven to be more challenging than others.

An update:

30 DAY PLAN – day 9 



My house:
15 min pickup a day
This has been one of the ‘eh’ items on the list. It has happened most days, but a few times it has been pushed off until it is too late in the day and then it gets lost in the chaos of homework and dinner and all the other end of the day craziness. Once dinner is over and the kids are getting ready for bed, I usually have lost all motivation to tidy up anything else. I have made the kids do the 15 minute pickup a few times with great results. I split the time between the playroom and their bedrooms and it seems like just enough time for them to do a good job and not start fighting. Win!

1 minute rule
This rule seems to be the sticky wicket of all my procrastination problems. If I could master this one thing, all my troubles would be over. Ok, maybe not ALL my troubles.  The rule is if a task takes less that one minute to accomplish, it must happen RIGHT AWAY. I constantly say things to myself like “I’ll put this here for now …” or “I need to do that today”  and go on to something else. After a day of this, I have a house full of items that need to be returned to their homes and tasks that are still unfinished. Why don’t I take care of these little items right away instead of letting them add up to a huge and frustrating problem? I have no idea. I need to keep telling myself “do it now … do it now … do it NOW.”

Health/Fitness

Stay off the scale:
I have not stepped on my scale since March 31. This seems like a small thing, but it is really very liberating. The numbers on the scale never made me happy and I don’t want to obsess about the fractions of a pound up or down my weight might fluctuate from day to day. And now I don’t.

Eating habits:
I promised to give up sweets and refined carbs, so no refined sugar or flour (with 2 exceptions—my daughter’s birthday, and Easter.) This has also been a total success. Yesterday, I had one little piece of Easter candy and a slice of pie after dinner. That is it. I seem to be more successful at the things I vow NOT to do than the ones where I have to actually do something, so somehow I need to figure out how to frame the items on my list I have trouble with into things I am giving up …

Exercise
My plan is: for the next 30 days I will take at least a 30 min walk (with some running) working toward a 30 minute run a day and/or take a yoga class. Every day.

So far, so good with this one, although I haven’t done it yet today …  I’m not sure I will ever be able to run for 30 minutes straight, but the running I have been doing has gotten a teeny, tiny bit better. However, if my gym had free hot yoga every day, I would do that in a heartbeat.

Work:
I am a freelance graphic designer, which means I have to constantly try to find more work. I promised to update my Facebook business page, and check job listings in Linkdin groups, Craigslist, Elance etc … and try to send my portfolio to at least one new contact each day.

I have not done any of these things. Booooooo. I have done a little pro bono design work for a local organization and I started to gather together some pictures of my work to update my Facebook business page, but that’s it. The FB page will be updated by the end of the week. Really. I mean it. I have also been looking every day at job listings, but I never seem to find anything that I am qualified to do AND can be done as a freelancer. The search continues …


Last but not least … blog every day:
This (obviously) I have done. Every day. And I will keep doing it until the end of the month. After that, I plan to post twice a week, so hopefully I will have something interesting to say.  

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