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The End of Pod One
Feb. 13th, 2011 07:15 pmIt’s been six weeks since I made my first set of New Year’s resolutions, can you believe it? My, how the time does fly.
In case you needed a refresher course, I had decided that instead of making these big, grandiose and vague plans, I would try to set three concrete goals that could be accomplished in six weeks. That way, I would have a built-in ticking clock, and a time period long enough to form a habit and short enough that I could keep it at the forefront of my consciousness for a while. Well, how did I do with that? Not well. Let’s review the resolutions, shall we?
Resolution #1: Write 3500 words a week for six weeks. Failed.
That first week was pretty productive, but ever since then I haven’t managed to capture that same spark. Unfortunately, I hit a pretty bad snag early in the year with Further Confusion and never recovered after that. Part of it was working picking up to the point where I was working through a lot of lunches, but honestly I’ll cop to the fact that I was lazy and unfocused too.
To be absolutely honest with you, writing scares the shit out of me. There are a lot of reasons for this, but I have a fundamental mistrust of my brain. It’s not the most reliable instrument I own, and if left to my own devices it’ll come up with all kinds of crazy stuff. I don’t really trust myself to be able to keep track of all the things you need to in a good short story. If I just...let myself go, who knows what I’ll come up with? More than likely, it will be a fever dream of half-formed images, where people say things in weird cadences that sound good but don’t illuminate much about what they’re thinking. That’s...not useful. It’s frustrating for the audience and just embarrassing for me.
But to be honest, that’s something I’m just going to have to get over. For a long time I’ve been operating under the mantra “Don’t get it right, just get it written.” But I’m too afraid of my own voice to do that. And that’s got to stop. All of the writing tricks in the world aren’t going to do me any good until I man up and start saying the things that are on my mind.
That’s one of the reasons I wanted to start this journal again; to get myself in the habit of “translating” my thoughts into essays that aren’t only legible, but interesting. Words are the only things we have to take our abstractions and give them form, and even if they make poor substitutes at times they’re mighty if you give them a chance.
Anyway, there really is nothing for it than to sit down, man up and write more. I don’t really have anything better to say than that.
Resolution #2: Eat no more than 1750 Calories per day for six weeks. Failed.
I haven’t done too terribly with the food thing, actually. I give myself failing marks because I haven’t been consistent or anal enough to keep track every day, every meal. If I had, chances are I wouldn’t have stayed within my limits on a regular basis.
Again, the convention sunk me and I just never really recovered from there. A good deal of it was lack of discipline, and trying to juggle too many things at once. I’m a stress eater, and with things going on at work and changes at home (the husband and I are moving soon), it’s a little difficult to keep my diet in check.
Obviously, the thing to do here is to find better ways to relieve my stress. It’s not that I’m unhappy with anything that’s going on, or there’s a single thing I’d change about my life, but...there are things making me nervous pretty regularly, and I’m going to need to find a way to deal with that.
Another thing that I can do is make my stress eating work *for* me. I made a pretty awful bet with Ryan (more on that later), so it’s in my best interests to have healthier snacks to reach for when I need something to nervously graze on. To that end, I’ve bought carrots, apples and other things for nibbling. Also, mini-bags of pretzels, baked Doritos and the like.
Resolution #3. Pay attention to my personal appearance more often. Done.
I’m paraphrasing a bit here, and this resolution was a bit more vague than the others, but I feel like I’ve taken good strides towards making sure my appearance comes off better than it did before. There’s still a lot of work to do, though. Which is where I could use your help.
Local folks who see me on a fairly regular basis, could you recommend a thing or two that might help me improve my appearance? I know this is a really dodgy area of criticism for most people, but I’m looking for constructive feedback of any kind. Just drop me a private message through LJ or shoot me an email; I’ll gladly talk it over with you.
Now, I think the second pod is going to be roughly a repeat of the first one. I want to start out with something simple and easily measured, and I will keep trying this until I get it right. So, my three new resolutions for the next six weeks are:
1. Write 3500 words a week for the next six weeks. More than that, I must have material ready for an audience within that time. Blogs, of course, are quite helpful for that, but short stories, poems and the like are what I would really like to focus on.
2. Eat no more than 1600 Calories per day, on average, for six weeks. This should be fairly easy if I stick to my exercise regiment and keep training for Bay to Breakers. My eating habits during the week are fine, but I have got to find a way to keep the wheels from coming off during the weekends or in social groups.
3. Meditate every day. Meditation will help with my focus and stress levels -- those are just two of the most immediate benefits. Besides that, it’s been far too long since I’ve made it a priority in my life, and I’d like for that to change. Looking good will still be a focus, but I can’t think of anything concrete for that resolution. This is much better.
We’ll come back to this on Sunday, March 27th, and we’ll see how I do this time.
In case you needed a refresher course, I had decided that instead of making these big, grandiose and vague plans, I would try to set three concrete goals that could be accomplished in six weeks. That way, I would have a built-in ticking clock, and a time period long enough to form a habit and short enough that I could keep it at the forefront of my consciousness for a while. Well, how did I do with that? Not well. Let’s review the resolutions, shall we?
Resolution #1: Write 3500 words a week for six weeks. Failed.
That first week was pretty productive, but ever since then I haven’t managed to capture that same spark. Unfortunately, I hit a pretty bad snag early in the year with Further Confusion and never recovered after that. Part of it was working picking up to the point where I was working through a lot of lunches, but honestly I’ll cop to the fact that I was lazy and unfocused too.
To be absolutely honest with you, writing scares the shit out of me. There are a lot of reasons for this, but I have a fundamental mistrust of my brain. It’s not the most reliable instrument I own, and if left to my own devices it’ll come up with all kinds of crazy stuff. I don’t really trust myself to be able to keep track of all the things you need to in a good short story. If I just...let myself go, who knows what I’ll come up with? More than likely, it will be a fever dream of half-formed images, where people say things in weird cadences that sound good but don’t illuminate much about what they’re thinking. That’s...not useful. It’s frustrating for the audience and just embarrassing for me.
But to be honest, that’s something I’m just going to have to get over. For a long time I’ve been operating under the mantra “Don’t get it right, just get it written.” But I’m too afraid of my own voice to do that. And that’s got to stop. All of the writing tricks in the world aren’t going to do me any good until I man up and start saying the things that are on my mind.
That’s one of the reasons I wanted to start this journal again; to get myself in the habit of “translating” my thoughts into essays that aren’t only legible, but interesting. Words are the only things we have to take our abstractions and give them form, and even if they make poor substitutes at times they’re mighty if you give them a chance.
Anyway, there really is nothing for it than to sit down, man up and write more. I don’t really have anything better to say than that.
Resolution #2: Eat no more than 1750 Calories per day for six weeks. Failed.
I haven’t done too terribly with the food thing, actually. I give myself failing marks because I haven’t been consistent or anal enough to keep track every day, every meal. If I had, chances are I wouldn’t have stayed within my limits on a regular basis.
Again, the convention sunk me and I just never really recovered from there. A good deal of it was lack of discipline, and trying to juggle too many things at once. I’m a stress eater, and with things going on at work and changes at home (the husband and I are moving soon), it’s a little difficult to keep my diet in check.
Obviously, the thing to do here is to find better ways to relieve my stress. It’s not that I’m unhappy with anything that’s going on, or there’s a single thing I’d change about my life, but...there are things making me nervous pretty regularly, and I’m going to need to find a way to deal with that.
Another thing that I can do is make my stress eating work *for* me. I made a pretty awful bet with Ryan (more on that later), so it’s in my best interests to have healthier snacks to reach for when I need something to nervously graze on. To that end, I’ve bought carrots, apples and other things for nibbling. Also, mini-bags of pretzels, baked Doritos and the like.
Resolution #3. Pay attention to my personal appearance more often. Done.
I’m paraphrasing a bit here, and this resolution was a bit more vague than the others, but I feel like I’ve taken good strides towards making sure my appearance comes off better than it did before. There’s still a lot of work to do, though. Which is where I could use your help.
Local folks who see me on a fairly regular basis, could you recommend a thing or two that might help me improve my appearance? I know this is a really dodgy area of criticism for most people, but I’m looking for constructive feedback of any kind. Just drop me a private message through LJ or shoot me an email; I’ll gladly talk it over with you.
Now, I think the second pod is going to be roughly a repeat of the first one. I want to start out with something simple and easily measured, and I will keep trying this until I get it right. So, my three new resolutions for the next six weeks are:
1. Write 3500 words a week for the next six weeks. More than that, I must have material ready for an audience within that time. Blogs, of course, are quite helpful for that, but short stories, poems and the like are what I would really like to focus on.
2. Eat no more than 1600 Calories per day, on average, for six weeks. This should be fairly easy if I stick to my exercise regiment and keep training for Bay to Breakers. My eating habits during the week are fine, but I have got to find a way to keep the wheels from coming off during the weekends or in social groups.
3. Meditate every day. Meditation will help with my focus and stress levels -- those are just two of the most immediate benefits. Besides that, it’s been far too long since I’ve made it a priority in my life, and I’d like for that to change. Looking good will still be a focus, but I can’t think of anything concrete for that resolution. This is much better.
We’ll come back to this on Sunday, March 27th, and we’ll see how I do this time.
