I’ll be honest: I really didn’t think my 31st trip around this planet would be quite this dramatic. While the past 3 months have been particularly rough, it’s generally been kind of a weird year for me. Actually, the last several years have been super weird in ways I wasn’t always totally prepared for. In many ways, I’ve lost a lot of the wind in my sails that I had previously. My motivation? Gone. My productivity? Non-existent.
I’m working on getting better about it (and part of it is going to therapy and improving other parts of my life that need it).
Several years ago (like in… 2013?) I started doing this thing where I set small goals for myself every single day to pull myself out of a pretty serious slump. I would basically try to do something specific every single day for a week, then pick something else the next week—basically to get myself back into the groove of doing those things. I remember one of my goals being “making my own dinner” (instead of like eating cereal out of a box) everyday and another being “get dressed” every day. Those little baby steps really helped me at that time and I’ve realized I need to start doing things like that now.
It feels so weird to me sometimes that for a long stretch of my life, I was so regimented, motivated, and on top of everything in my life—granted, I was in college, so it wasn’t really that hard. But man! How things have changed!
The hard part is that, of course, I have a lot more responsibilities than I did in 2013 and sometimes they can be incredibly overwhelming in a way that I don’t know how to deal with.
Anyway, that’s a very personal intro to say: I, just like everyone else, am working on who I am and who I want to be; I want to be a better version of myself and I assume you also want to be a better version of yourself; and I hope that learning about my process can help you a little bit. Ultimately, my goal for blogging has always been to share a little bit of my life and help other people in whatever way I can—whether you are looking for a new foundation or are anxious about your career.
As I said, setting small goals has been a huge help to me in the past. For the past week, I’ve been hemming and hawing about how to get myself back in gear and feeling like myself again. What can I do to make things easier? I’ve reorganized my planners & journals, I’ve starting writing down a master to do list of everything I’ve been avoiding for 3 months, and I’ve written down a series of baby steps to help myself get back on the wagon. I wanted to walk through a few of my goals, share what I’m doing, and how I’m implementing everything.
So, without further ado, here are my goals for the end of October into November, and how they translate into my long-term goals for 2020.
1. Pick one weekly goal every week.
I have a planner from 52 Lists (which I highly recommend!) and I’ve started using it to keep track of my weekly master to do list (basically, the to list I have had basically exactly the same for about 12 weeks now), as well as my weekly goals. Here are a few examples of my weekly goals for the next several weeks:
Take a walk daily.
Speak to someone besides Danny, my mom, or Forrest every day.
Journal.
Get dressed and/or make myself presentable.
I know a lot of those seems really basic (get dressed!?) but let me tell you: the past 6 months have been some of the hardest for me in terms of doing basic, every day “normal” tasks. It goes without saying that I haven’t been having an easy time. It’s hard to talk about, but in many ways, I’m trying to reteach myself how to function every single day as someone other than Forrest’s mother. When things were hardest for me, and I was at my most low mentally, it was easiest for me to channel everything into “do it for Forrest, just get Forrest to school” or “just make sure Forrest is fed and happy”, which took the onus off of me. It was mentally a relief, but I’ve been wearing leggings + baggy t-shirt everyday for a year and a half now; it’s probably time to do something about that.
Anyway, I’m working on getting myself back into the swing of things. Speaking of which…
2. Create & maintain a schedule.
The hardest part of having a child has been the lack of schedule sometimes. When you’re a stay-at-home-mom, you aren’t going anywhere. No one is depending on you, or asking you for anything.
In 2014 and 2015, I was going to work everyday. Waking up, taking a shower, getting dressed, going to work. After I had Forrest, that schedule started to erode. No one really talks about this (or maybe they do, I just haven’t seen it), but having a child really does throw everything sideways. For 3 and a half years, I’ve woken up at 5:30 am or earlier and immediately had a small person attached to me. Maybe sometimes, he napped away from me, but most of the time, he didn’t. If I woke up in the morning, I might have time to make coffee, but not shower; I might have enough time to get dressed in somethings besides leggings (or, maybe not!!), but showering was often out of the question. My schedule eroded. It became wake up to crying baby, get him, feed him, get him changed and dressed, make coffee in a rush, put on clothes that don’t make me feel awful about myself, and get him to my mom’s so I could get to work. Or, if I was home with him, it was jumping into whatever activity I had planned, doing laundry, cleaning, or whatever.
Basically: I need a schedule again. I have to start taking care of myself in the morning again.
It’s challenging because Forrest already wakes up early, so waking up any earlier is extremely painful. Parenthood makes you tired. I’m also 31 now (happy birthday to me!) and I need more sleep than ever, it feels like. Stress, anxiety, depression, and a constant heavy mental load mean I’m just a lot more tired than I used to be—and probably have a headache on top of it.
However, even if I’m working at home, I realize I need a schedule. I need to have expectations. Even if it means just putting on a bra and a different pair of leggings for the day at home with Forrest, that’s probably enough.
So, yes, one of my biggest goals for November and December is starting to have structure in my life again. I need it, I’ve missed it, and I’ve got to do it if I want to feel better anytime soon.
3. Finish NaNoWriMo.
It goes without saying: my biggest goal for November is to finish NaNoWriMo!!! I’m really excited for my story this year and it’s honestly the one thing propelling me through what has been a not-so-great month otherwise.
4. Plan & launch one product before March 2020.
Some of the sneakiest of my readers noticed I had casually added a Products page to my website and then promptly removed it. (It technically still exists, but is in progress!) I’ve had this idea to start selling small ebooks for about a year now, but it makes me nervous. I launched an e-course as a tester a few months ago and it seriously fizzled, but that was partly my fault. One of the things I find most difficult is creating buzz for my own content and really selling it. I don’t like being a salesman, but I’ve realized if I want to be in control of my own life and work, I need to try something different—and selling myself as a freelance writer (and a good one!) means doing sales.
I’ve had several ideas for ebooks and workbooks for a long time, but actually going through with it has been incredibly challenging. I’m my own worst critic and I realize I just need to do it, if I’m ever actually going to get anything done. So yes!! Watch this space!!
