I’m writing the day before we board a plane to fly to Las Vegas, and then drive up to southern Utah. We are all pretty excited to have a vacation even though the temperatures are going to be brutal. It’s time for me to learn what a dry heat truly feels like!
Those of you reading along have probably experienced both my desire to write with some frequency and my inability to keep up that habit. Recently Arun shared with me this blog post and I think things have finally clicked. I have since written in my journal sixteen of the past seventeen days.
It’s an odd feeling because my writing in this journal has not been substantial. My total words written in these past few weeks have been less than many other stretches throughout the past years. The big discovery here is that I’m not worrying about it. I’m just forming a habit, and worrying about doing it “correctly” is sure to end things before the habit forms.
In order to start journaling I only wrote 2-3 sentences a day. These would be the thoughts at the top of mind, or the experiences that seemed the most relevant. I start by describing the events of my day.
This has always felt like at best a cheat or at worst a waste of time. Yet if it helps me form a habit that I want to form, how can it be a waste of time? It is not cheating to use known-techniques to form a habit!
I’ve stopped trying to journal at my computer. I’m using a notebook and a pen. It’s not out of a desire to throw back to 100 years ago or to be hip or to be “that guy” with a collection of hand-written journals. It’s just practical because the other thing I’ve changed is to journal at the end of the day rather than in the morning. I already have enough screen temptations at night, so avoiding a nine o’clock journaling computer session seems for the best. Journaling at the end of the day means it’s pretty easy to use that trick of journaling by “describing the events of my day.”
Also, I wouldn’t mind being “that guy” with a collection of hand-written journals.
So I’m trusting the process. If I build this habit, I think I will start mentally processing my days in a different way. I think I will start making better (for me) choices throughout the day. And when I sit down in the evening I think I will eventually write more than just a few sentences, and more interesting things. I think I will.
More...
I have not written any blog posts this month, nor do I have any announcements. Keeping it light for ya!
Ephemera
Wet theme park conditions on this very trying “vacation” as a chaperone.
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It was a trip with challenges, but the kids had a blast and they got experiences like this. Success!
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Our roof was replaced last week while we were gone on a marching band trip. The roofers did not do an adequate job cleaning up. Unfortunately one of these ended up in my youngest's foot. So she got to make a surprise Fourth of July emergency room visit for a tetanus shot.
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Good Enough is taking a summer break, but we squeezed out one last newsletter for all of our superfans.
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A good night. 🎵
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Sculpture, what does it mean?
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Some links I found interesting:
- Latitude Studios – Continuing to feed my backyard office dreams (though their Instagram seems dead, so...)
- Non-Consensual Doom – A good reminder for me to avoid popping other people’s balloons
Click through for more ephemera.