Doing What You Want

Don't procrastinate!  As I check off writing deadlines one by one, doing the work that brings in the bacon, I think of the poems, stories, music and other stuff that doesn't get written or done.  How many of us postpone doing what we say we want to do while slogging away at something else?

"Who are you to talk?" says Virginia.  "You don't need to hustle off to an 8-to-6 job, risk getting fired if you don't, or struggle making ends meet payday to payday."

She doesn't really know, but I'd have to admit, like many if not most people my age in this country, my situation isn't the same as the majority of twenty- or thirty-somethings.  It's tough for the strugglers to find time to do what they really want, although I think they can.

The first step might be to convince yourself that you really want to do what you want to do.  Frankly, if you're not finding time to do it, you probably don't want to do it enough.  Think of what you find time to do.  Sketch out your day.  Sleep as late as possible? Clean house?  Mow the lawn?  Sit and talk to strangers while your laundry spins?  Email, "talk" on Facebook, watch television, play golf?  All those things are perfectly fine activities, but if they're not that thing you really want to do, then what's up?

Next, focus on what you're missing.  A writer, artist or composer knows he or she forfeits product each day that passes without practicing the medium.  Ideas disappear or fail to appear in the first place, and then they're gone for good.  If a writer writes, he or she has something to show for it.  If the writer doesn't write, there's zip.  Some day, looking back, he or she may say, gosh, if only I'd....  The same is true whatever you want to do -- knitting, learning automobile mechanics, singing, walking, exercising, starting a business, growing a garden.

That's enough.  I'm going to work on that trio.