Rain lilies, from Abby’s tiny window garden.
They bloom only around this time of the year, on the onset of the monsoon.
Click the pic, for a bigger image
I love to write.
Correction, I need to write.
Writing helps me think, to be deliberate about things, to slow down.
At the same time, writing is also a slow, plodding process for me. Every post seems to take forever. So many years of doing it and it does not get any easier.
I agonise over what I want to say, the picture or quotes I want to include, the overall arc of my thoughts, the structure, everything has to be just so.1
I’ve lowered the bar, to build consistency, with my #100WordHabit and now I have a new problem. First, I could not get started, and now I cannot stop once I get started.
I just have to finish my thoughts, my post, and that sometimes takes hours.
Which brings me back to me not wanting to start, for the fear that nothing else (that are in fact, more important) will get done.
This in turn, brings me to the brainwave I had a couple of days ago, in the bath.2
The pressure comes from wanting to publish what I write, the day I write.
What if, I didn’t?
Nothing has to change. With the exception of a hard stop.
One hour.
One hour to write and publish.
Or one hour to write and then put my pencil down.
And then I can come back to it the next day.
Yesterday’s post was the result of this approach.
I wrote it over two days, in two one hour sessions.
Very like Abby’s rain lillies up up above. They are prepping through the year, to bloom at this time, every time. Just because I cannot see it, does not mean nothing’s happening
One downside, that I potentially see, is that I will use this as an excuse to slack.
I hope I don’t.
But then on the other hand, without a pressure control valve like this, I can very easily see myself burning out again.
So let’s see how this goes.
I’m betting on me being a rain lily.
Feedback on this post? Mail me at feedback at this domain
P.S. Subscribe to my mailing list!
Forward these posts and letters to your friends and get them to subscribe!
P.P.S. Feed my insatiable reading habit.