Balancing Act

Time-Management, Procastination and Perfectionism.

Ok, I’m trying not to whine or moan here, but galatic forces have been pushing me to think about how these are related. Yes, Bria and Andi can now consider themselves part of the galatic forces. I don’t know if there’s a uniform or even a t-shirt, sorry.

The Acountability Corner thread Bria started has helped me move from thinking only of what I’m going to do the next day to thinking about a week at a time. I need to wrap my head around the non-writing things that also have to be factored in there. I’ve never been good with calendaring. If I write stuff on it, I never remember to check it. I have been using the calendar in Entrourage (Exchange lite) more since I’ve been using the laptop and taking it with me more places.

Bria asked me if I ever set myself deadlines and I’ve never really tried. Internal deadlines don’t have any sort of urgency or consequences for not meeting them. External deadlines work wonders, like the landlord coming to visit her house next monday and the appointment for the carpet cleaners to come next Thursday. Those are concrete and real to me. They scream, “GET MOVING!”

Andi has been pestering me about my perfectionism which is also tied very closely to my procrastination habits. And she’s right, I do have time management skills, I just don’t usually USE them. I use them to make sure the kids get out the door in time for school and to martial arts class on time. Outside of that… not so much.

So, how does being a perfectionist feed into procrastinating? Several ways. If you don’t start, how can you fail to meet your goal? Ok that seems like an oxymoron, but it’s very real. Not trying is very different from putting yourself to the challenge and failing to meet your own high standards.

This concept was brought home watching an Ira Glass video on Getting Creative Work Done that Bethanne posted at Romance Divas yesterday. He mentions that people attempt to produce creative endeavors because they love a particular form and they have good taste concerning it. Getting past the point where the gap exists between your ability to create and the quality standard imposed by your taste is where the hard work lies.

This is exactly the problem that perfectionists who procrastinate face on every level. It’s much easier to ignore a problem or situation that you know you can’t fix or change to be like the ideal to which you aspire. This even applies to housework and CHAOS (Flylady’s acronym for Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome).

So… balance. Every member of my family needs to find a better balance between obligations and leisure. We run the full gamut at our house and I understand the reasons for the individual choices. I fall somewhere in the middle, but because I’m such a practiced procrastinator, I fall closer to one side than the other. What I need to work on is finding ways to motivate myself and everyone else so we have more quality leisure time together and can learn to meet internally imposed deadlines to meet goals instead of surrendering to the stress and panic of externally imposed deadlines.

I think even if it’s unofficial this round of AC, I’m going to start trying to build in some shorter term deadlines and goals for myself that may or may not directly apply to writing. The less I have to worry and stress about little things that build up to giant things, the more regular time I’ll have to put toward writing without added guilt.

I have to keep asking myself, “Are my routines working FOR me?”