I have this “thing” at my desk at my Totally Exhausting 9-5 Job—yes, I’ve named it, and it’s actually 8-5 but that sounds awful—a purple, stringy blob, that used to sit at my co-worker Michael’s desk.  Every time I passed his desk, I’d pat the Purple Blob and say “Hello,” to both Michael and the Purple Blob.  One fine day, bless his heart, Michael bequeathed it to me, and there it sits, on my desk, and I get to pat it for, whatever, erryday (let’s say the pat is for good luck, shall we?) … somewhat like Laverne kissing her Beatles poster on her way down the stairs (although why she put milk in my beloved Pepsi, I’ll never understand).  Oops, I digress … 

As I was saying, one thing that brings me great satisfaction is looking at The Purple Blob. I don’t have to pull it’s stringy feelers or touch it at all, just being able to see it, and know that it’s there, a constant, is enough.

Which is my point: on a daily basis there is always something, however small and, to some folks perhaps, insignificant, that has the power to make it all better. I like to have things like that, that bring me joy, or make me smile, or laugh out loud, just by their very presence. It’s good to know that I can be pleased so easily and that’s not something I take lightly. I kid you knot.

So my advice, and I know you didn’t ask for it, but I’m gonna share it with you anyway, is:

Go out in the world with confidence and pride in who you are, with all your quirks and insecurities, ‘cause that’s what makes you you.

You can always work on what you think needs improvement, but you are your best cheerleader. You’d be surprised how much influence your words and thoughts have on your psyche, so, if negatives start popping up and your thoughts turn cloudy, think of something positive and say it OUT LOUD. Reinforcement is the key. Even if all you can think to say is “I can do this,” that’s all you need to say, and the more you say it, the more it will come to be.

I know whereof I speak: I used to be the child who’s mother had to climb out a window because, I was told, I would have a screaming hissy fit if I saw her leave for work. And look at me now, I’m able to write about it without so much as a whimper. See? I toldja it works … :)

procrastination … sometimes you just have to jump right in. As I was thinking of what to post today, thoughts came to me and usually, typically, I need to write them down, right as they come to me, or I’ll forget the fantabulous idea I just had:

fan·tab·u·lous

[ˈfantabyələs]

ADJECTIVE

1.  think: if fantastic and fabulous had a baby, only 10 times better!!!

So, today, as I was looking at my friend, The Purple Blob, resting so quietly on my desk, that I’d just created this Blog Post #5 about, the word procrastination popped into my head, out of nowhere. I was thinking how I could adjust the quality of the image I’d just snapped on my iPhone, and then it just segued (love this word) into another post idea, Blog Post #6, perhaps? ... nah, just write it here ...  I feel that I just experienced a stream of consciousness, where my thoughts are vividly coming to me in such poignantly clear paths, that I had to share them … (I think I just switched from 1st person to 2nd person and back again.) Hmmmmm.

So, back to procrastination, and how I find that a small action on my part makes that word disintegrate, like a puff of smoke. “Pouf!!!” And what is that, pray tell? The small action on my part is the trinity of my “Just Do It” world, three things that, if I do them, I will not procrastinate, and they are:

say it . write it . do it

Simple, as long as you DO those 3 things, no?

I’ve gotten more done in the first few months of 2019 than the last few years of my life, and I owe it all to those 3 things, (1) saying one thing I want to do; (2) writing down that one thing I want to do, and (3) doing that one thing I want to do.

You see how this works? The more you say it and write it, the closer you are to DOING it.  I place emphasis on DOING because isn’t that what procrastination is all about, NOT doing whatever it is we have/need to do?

I can find myself sitting on my bed watching TV, knowing I need to do [fill in the blank of whatever it is I need to do], and yet I simply don’t do it. Instead, I continue watching TV until I realize time has passed and I haven’t done a thing, other than watch TV, and I’m a two-fur kinda gal: I have to, at least, be doing two things at once otherwise, I’m wasting my potential.

When I say at least 2 things, I mean something like knit or crochet or iron while watching TV. So, in the example above, I lost precious time either creating something or getting my ironing out of the way, because all I did was watch TV. In some instances, I’ve suddenly shouted, “Get Up and [fill in the blank of whatever it is I need to do]!!!” I might have cursed a little bit, too, but that’s okay, it’s more motivation, and that usually gets me going and something gets DUN.

The moral of this tale is that it doesn’t take a lot of time to achieve a few things on a daily basis, yet that doesn’t mean you have to have a life goal planned or something as serious every single day. One of my goals is that I need to relax at some point during the week, otherwise, I’m doing myself a disservice. Every minute of my day is not planned, nor do I write daily goals on a daily basis. What I try to do, because I have so much going on, is write at least 3 things to do every weekday. I check off whatever I wrote at the start of my week, and move what I haven’t done to the next day. This happens throughout the week until the weekend, where I try to pick up any slack that happened during the entire week and because I have 2 full days that I don’t have to be at my Totally Exhausting 9-5 Job, and life gets in the way, as always, so there’s adjustment and movement from day to day, but as long as I get something DUN through the week, I’m good.

I have a healthy, thriving and growing collection of To-Do lists: images and folders on my laptops and phone and some things are duplicates that I keep adding to new lists so that all I’ve done is create a lovely collage of stuff to do, use up valuable computer space and I never do any of it. Somehow, in 2019, it was time to get off the pot … and Get ‘er DUN.  My youngest daughter, Grace is constantly telling me to “put it in your book, Ma,” because I’m notorious for writing on any scraps of paper or anything (i.e., envelopes within reach), and suddenly years later, I find myself swallowed up by the shear volume of paper I’ve accumulated … and when did it turn into junk?

Yes, knit happens (say it ain’t sew), crochet today and knot your grandma’s macramè … hmm, I sense a theme here. My life pre-2019 was full of “ooos, ahhs, and inspiration,” and not enough DOING. My home is filled with materials and supplies for all of the things I’m gonna get to, just as soon as I can, but I have no idea when that will be because I have to finish This, That and The Other, and there’s this thing called life, work, online store, kids and responsibility (take a breath) and they all seem to want a piece of me … did I mention I was busy?

This current stream of consciousness, although uninterrupted and pure, has brought me full-circle back to my initial conceptualization of procrastination, and how I’m changing my life, one pen stroke at a time, so that I can say, with certainty, that I was able to Get ‘er DUN and still have time leftover for a little thing like watching TV.

Until we meet again, c'est la vie!!! Oh, I almost forgot:

pro cras ti na tion

[prəˌkrastəˈnāSH(ə)n]
NOUN

procrastinations (plural noun)

1. the action of delaying or postponing something."your first tip is to avoid procrastination"

2. procrastination is the avoidance of doing a task which needs to be accomplished. It is the practice of doing more pleasurable things in place of less pleasurable ones, or carrying out less urgent tasks instead of more urgent ones, thus putting off impending tasks to a later time.

... repetition ya'll ...