Recently, i've been feeling the need to simplify things. I've got too many plates spinning all at the same time and I've not been making clear progress in any of them.
As a writer and creator, there's the writing itself. That's the most important part, the bit we dream and fantasize about - but it's also often the first thing that goes when other things take our attention. I need to be in a clear, undistracted place mentally, emotionally and physically to do my best work. So, in the last few weeks I have cleared and rearranged my studio space. That bit feels great now.
Then there's the stomach churning dilemma of feeling the need for some sort of social media presence whilst resenting it at the same time. Many writers enjoy the privacy and intimacy of writing, yes it can be a lonely world sometimes, but for the most part the magic happens in the solitude. Social media is the most extreme opposite of that, and I admire any writers that can marry those two worlds and be comfortable in that space.
Many writers now have newsletters too and blogs to write, and any published authors have to publicise their books too.
It all takes your time and energy.
It can all feel so overwhelming and demoralising.
Procrastination kicks in.
We do the jobs we like first and put off the ones we don't like....forever.
I read David Allen's Getting Things Done awhile back and knew it contained some gold for sorting this out, and so I dug out my copy and picked out some of the key points. I knew I just needed to simplify things, create systems that would flow together and enable me to work clever not harder.
I can't say I'm fully there yet, but I'm working on it and I can feel the light at the end of the tunnel. I can feel things are making sense now. I can sense the simplicity emerging through the fog. I can almost touch it, and that is enough to keep me going for now.