So I just missed the deadline for yesterday’s post. Ordinarily I write for the next day but this time, I’ve been leaving things until the night of that day’s post. Oddly since retiring, I’ve not fallen into a routine. Before, I fit my life into the limited free available after work. Blogging didn’t pose such a big problem; a three hour post-dinner deadline always loomed. Now with all the time in the world – you’d think I would write reams. That’s not been the case. After 25 years working, it’s hilarious to develop time management problems in retirement. This goes back to an issue I touched on last year. I spent my time always reacting to negative motivation on the job (i.e., work deadlines, micromanaging etc). Now I have to be proactive; all the impetus must come from within. But that’s one of the problems with/recovering from depression – finding the mysterious self-motivation.
Then I wonder about other people with illnesses who seem to have no problem in the respect. People like Stephen Fry who acts, produces, lectures, hosts, blogs, geeks, writes, advocates and seemingly has his fingers in every UK entertainment pie despite being bi-polar. Closer to home, The Bloggess, Jenny Lawson writes books and a hilarious bawdy off-kilter blog even with depressive and anxiety disorders. Both of these people manage to regiment their time quite well. Are they juggling many balls to stay ahead of their illnesses, or is The Secret keeping busy and productive with many things.
Maybe I’m suffering from too much time on my hands.
Since you made it this far, here’s a treat – a man who doesn’t have enough time on his hands. I’d love to ask him about time management.
Enjoy.
Richard Armitage photo by Robert Ashcroft
I tend to do better with deadlines, but I also discovered in my past professional life that eventually I could not longer motivate myself to do something with adrenaline — eventually that technique stopped working. It was part of what was behind the blog: how do I learn to know what I love and do things out of that place, which is calm, peaceful (and not tied up in consumption of caffeine or other drugs) and pleasant? How do I deal with my own apparent internal resistance against doing the thing I know I want to do most? How do I know if something I say I want to do is what I really want to do?
Yes, yes, yes to all of your comments. What causes that internal resistance when we both know we love to write? Is it fear of something? Maybe I fear actually being a success (or a failure), I don’t know. What do you do when interests are disparate? How do I connect the dots? Or maybe the thing is to develop all the them like Stephen Fry does?
Loss of a career is a mind blower when identity and purpose was so wrapped in it. The world has opened up for both us, and there’s so much potential out there we don’t even know about.
There’s a book that @Rob always recommends, Steven Pressfield, The War of Art, which is about resistance — I am so resistant that I’ve never read it (j/k).
At this stage, anyway, I have reached two conclusions: (a) beating up on myself to get stuff done does not work. Operant conditioning has no more effect on me (unless it’s something like the IRS involved); and (b) I remind myself that for two decades I didn’t really have “normal” moments like I can now have on weekends: sleeping in without guilt, the luxury of not having to count what I’d done at the end of the day and plan for the next one. I don’t want to get lost in this kind of aimless enjoyment, but at the same time, a little bit of it may be salubrious.
I’m glad you have a chance to enjoy your own time on the weekends now. Peace and rest is good for the spirit.
I have too much peace and rest and aimless time. Don’t know what to fill it with besides, writing, errands, and walking Patty. (Probably when I get over the car anxiety and get myself around, more ideas will occur to me).
I think dealing with the car situation is paramount — until you address that you’re stuck where you are.
If you need something to write about, what is Patty up to?
Now, there’s someone for whom I’d make sure I met a deadline! 😉
RA? Purrrrr!
And you know, the word retirement–or re-tire-ment–sounds like it is the process of finding new ways to get tired, as in re-tire. When one is working, the aforementioned project deadlines and stress will tire you out all on their own.
Yet when large stretches of unscheduled days loom–as they did for me over the ten days of “Christmas Break”–I found myself worrying that I wasn’t accomplishing enough at home the first day or two. So my muse kicked in and I wrote and published a “short” story (for me) of 95 pages over 7 days. And yet, the recycling still sits, waiting to be gathered and jettisoned. Sighhh! But, I gave myself daily chapter deadlines–posting later each day. And trying to help me relax and destress about my daily posting deadlines, my hubby would quote his most recent mantra regarding my blogging/writing: “Is anyone paying you to do this?” Silly adorable man, doesn’t he know that I would pay them? Ha!
And you, my dear, have bravely moved to a new home in a new city–which is quite enough of a task. And now you’re taking on teenagers? You strike me as a lady who is quite motivated, indeed! So don’t beat yourself up about the mental health creativity role models whom you mentioned. I’m sure they have flaws in there somewhere. Or you could make up some flaws for them–their “feet of clay”. *wink*