Stick-to-it-iveness

Hi, followers (and others),

I have written at length in the past about my "procrastination challenge." Hmmmm. Well. I have another personality challenge to share with you all. Aren't you just itching to know all about it? I know, my life is full of exciting and juicy details and adventures. Hold onto your hats, it's another doozy. No clues from the title, huh?

I have a small problem not finishing what I start. A problem with getting started AND with completing things?? NO! Say it ain't so! It's true. I have a long history of giving up on projects looooong before they're done. For various reasons....I get bored with it, it's not as fun to do as it was to think about doing, it's too hard, it's not going the way I envisioned, I've hit a wall with ideas or ways to overcome a problem, I just don't have a passion for it, I just don't like it! Hence, my long list of unfinished projects. Once in a while, I have even been known to throw something away if I absolutely don't want to go back to it, but looking at it makes me feel guilty for not completing it (case in point...I started a cross stitch picture of a swan for my mother one year...for Christmas...and was probably 80% done with it when I stopped working on it. I just didn't finish it. I didn't want to finish it, I was so sick of that stinkin' swan. I didn't want to look at it ever again, for reasons I don't want to go into...but it took me at least 5 years to finally get rid of it, because I kept thinking I SHOULD finish it, when my sister told me to stop feeling guilty about a dumb picture and toss it...so I did). That's just one example and one reason....it feels like there are myriads of both.

Not that I NEVER finish anything, of course I do! But just like getting STARTED on a project, I have to have a good REASON to do it, and I have to have the proper passion or motivation to FINISH one also. Like it's a gift for someone else or someone is really counting on me to do it....that's usually a good one to get me to start AND finish something. Usually, but not always.... and just because I thought of it and it's a really good idea and I get excited about it, that's not usually enough to keep me going all the way to completion. And I'm not sure why (LOL, this is where my not really caring enough about the why to pursue it comes in!). Probably because I get overwhelmed with the magnitude of the project, I get daunted with the seemingly ENDLESS steps to the project. For example, I have a really good idea for a children's book, and even started planning the storyboard and watercolors for it and taking pictures to paint from, and ALMOST got the first painting started....a year ago. Doing a project just for myself? Uh, no. Rarely. Even when I know deep down it could be GREAT? No.

Perhaps, in some way, I don't feel worthy to invest the time and effort just for my own pleasure or feeling of accomplishment. It's only worth doing if it's for someone else. Yeah, that sounds about right. Putting it on paper, right out there in the light of day, it sounds really dumb. But false negative self-perceptions are really dumb, however real they feel and damaging they ARE. I will just keep fighting against those lies, those damaging feelings. And yeah, I have several new ideas. I wonder where they will take me? Anywhere? I have hope.

Self Flagellation

How do I talk about this without sounding totally whiny? Sometimes (okay, a little more than sometimes), I really don't like me. My self-talk is usually negative (my mother's voice, as I've mentioned before), and everyone else seems to have a better handle on life, on productivity, on self control than I do (yes, I know I see the brightest happiest most productive faces on social media --- it works, I feel inadequate). I get so frustrated with myself and my lack of focus and self control.

Today is one of those one-step-forward-two-steps-back kind of a day. One of those days where I feel completely inept, incompetent, unintelligent, un-creative, procrastinating (I KNOW that one is true), unfocused, un- un- un- (add in fat and lazy, just for good measure).

I set goals, I make lists, I make a schedule (sort of), then totally disappoint myself when I can't stick to my super-aggressively-hopelessly-intimidatingly huge amount of goals. Okay, yes, I know I'm too hard on myself. And tomorrow I will probably rededicate myself to my goals, and pump myself up again. I'll read my goals and my ways to achieve them, I'll make a list, I'll try a new productivity technique, and I'll climb back up on that horse.

But for today, I'm bucked off and the horse is stomping on me while he whinnies gleefully. Today I hate that horse.