List Mania

Have a week full of appointments this week - as well as work - so in my effort to be more productive, here are my current thoughts.

There’s no point in dedicating a set time each day to write if you spend the entire time staring at a blank screen / piece of paper, so its important to plan what you’re going to work on before the allocated time.  That way you can hit the ground running and grind Mr Procrastination into the dirt.

And this is where lists come in.  I’m of big fan of a list and quite happily write endless bullet points of things I want to do.  But, unfortunately the lists themselves seem to strangle me with their own enthusiasm because they are so long that they become unachievable.  So whilst I will probably never be able to contain the urge to put everything in my head down on paper, its important for me to prioritise.  

From now on I’m going to pick three things from the list and make them my priority.  That way the list won’t seem so daunting and I’ll get things done.

There’s nothing like the satisfaction of a ticked off list - I must be a very sad person!

List Mania

I've always been a bit fan of lists, in fact, if I didn't write things down, I would be in a right pickle because I'm sure I'd forget half the things I'm supposed to be doing. So when I finished work last year, I wrote down a list of things of all the things I wanted / needed to do, because I was determined to remained focussed.

 

I'm horrified to realise that a year on, some of the same items are still on the list.  And although I have achieved many things over the last year, the list has grown rather than diminished. 

 

Some days when I look at the list I feel demoralised by what still needs to be done and instead of it being helpful I feel haunted by it. In an act of retaliation I go off and do something completely different just so I don't have to look at it any more.

 

So I was interested to read that Peter Jones had had a similar experience in his book, How To Do Everything and Be Happy (see yesterday's post). He recomends lists to the power of three, ie to prioritise the three most important things, write them down, and then chose one things from the list.  At least only having three things on the list gives you a sense of achievement as you cross them out. 

 

I've tried this and I do feel a sense of empowerment by being able to cross things off, but I have to admit that I do have a tendency to remember other things which need to be done as a priority and my lists do sometimes grow longer.

 

Sometimes I wonder if the tail is wagging the dog and I decide to stop writing them at all, but I just can't go cold turkey.

 

Do lists work for you or do they make you feel like you are living in a mental straight jacket?   

New Year's Resolutions

OK so I know its a bit late for resolutions but....

I decided this year I wasn't going to make any yearly resolutions because basically they would be the same as last year - get a novel out there, read more, declutter the house, create more time for writing etc etc. I have found that having a resolution with a time span of a whole year simply doesn't work for me because you think you have loads of time and then suddenly its December.

Towards the end of last year I started setting myself monthy writing targets.  I found that this shorter space of time geared me up to work harder and while some months I set myself too many tasks, at least I had a list that I could tick off as I went. A ticked list gives me a huge sense of satisfaction (saddo that I am) and even a half ticked off list is better than none.

So this year my new year's resolution was to set myself monthly targets for both my writing and at home.  Now, that January is nearly at a end I have some ticks and some not.  One of the tasks I set myself for my writing took me alot longer than I had anticipated but I have worked really hard on it so I don't feel I should beat myself up too much over that.

One of my goals for January was to join the Romantic Novelists Association. I've wanted to join for a few years now but never managed to apply in time - applications for the New Writer's Scheme opens in January and usually get filled up quite quickly. But this year I was on the ball and am now officially a member.

This is something I'm really excited about, not only for the chance to meet other writers (if I manage to attend any of the events) but also for the opportunity to submit a completed script for an appraisal.

I have decided to work on the novel I started on for NaNoWriMo. I completed a very rough first draft of this at the end of December, so after a month of working on other projects, February will see me starting to whip this into shape (well attempting to anyway).

I am the kind of person who responds to deadlines and I realise that at the moment the only person who is going to set these for me is myself, and now with something concrete in mind I'm feeling really optimistic about the year ahead.

Hear's hoping I'm still feeling optimistic as August looms!