Well, I don’t know if it would have paid, I didn’t make one. I had every intention of creating a nice outline for myself today, as well as checking a few other things off my to do list.

I managed to check a number of things off my list, but I didn’t get the outline written. I think the problem was planning to do it.

Sometimes I can create a plan out of nowhere, at the last minute, or just in the nick of time. If I plan to plan, however, I stall. I didn’t think of creating an outline as the sort of plan that I might resist doing, but apparently it is.

I think the issue is that plans create too much of a sense of what ‘should’ happen for me, and then when things go off (as they invariably do) I am way too hard on myself about it. It’s easier to just fumble along and deal with emergencies (or in this case, random ideas) than to create a plan that I might not be able to follow.

Perhaps as I get better at learning how to run with what’s happening, I will also get better at planning. It sounds sort of contradictory, I know but you need to have a certain flexibility to be able to work a plan and without that, you risk throwing the whole plan away when things don’t work.

I’m being hard on myself here, stating the case a bit too baldly. I can be flexible in many circumstances, and I think well on my feet – but that’s being responsive to the situation , and that I can do. The ability to create a plan and then change course within the parameters of that plan, that’s a skill set I need to work on.

The question is, how do I deal with it right now? I think I need an outline in order to go forward. The outline, however, refuses to be written at the moment.  I don’t think this is a problem of focusing on the results, that doesn’t feel like where the issue is (although obviously it is part and parcel of the same thing). Perhaps this is a problem of practice? Perhaps I need to think of this as outlining practice (similar to the practice of yoga) and not about getting good at it, but about the practice itself. Practice for its own sake.

On that note, I’m going to do a little writing and then head to bed. Perhaps with some sleep and a plan to practise I will be able to start outlining tomorrow.