It’s my birthday month!

I’m making decent progress with my arm muscles and I expect I’ll have some more muscle visibility by the end of next week (yay, me!).

But that’s not why I am so happy to see November.

I’m thrilled because this is the month I am teaching myself to consistently work toward my goals instead of setting them and either hoping for the best or piling all the work in at the end.

How am I going to do that? I’m so glad you asked!

The answer is NaNoWriMo (or National Novel Writing Month if you want to be formal). Last year, I wrote my first novel in the month of November. It was exciting and exhilarating, and helped me break a mental barrier about writing a longer piece.  The thing is, though, I wrote the majority of that novel, over 30,000 words, in one weekend.  Sure, that’s a feat in itself, and it’s good to have that skill to pull out when you need it but it’s not a great way to work.

That’s why I am challenging myself to not only write 50, 000 words this month, but to write every day. I want to become one of those people who can pace their work to match their lives, and I want to stop using panic to fuel my work.*

As part of this challenge to myself, I am going to blog every day about writing or about whatever comes up. I’ll warn you now, some of these posts are going to suck,  because, like NaNoWriMo taught me, sometimes you have to let go of the focus on quality so you can just get the work done.  I’m totally letting myself off the hook on the quality front while I get my habits in place.

Allons-y, Alonso, November awaits!

*Consistency: it’s where it’s at.  Or I think it is, I wouldn’t know,

You heard it here first. I will have actual, defined arm muscles by November 10th.

No, I am not going to be in perfect shape by then (seriously, what is perfect shape? I have no idea).  And no, I won’t have my ultimate plan muscles my then, but my arms will be noticeably stronger, and you will be able to see the muscles.

How am I going to do that?

I don’t have the whole plan worked out, because usually once I do that I somehow check it off in my head as done, and then I don’t keep working at it. Soooo, I’m starting with my yoga from Marianne  which helps build nice strong arms and I’m throwing in a regular pattern of arm and shoulder strength training.  Between that, and my Taekwon-do punching practice, I should be well on my way by November.

Yeah, yeah, I know I am supposed to do a full body thing, and I’m working up to that. Arms are just how I’m pulling open that door.

I’m driving myself crazy lately.

“Only lately?” you might ask, and I frown because that’s unkind.  So, let me just say it is worse than normal.

The problem is my juggling act is getting worse.  I have a giant client project* I am working on at the moment but I have a whole bunch of little things for other projects that need to get done and because of the gears problem I mentioned yesterday, I keep blustering ahead on the big project and leaving the little things in low gear (or no gear).

When someone asks about the low gear things, I pick a time that seems reasonable (but has no relation to the amount of work I have to accomplish in the meantime) and say I’ll have the task done by then. Then I go about my business until I remember that task at the last minute and scramble to do it.

See? Crazymaking, no?

But the good news is, I have a plan.

I’m going to start carrying a notebook with me at all times and whenever I think of something I have to do (or someone asks me to do something) I’m going to add it to the list…

“Sure,” you say, “but that’s no improvement.”

That’s when I chide you for your impatience (chide is a great word, no?) and you realize you didn’t let me finish.

I’m going to add it to the list but, BUT, I am not going to commit to a time. The time commitment will have to wait until I get a chance to look at my calendar, see my work time and pick I time I can fit it in.

So here’s the plan

1) find the proper (pocket) notebook

2) create running list

3) when a new to do comes up,  add it to the list but do NOT agree to a time

4) pick a time each day to add to dos to work schedule, cross them off the notebook list as they are added to the schedule

5) email/phone people to tell them when stuff will be ready

6) do the stuff when scheduled

7) feel less overwhelmed

So that’s the plan for this part of the problem. I need a whole different plan for scheduling my work time, but let’s take this one step at a time, hey?

*to clarify, the project is giant, the client is average-size.

I bought a bike about 3 weeks ago, but aside from a 5 minute spin around my neighbourhood (while wearing a skirt!) on the night I bought it, the weather had been too lousy or I’ve been too busy to use it.

Today, I decided that I was getting out on the bike no matter what. Nature tried to throw me off by dropping the temperature by I refused to be diverted. I was getting on that bike.

I was halfway down the bath between here and my Mom’s when I remembered that I didn’t know how to use the gears. I actually laughed out loud at that, because holy metaphor batman, that’s a problem for my whole life – I’m either all out, or I’m in the tub with a book, no in between. I got The Man to explain it to me when I got home, hopefully learning it on the bike will translate to real life too.

What else did I learn?

I like to go fast. Well, fast for me anyway.

If you look friendly, and like you are trying to share the path, people smile as they move out of your way.

That stand up and pedal thing to get up a hill is a lot harder than I remember.

And, last but not least, bicycling is more fun if your bike looks cool. I think I knew that when I was a kid, but I had totally forgotten until now.

Hmm, maybe I need streamers for the handlebars.