Well, we've had our first full week of the new year, plans have been made, work routines have been set up, the Christmas decorations have been put away for another year.
At times, I find myself wondering however I managed to get the things done I used to get done when I was first starting my businesses.
Then I recognize that I lived alone, my home was in a small apartment, I pretty much had no social life and very few other things in my life to draw my focus away from just getting the work done.
I bring this up, because sometimes our "false expectations" about how well (or badly) a project may or may not be going can turn out to be based on conditions in our lives that simply don't exist at the current time. Such as being a married homeowner with pets just doesn't accommodate working 16-hour days. So when I ask myself "HOW did I get all that DONE?" the basis for comparison is a little out of whack!
So What Is "Success?"
The whole notion of "success" can be a really slippery beast.
Is it really successful if your "making good money" calls for 12-16 hours of work, seven days a week? Or is that ostensible "success" purely predicated on a willingness to commit yourself to something akin to indentured servitude... to yourself?
These thoughts bubbled to the surface today, as I tried to maintain my new work routine of committing to "get small amounts done EVERY day."
Even though I haven't been asking that much of myself... when you figure in such things as spending hours taking down Christmas decorations, doing a run with a truckload to the recycling center, doing grocery shopping and spending an hour or so having coffee and talking to my wife about this-and-that, you end up with very little time left over.
Music, Coming and Going...
Shifting to a completely different topic... music has always figured substantially in my world and environment.
I have zero talent for playing music, but I almost always have something going in the background, to reflect the mood of the moment.
Today, I found myself musing over the fact that when we put up the Christmas tree and decorations the week before Christmas, we were playing beautiful holiday tunes to set the mood... and now we "played out the season" with a healthy dose of techno/trance.
Each genre seemed equally fitting for the occasion!
Fitting Creativity Into the Mix...
I have two primary creative outlets:
I paint intricate mandalas on stones
I write... primarily blog posts on Hive
Now that the basic framework for my 2023 work routine has been set up and gradually implemented (hence my 6-day absence from Hive), the time comes to somehow fit my creative recreations back into the mix.
As they say "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." I suppose that old truism is somewhat tempered by another old truism... that "beggars can't be choosers."
And during tough (financial) times we often find that our situations dictate whether or not we get to enjoy any of our leisure activities... even if they are marginally income producing.
Still noodling that one around... and probably will, for a while!
Thanks for stopping by, and have a great remainder of your week!
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Created at 2023-01-09 23:59 PDT
0716/1971