…or, The Zen of Starting
What better time to start a blog than the first day of the year, eh?
I’ve been reading this great book recently called “The Now Habit”, which goes into the reasons why we procrastinate and how to address the underlying causes in order to stop putting things off. If there’s one thing I’ve been guilty of, it’s perfectionism — which, in turn, creates anxiety when thinking about a new project, because if I couldn’t do something flawlessly, then I didn’t want to do it at all. But teaching myself not to think about perfection when I start something, has been immensely helpful. As in this blog.
That’s the plan, man — whatever comes out of my head, in all its imperfection, out here in the open for everyone to see, dammit! And I can still keep a bit of perfectionism for other things. Hey, you can’t expect a guy to change overnight, can ya?
Every New Year’s Day, I look back at what I’ve accomplished, and sometimes find that I haven’t gotten much closer to many of my goals than I was a few years ago. But here and there, are a few things that have gone better than I imagined they would. Realizing that successful people fail many times (and keep on going), but the real failures fail once and then quit, I can at least know that I am still going.
I’m still here, and I’ll still be here this time next year, if I have anything to say about it.
© 2006 DJ Holte