Putting It Off

I'm awfully good at finding things to do. However sometimes it's not that one job that I have to do.

That really can surprise people. Because I can be very productive when I turn my mind to it. When I'm 'in the zone', so to speak.

And there's the problem. Sometimes I really don't feel like it.

The best way that I can explain this is to go back to the ancient idea that inspiration for great work in the realms of literature or the arts only came from heaven. Try and force your way through a particular job without receiving a degree of divine inspiration - and you're sunk.

• Sometimes I can't find my 'zone', no matter how hard I look for it.
• If I am 'in the zone', then I need to start work now. Get it done, if it's a job around the house. Or, if it's writing, get as much of it down on paper/laptop as I can before it fades; before I lose it.
• If I can't get into my stride when I'm 'in the zone', then pow! Suddenly, I've lost it.
• If I can't get others to buy into what I'm trying to do when I'm 'in the zone', then my enthusiasm wanes because they don't feel like it - so therefore, it soon rubs off on me, so I don't want to do it any more...
• And if I'm drained - emotionally or physically - there's very little I can do. It's just too much. All I want to do is rest, and wait for that inspiration to descend once again. Wait until I'm back 'in the zone'.

The problem here - when I read this all back - is that I see that the problem here is feelings. I don't feel like it. Or others don't feel like working when I want to..

There's also an assumption here, of course. It's an assumption that really productive people are always 'in the zone' - that positive, energetic frame of mind that impels them to start and carries them through all the way until completion. I'm afraid that this is not so.

It needs a bit of willpower as well. An understanding that there are going to be hard times, frustrations, and setbacks along the way. And I guess sometimes that it's my fear of these hard times - and of encountering the people who'd rather muck about than get down to some hard work - that creates some of the biggest hurdles in my life and prevents me personally from staying in 'the zone'. If they don't bother, why should I?

So, sometimes it takes a bit of a push to get me back into 'the zone'.

That's where the following quotes resonate with me:

Rita Emmett, in The Procrastinator’s Handbook, came up with Emmett’s Law:
"The dread of doing a task uses up more time and energy than doing the task itself."

O’Connor’s corollary:
"It’s amazing what you can accomplish when you finally get down to work."

Just a few stray thoughts today. That I had to get down. Or else, lose them completely... :)