okay, post title has your attention, right? then get prepared to be blown away by what's got me honestly feeling just a little bit pumped ...
i think i'm going to fail my blog-post record-breaking streak this year!
now before you go asking whether maybe i recently took some kind of blow to the head, lemme tell you why that is.
longtime readers here know that i've been busting out the bigger-and-better blog post numbers every year for quite a few years now -- since 2019 as a matter of fact. (less longtime readers who are smart enough to just look at the numbers in my blog archive on the left also know it, i guess, and good for you guys too!) but this year the mood hasn't been striking me as much and i've been like, it's really no big deal if i don't keep breaking my record every year, you know? it's kind of just a random goal, and it's actually produced some pretty lame and cheaty posts where i was basically cranking them out to go for the record.
so it's been nagging at me a little but i've also been telling myself it's no big deal and i shouldn't stress about it and who cares anyway? i mean, i care, but if i really really really cared, i'd already have broken the record months ago, right? all it was going to take to beat the record this year was averaging 4 posts a month.
4 posts is nothing! how hard would it be to push myself and go to 8 posts a month? then i'd have busted my record back in june. (actually, that would've been cool since it's my birthday month, and i'm a miss june.)
but instead of jamming out on my posting, i've been frittering back and forth with like, 3 posts in a month, then 4 posts then 3 posts, then 5 posts to make up for one of the 3-post months ... and now whammo, if i wasn't writing this post right now, it was going to be a 1-post month for september.
1 post!
and when i saw that, for the first time i thought, "yikes, it looks like i might actually fail-a-roni this thing." but instead of bringing me down, the idea ... tickled me? or at least it tickled me a little while also feeling a little bit of a downer. but more tickling than downing.
and i realized, the reason it kind of excited me that i might fail was, that it meant i'd given myself permission to fail.
some clump of cells somewhere in my brain raised their hands and said, "hey, here's an idea ... what if even though you do care, it's still okay to blow it?" and the other clumps of brain cells were like, "hmmm" and "you know, i hadn't really thought of that ..." and "i like it!"
and now the thing is, because i have permission to fail, if i do make it and beat my record, it will mean something.
it won't be just, yep, i showed i could push myself into writing 4 posts a month. now next year i've got to write 4 and a half.
it will be, hey ... i did that because i wanted to!
obviously, there's a certain satisfaction in achieving something because you put some willpower into it and tried really hard. but if you achieve that thing because you want it instead of because you think you "ought" to do it, you haven't just achieved something for the sake of achieving it -- you've achieved something for yourself.
and honestly, i think it's going to feel a lot better if end the year up at 47 or 48 posts and instead of saying, "that was hard, but by gum, i did it," i can say, "actually, that wasn't that hard. because i wanted it."
anyway, there's also now the excitement of "will i do it, or won't i?" and that's a lot more fun than, "yeah, i'm going to do it even if i have to slog through some bleh posting the next few months."
giving yourself permission to fail isn't the same thing as giving up, after all -- it's basically having the confidence in yourself to set goals and take on risks and be willing to accept the consequences of your choices and still feel good about yourself even if something doesn't work out.
okay, that's all for now i guess.
i hope i'm not too excited about this to get to sleep tonight!
xoxo,
claire
1 comment:
As famed hockeyman Wayne Gretzky once said, 'You miss 100% of the shots you don't take'. Let that be a lesson to you.
I think intent plays a huge part in goals, particularly writing goals, such as this. With all the previous work you've done, if you're aiming for a minimum/average of four posts a month, and you're on track with that for the most part, then if you miss that goal once or even occasionally, it's okay. But if when you fail to hit that goal, you're thinking 'I would've been on track, but this or that happened that got in my way', I suppose your good intentions would count for SOMETHING. Of course, you can't let yourself not reach your personal goals all the time, but if you allow yourself the grace of occasional failure, as you'd mentioned, then it's fine. But only occasionally! Don't be like me and 'Shouting &c.' and my posting ratio that's so abysmal that it's not even a number! :-P
I leave you with this: there was an episode of Golden girls, where Blanche was writing a book. At one point, Dorothy asked her how the book was coming along, and Blanche replied that she hadn't even started cos of writers' block. Dorothy came back with 'You have to have written to have writers' block! Otherwise we'd all have it!' Let that be a lesson to you.
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