follow through

Has anyone read the book “The Dip”? In it, the author advocates quitting when the going gets tough, if in fact, your not that invested in finishing the task. In other words, “following through” is not necessarily a virtue if you don’t have that much to gain.

I’m pretty great at making plans. Really, when I put my mind to something I can think the hell out of it and come up with a good solution. The problem is that I wear myself out coming up with a good plan and then lose interest in the topic.

I need to be better about acting on my plans.

I haven’t been keeping up with the Tumblr, or any of my other full-length blogs, but the rest of my intentions with this goal have been fairly easy to uphold.

I think my outlook changed from not wanting to let other people down to not wanting to let myself down. I realized that every time I flaked out on a social event or just a cool solo outing, I was cheating myself out of what could possibly be an interesting & educational experience.

My recent solo vacation to Chicago is proof that when you plan something, carry it out, and keep an open mind, you can make memories & have experiences that will last you a lifetime. I packed more adventure & activity into the 7 days I was there than I have in probably a few months of living in my own city. I wish I could see every day as I did when I was in Chicago – no time to waste! I gained a lot of self-confidence by just going out and doing things without worrying what I was going to wear, how I would be perceived, or who was going to be there to make it worthwhile. I was there, and that’s all that mattered.

I hope to continue working on this goal when it comes to my professional life. Most often, I get a really great burst of motivation, but then it quickly dies out when I get discouraged by time or effort. I also want to get back to updating my blogs as mentioned above.

I made significant progress with my paperwork and continue to plow forward, through my resistance, which is considerable. I lost a few hours today, ruminating on it, but I just have to keep going.
- get organize
- get in shape
- get published
- finish paper
- revise outline
- employment

I’m going to follow through on getting this place organized, and getting this paper off the floor, and writing up my notes for Monday. Must follow through on detox.

...for whatever reason, I really hate making plans, at least in the way I’ve tried to make them, ie. “work out schedule” etc. I’m just not into – being my own boss lady, I suppose. Yes, I want to be disciplined and healthy – and I am, for the most part. But this and nothing else I have ever done or achieved has been motivated or actualized by “forcing” myself to do it. I’m motivated by what I want to do, and its a strong motivation when I’m clear about what I want. If I want something, I’ll just naturally practice it. I mean, when I stopped smoking, it was because I didn’t want to smoke anymore. And then it just stopped making any sense, and I didn’t do it, and it wasn’t hard for that reason. Whenever I tried to “force” myself – oh, I would for awhile, but I’d always give myself permission to give into the urge.

It just seems stupid to treat myself like a moron or infant – not to insult either – I just want to know what I want, and do it. Following through means this, and not “making plans” etc.
I want to get really clear about what I want, and then I know damn well I’ll follow through. I always have, I always do, as a matter of pride and principle and character. But I’m not going to be my own damned whipping boy.

I’m very proud to say that my follow-through has been very good lately. My tardiness isn’t fully cured, but I’m getting much better at accepting invitations to things and not backing out at the last minute because I was too lazy or uninspired to be social.

I think my problem is that sometimes I fear too much what other people will think of me. Before, if I was running late, I would drag myself even more until I was very late, then I would worry about what people would think of me for being so late, and then I’d just call and say I couldn’t make it.

Now, I try to focus on what people will be saying AFTER I attend an event. I’d rather have them talk about how good it was to see me and have memories to talk about at future gatherings. I like being included. I don’t like being left out. And flaking on people is a good way to get you on the “don’t bother calling” list.

I’m pretty sure I’ve succeeded in reaching my goals on this related to my social life. There are also some other components, like updating blogs that I’ve started and finishing general projects.

So there’s good news and bad news… The gratitude blog is still abandoned, as is my personal LiveJournal. I think I wrote one entry on LJ in the past 6 months, and I feel bad, but not too bad because I know not a lot of people read it to begin with. On the positive side, I have started an inspirational Tumblr that I post in every 2 days. I’ve been doing this, without fail, for almost 2 months. Because of my diligence I’ve been featured in the Tumblettes section and landed on Inspired Magazine’s list of “Top 50 Most Inspirational Tumblelogs” and gained quite a few new followers.

Need to get moving on my workout plans, and buy a scale. Need to set up a writing schedule of some kind, and brainstorm on my goals. Need to go through my writing, and see what is worth sending out. Need to research funding opportunties.

I procrastinate. But when I do take action I have the tendency to multi-task a lot. This is where the problem comes in, I usually get too impatient such that I want to finish everything at the same time only to end up with nothing finished at all!

This is the second Waterloo in my character and I hope that I’ll be able to follow through this time by learning the urgency of following through everything I start.

I have a pattern of starting things but not finishing, or not putting the work in. Most of the things I want to do (write a novel, get better at French horn, lose weight) just take WORK, and I have a hard time doing it. I want the goal, I REALLY want the goal. But I don’t take the steps to make it happen.