Making progress

[truepenny]

There. Chapter One edited, and I didn't vomit, weep, or hurl the manuscript across the room. Go Team Me.

I think a good deal of my trouble over the weekend (and thanks, HL and Papersky, for sympathy and suggestions) has been looking at that terrible long list of things I have to do and seeing as a kind of towering adversary, like the Red Bull in The Last Unicorn. But it's a series of things, and I can't do all of them at once. Nobody can. But that's not a reason not to do one thing.

I just wish I didn't have to keep learning that lesson over and over and over again.

This afternoon, my One Thing is that dissertation chapter (yes, I was lying to myself earlier when I said today's only task was Ch. 1; it's okay, I knew I was lying when I said it). I'm sick to death of it and the guilt. Get it finished, give it to my director to read, and start the long horrible process of Finishing This Gorram Dissertation Before It Kills Me.

Comments

[renenet.livejournal.com]

I can't do all of them at once. Nobody can. But that's not a reason not to do one thing.

I just wish I didn't have to keep learning that lesson over and over and over again.

Word to the mother. You are not the only one. I say this to myself again and again. Also, I gave the can't-see-the-trees-for-the-forest pep talk to a coworker last month and it seemed to be a kind of divine revelation to her, as well (instead of just the reversal of the well-worn adage). She keeps throwing the lesson back at me, as one or the other of us seems to lose track of it on a daily basis. Slippery little bugger. Wet and wrrrrrrriiggggly!

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

But it's a series of things, and I can't do all of them at once. Nobody can. But that's not a reason not to do one thing.

It's nice to see this so clearly laid out. I keep needing to learn it over and over and over again.