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Tag: Thoughts

15

Published on 15 Comments on Beginner Mind
Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Sometimes when I'm trying something new with something I do a lot of (writing!), it becomes a real struggle. My brain doesn't want to take in the new information because it says, "But I already know all sorts of stuff about this topic!" Even though I know the information I'm trying to take in is new or might give me a new perspective, I run up against all the things I already know, and I think I know enough and don't need the new stuff.

The thing is, new stuff is pretty much always good. A new perspective, a new way of approaching something, all of that can lead to creative growth. But you (I!) have to bring yourself to a place where you can let in the new stuff. You have to get back to beginner mind.

When I'm in that place I return to Natalie Goldberg's writings about beginner mind to help me open up to new things and look at new things the way I would have as an absolute beginner. This article shares some of her thoughts on that. I'd like to also add a few ideas of my own.

  • You can't unlearn what you already know to get to beginner mind. I find that it's not a forgetting of what has come before. It's more a quieting of the voices telling you what you already know. Self-talk helps a lot with this for me. "Yes, but I don't know this thing from this person's perspective." Or, in the case of things like writing exercises and things to do, "Just do it and see what happens even if I already know how to do this a different way. See if the two ways go together." Things like that, acknowledging that I do know things but am trying new things anyhow really helps me get past the resistance and into more of a beginner mindset.
  • Talking back to the judgemental voice helps me, too. My brain sometimes has a fit about the new thing being different from what I already know and likes to throw out "this is dumb!" or "this is wrong!" messages. I tell myself, "It's just new. Just try it and see what happens." (That "try it and see what happens" is my favorite!)
  • As I work through new techniques and ideas, I do a comparison to see how they are like what I already know. Then I find where the differences are. My brain likes to analyze things, so doing this opens me up to moving forward with the new stuff.
  • Finally, sometimes I fall back on a favorite KaizenMuse saying. "So what? I'll do it anyway!" I just add a bunch of attitude and plow forward.

I'll admit, I am mostly writing this to remind myself that trying new things is good and useful. I'm butting up against my "but I already know stuff!" voice a lot as I work on The 90-Day Novel, I need the reminders to keep going anyhow. I hope some of this is useful for you if you're trying something new in an area you're already knowledgeable in, too.

As an aside, I always feel weird ending blog posts. I feel like there should be something that says, "the end," but not just a wrap-up paragraph as if it's an essay. So I'm going to try a sign-off.

Until next time,
Kim

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14

Published on 14 Comments on Odds and Ends, May 5
Just a small selection of project scraps from the table next to me. Don't worry, I put the cap back on the marker!

Just a little wrap-up after my daily blogging with Effy Wild during April.

  • I love doing blog challenges! I had forgotten how much fun they are, and I'm so glad I did this and connected with a bunch of other creatives and stretched my blogging muscles.
  • Daily blogging is way too much for me, at least long term. But I like the push of "blogging must happen today," so I'm trying out a set schedule of blogging on Wednesdays and Sundays. We'll see how that goes.
  • Back on April 1 at the start of the blog-along I wrote about these cute habit trackers I found. I loved them! They were adorable! I completely forgot to use them after two days. It turns out having them glued into my planner does not remind me to fill them in. I did do some of the things on that list (blogging for the challenge which I did each day in April, story writing which I did very little of, and cleaning something which I also did very little of). I do great with my monthly exercise calendar which has my goals for the month and squares to put cute stickers in every time I exercise. And it also hangs on a board in my bedroom where I see it several times a day, and I'm wondering if that visibility is a much more crucial element than I realized. I'm going to rearrange a few things and make space for hanging up more trackers, and I will try again in June (or maybe a half-month thing starting mid-May).
  • I'm working through a 90-day novel writing book with a couple of writer friends. We started May 1, and so far it's different from what I imagined and seems pretty useful. More about that in another post, maybe on Sunday.

That's about it in my corner of the world. Looking at what's been working. Making plans for how to use that going forward. How are things in your corner?

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6

Published on 6 Comments on Feelings

I had a few different topics rolling around in my head for today's post. Then I opened Jon Acuff's Friday newsletter, and this sentence flung itself into my brain. I almost never read newsletters when they hit my inbox, so this was kind of an odd situation. I decided it must mean something, me reading it on the day I got it, and this sentence getting stuck in my head. And so here we are.

Feelings are an odd thing for me. I used to fight mine a lot. I used to try to never cry and not show too many of them. In my family, I was known for never crying at funerals. And at the same time I was actually incredibly emotional. I just saved the tears and the expression of it all for when I was alone or with a couple of close friends. It was like this all through high school and college and beyond.

I've been practicing more at expressing my feelings, examining them and doing what needs doing with them in a timely manner rather than burying them. And I've realized that my struggles with trying to control my emotions, keep them in check and invisible, has lead me to let them rule me and make all my decisions for me.

I've had that understanding but not quite these words for it until today when this phrase came along and lit everything up for me. Emotions are important. They need to be listened to, acknowledged, worked with. But letting them make the decisions in how I talk to myself and my actions--that doesn't need to be the way things go.

This is something I know, of course. I've known it for a long time. It's so much harder to practice than it seems like it should be. So this reminder today, when I've been having a lot of hard days, is good and needed.

I don't have a wrap-up. This is just a thing that swirled back into my attention today in a way that made it a little clearer and more solid, and now I am thinking of ways to work with it to help me move toward the life I want to be living. It's good stuff, but it's still open-ended. Like life is. Like so many things are.

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16

Published on 16 Comments on Dear Diary, April 29
Photo by Marcos Paulo Prado on Unsplash

Thursdays are turning into weirdly hard days. I got called last minute to go to a different school, and it was an elementary school again (I teach middle school and high school for Pete's sake!). And a mix of things have added up to lots of pain in my leg, so I can't get comfortable and I can't concentrate so I can't get anything done that I really wanted to do, and it's about bed time, and I feel like there's too much stuff I need to do in the next three days. And really what I want to do is delve into this new writing book I'm working through with a friend and some writer friends of hers. We're starting Saturday, but we're doing the prep exercises right now, and being responsible and doing the stuff I need to do is killing me! I don't want to be an adult right now!

Okay, I feel a little better now. I highly recommend writing down the stuff that's bugging you. And complain about it, too! I think it clears the brain. Now I'm going to go write a list. On paper. Of the things I need to do over the next few days. And I'll get it all done. That's the power of writing things down for me. This brain is ready to go!

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14

Published on 14 Comments on Gratitude Vs. Good Things
Photo by Sebastián Silva on Unsplash

I don't like gratitude lists. I think it's great that other people like them, but I kinda hate them. They feel forced and phony, and the few times I've worked with them I've been really resentful. But I love writing lists of good things in my day (today the good things are plants--I bought gerbera daisies and polka dot plants and spearmint and curly parsley!).

Aren't they the same thing, you ask. I ask, too. Maybe they are. Somehow, the designation of gratitude list and the designation of list of good things sit very differently with me. Making a gratitude list makes me feel like I'm faking an emotion, because I often don't feel particularly grateful about the things I'm writing down. But a good things list is more objective, or at least more removed from the emotion part. I'm just looking around, observing good things, and writing them down. I'm not trying to force myself to feel anything about it.

That's really it. I don't have a point to this post really except to say that I don't like gratitude lists but I do like good things lists. Do you do either one of these? How do you feel about them?

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2

Published on 2 Comments on Five Things–April 27

When I'm tired, especially when it's the kind of tired from my body hurting and it's still hurting, it's hard to find five good things (or even three or two, honestly) in my day. But I think that's when it's especially important for me to do these lists. Finding some good things on hard days keeps me from sliding into even harder times. So here's a list for today.

  • I have a day off tomorrow, so I get to stay up a little later (I am a night owl!) and sleep in a bit in the morning.
  • We ordered pizza for dinner.
  • I was invited to do a writing thing with a group of writers starting on the weekend, and I have a brand new composition book to crack open for it!
  • M surprised me with an adorable Strange Planet mask to add to my collection of fun masks to wear at school. It even says "knowledge transmitter."
  • It's chilly enough to have the fireplace on and a blanket on my legs (under the sleeping kitty), and it feels very cozy and relaxing right now.

That's my list. How's your day?

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10

Published on 10 Comments on I Want To Be That Person
Photo by Randy Fath on Unsplash

I was just telling my partner that I want a spot in the backyard to go and hangout. In the past I had toyed with the idea of a she-shed, but right now the space just won't work. We're going to be putting an enclosed patio on the back of our bedroom, but right now the front yard is the focus. Then a friend got this super cute tent that has colorful pennants and swirly things on it, and I want one! Or something like that. For my backyard. So he came up with a few ideas for me, and I got pretty excited.

And then I stopped dead in my tracks. I don't tend to go sit outside. I never really have, unless I'm at an outdoor party or something like that. I shouldn't put any time and effort and money into fixing up a spot in the backyard. I just want to be that person who sits outside to read and listen to music. I've never actually been that person. What if I set everything up and don't use the space?

But then I realized that if you want to be a certain kind of person, you don't have to wait to do the things that sort of person does until you've made the proper inner shift or whatever. You become a certain type of person by doing the things that sort of person does. I

Writers write. Artists create. Backyard sitters go sit outside. So I'm going to set up a space for myself and see what happens. I might just be a person who enjoys sitting outside! And I'm going to think of what other people I want to be, and I'm going to start walking the walk. That's how you get there, after all.

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19

Published on 19 Comments on Dear Diary, April 22
Photo by Marcos Paulo Prado on Unsplash

What do you do with a really weird, hard day? I write about it. Usually in my notebook, but since I'm doing this blogging challenge I'll write a little here.

Nothing today went how it was supposed to, and it was all stuff that was out of my control. And now I'm feeling like I'm not doing any of the things I was supposed to do with my life, and that must be how I ended up here.

You know, I used to be a poet. And I used to be a story writer. I used to be a photographer. I used to have plans. I used to think I was going someplace.

Today, I'm just tired.

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12

Published on 12 Comments on Five Things–April 21

It's been a really long, hard day. But I got some big things sorted out and still managed a load of laundry and a shower! And now I'm going to use a technique I learned from the fabulous Liz Lamoreux. I'm going to find five good things in this day. (By the way, take one of her Here sessions--so wonderful, peaceful, comforting, uplifting. Just so good!)

Five Things:

  • Chinese carry-out for dinner
  • Goofy cats running around making me laugh
  • All of my besties have had their vaccines or have scheduled them, so we should get to have a small gathering in my yard in a few weeks!
  • Today I learned about the bee hummingbird, the world's smallest bird, and someone had one perched on their finger in a photo (it must have been a baby) and it was so tiny--really the size of a bee!
  • Met online with my writing group and had a great talk about doll houses and miniatures which was funny and odd and very fun

That's what I can manage today. And for today it's enough.

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10

Published on 10 Comments on Ta-da, April 20

I'm feeling really exhausted and run over today. Two days at the new job have my body rebelling a little bit. Lots of pain, really tired, feeling a bit disheartened. So I decided today would be a good day for a ta-da list to remind myself of good things.

  • I've blogged every day this month!
  • I'm keeping up with the lessons in the 5-day plotting challenge I signed up for even with starting the new job
  • I did my strength training exercises today even though I was so wiped out
  • Yesterday I walked 3 miles during my school day--two years ago I would have thought that was impossible
  • I made a healthy dinner for us tonight instead of ordering out

I've been getting some stuff done. I'm still taking care of the basics even with feeling so beat up. Tomorrow I get to sleep in because I don't work on Wednesdays. Tomorrow, I'll probably have more to say.

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