Doing What We Love, Money or Not

My canine companion is a little bit greyhound, a little bit yellow lab. . . and a whole lot rock and roll. 

And here's the thing.  He's been busting his butt, for eight plus years, trying to teach me joy.

He's got this one thing that he's great at, that he loves above all else.  And he'll pull out all the stops so he can do it.  As often as possible.

That thing is running, like the wind, like there's no tomorrow, like, well, a greyhound.  Like the dog on the side of the bus, stretched out as long as possible, all four paws in the air.

Of course, his running has taken out more than one knee in our family.  Luckily for our insurance rates, and the security of our position in the dog park community, he has confined his damage to those he loves, and more importantly, those who love him.  

Early on in his career as our canine roommate, he accidentally "clipped" my thirteen-year-old budding basketball star, resulting in a severe patellar dislocation in the field; much pain and swelling; a veerrryyyy sllloooowwww ambulance ride; a gruesome "external reduction" in the ER; surgery to remove "loose bodies" (bone fragments) inside the knee; some serious medical expenses; and the end of serious hoops. 

About a year later, it was me.  He came careening up behind me, again at the dog park, and crashed into my knee, injuring my medial collateral ligament.  My son's physical therapist got to work his magic on me for three months.

But Ollie still loves to run.  And we still love to watch him.  We just don't turn our backs on him much.  

My husband and I have always said that we would love to find our one thing--like running to Ollie--that is utter bliss, absorption, raison d'etre.  That special gear that takes everyone's breath away who sees it.  The thing we were born to do.


I'm not sure every being has one.  Or maybe some of us have too many, which results in a splintering of the effect.  Maybe part of the secret is investing in a thing to the exclusion of others.


I'm pretty sure, though, that "do[ing] what we love [so] the money will follow" is antithetical to the joie de vivre so evident on Ollie's face as he flies by.  So while I intend to keep on searching, and attending to clues in the pleasant moments in my life, I will avoid harnessing my delight, should I manage to stumble upon it, to the plow of occupation.  That would be too much like setting Ollie off after a mechanical rabbit with money down on his pace.

99 and Counting. . .

On the order of onomatopoeia --you know, those words that sound like the noise being referred to, like "bang" and "wack" and "sizzle"--here is a way to procrastinate with the word procrastination.  (And by the way, clicking on  onomatopoeia  will take you to a nifty site where you can waste lots of time on onomatopoeia games.  Just in case you're on a roll.)

Clearly, any amount of time spent on seeing how many words you can make from the letters in "procrastination" is a waste, and by definition a way of putting off doing something more worthwhile.  I could have been paying my monthly bills this evening, since we actually got paid on time this month.  Instead, I produced the following, using abnormally lax--some would say virtually nonexistent--standards:

action     ant

cant     cantor     carp     cars     cart     cast     coin     corn     corps     crap     crisp     crop              

ion

nation     nit     notion                       

option

pain     paint     part     partition     past     pats     pins     pint     piston     pits     point     poison     poor     port     portion     post     potion     pots     print     prior     proctor           

rain     rant     raps     rasp     ratio     ration     riot     rips     roast     roost                         

saint     saps     satin     scant     scion     scoot     scorpion     scorn     scrap     scrip     sin     soot     sort     Spain     spar     spat     spin     spit     spittoon     sport     spot     sprint     stain     star     start     stint     stir     stop    strap     strip     strop     stoop     strain                           

tact     tans     taps     tarp      tars     tart      tins     tint     tips     toast     tons     torpor     tort     traction     train

Wow!  What an accomplishment.              

                        

I invite others to weigh in on words I missed, thus encouraging the spread of the scourge of the p-word.

Giving In to the Snow

In the middle of what our local media are referring to, variously, as "Snowapalooza," "Snowmageddon," and "Snowpocalypse," I am face to face with a personal demon.  An evil inner voice has come to seduce my inner snow angel with promises of productivity, self-improvement, and achievement.  I could be getting so much done!  What better time to start to dig out the basement, to declutter the kitchen, to catch up on the health insurance and medical bills mess?

Fortunately, I still have two of my children at home, and my three-year-old grandson living just blocks away.  So if my soul is in too weakened a state to recognize the mandate to play and re-create, delivered as a cold, white wallop, they are here to remind me.  

How did I get to a place where a statewide--nay, regional--snow day puts me in a state of distress as I stew over how I'm going to get everything done?  I remember a time, not so very long ago, when my heart did a little dance at the thought of the world stopping for a day; when I stopped too, happily, willingly.  Snow days were for baking, maybe.  For building snowmen, and forts, and having snowball fights.  For movies, puzzles, board games.  If I left the house at all, it was for a sledding hill, or to walk in the sparkling streets. 

My son, who I raised to know better than me, it seems, has just commanded me to let go today, and to accept the gift of being snowed in.  My grandson wants Nana to help build "snow persons."  And so, although phones and email can penetrate our fortress, I'm going to follow the lead of our local schools, libraries, and coffee shops--and close for business.  Just for today.  Cocoa, anyone?

Life Management 101--All Work and No Play is a Waste of Time

With this post, Tuesday's Life Management 101 concludes our look at Laura Stack's Find More Time:  How to Get Things Done at Home, Organize Your Life, and Feel Great About It.  This week, Chapter 8, "Mastering the Eighth Pillar--PLAY."

In this final chapter, Stack advises us to resist our society's push to "confuse your job with your life."  Another of her books--Leave the Office Earlier:  Do More in Less Time and Feel Great About It--deals more extensively with this issue.  But here the focus is on the rest, relaxation, and re-creation that we make room for when we tame the omnivorous work monster.  


As with the previous chapters in Find More Time, each centered on one of Stack's eight pillars of productivity, self-assessment provides the architecture.  (Stack's productivity quiz can be found in its entirety on her website.)  For me, this measure showed that Play was tied with Paper, together my weakest pillars.  My cheerless score resulted from rating each of the following ten quiz items as:   1) to no extent; 2) to a little extent; 3) to some extent; 4) to a considerable extent; or 5) to a great extent.  My responses are in red.

To what extent do I . . . 

• Close the mental office door and turn off work each day.  [2]
• Leave work on time, so I can get home and enjoy my personal life.  [2]
• Keep my stress levels low.  [2]
• Rest, relax, and play daily. [1]
• Go on a long vacation each year.  [1]
• Create fond memories with the people I love.  [2]
• Have a regular family time with loved ones.  [2]
• Make time for a favorite hobby.  [2]
• Force myself to slow down and stop rushing around.  [1]
• Take care of myself on a regular basis.  [2]

In my humble opinion, this is Stack's best chapter.  She does a great job of making the case for play, and tells us that finding time to spend on "leisure, wellness, fun and stress reduction. . . is one of [her] book's main goals."


To me, her enthusiasm for this pillar was evident in the loving detail with which she described suggested approaches and activities.  As a play-challenged person, I was seduced by many of her recommendations.  I am especially eager to try her brief stress-management techniques, including this one:

REST YOUR EYES.  Try this one for instant stress relief.  Anytime your eyes are tired, like when reading or working on the computer, pause to give your eyes a rest.  Rub the palms of your hands together in a vigorous fashion to generate energy and heat.  Then quickly place your hands one over each eye socket, so that your eyes are at the center of your palms.  Let your eyes relax in this warm darkness for one full minute.  Instant relief.

or this:

BREAK YOUR FOCUS.  When you're stressing out over something, force yourself to stop thinking about it.

• Say or write the alphabet backward.
• Close your eyes and hum a song.
• Drink a glass of water in exactly twenty-seven sips.
• Close your eyes and think of a color.  Now picture seven things that have that color.
• Try to recall all the objects in your purse, wallet, or briefcase.  Write down as many things as you can in one minute.
• List six things you've enjoyed most in the last week.
• Picture a room in your home and write about it as if you're describing it to someone else.

For those of us who work in more standard employment situations, Stack offers some practical ideas for negotiating more sane expectations in the workplace.  It has been a while since my work life was bound in this way, but I found her thoughts useful.  It was, however, dispiriting to see just how deeply workaholism has permeated our culture, and how much strategizing is necessary to achieve so little in the way of self-preservation.  The trade-off I have made in stepping back from mainstream full-time paid employment has meant extremely suppressed income.  (I am fortunate that my husband's compensation for the workaholic efforts he wouldn't dream of giving up anyway allows me this choice.)  The gain is that I escape the usual strictures so many of us have to work with.  My challenge is to stop acting like my own difficult boss, and to stop flunking "play."


Stack strongly encourages her readers to take annual vacations, either involving travel or of the "stay-cation" variety; to create memories; to nurture family relationships; to cultivate a hobby; to stop rushing--by moving slowly, cutting back on commitments, scheduling personal days, and "seizing the moment"-- and to take care of ourselves.  All of these are things I need to do.


But right now, I'm going to try the eye thing.  So I guess I'm done with this post, since I won't be able to see to type with my palms over my eyes.

Guilt-free Play: My Top 31

The last two days, I have been trying to implement Neil Fiore's advice (in The Now Habit:  A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play), interspersing "play" with short periods of focused work.  I am pretty enthusiastic about this approach, so far.  I'm not sure whether the production of the following list should be considered work or play, but isn't such blending kind of what we're supposed to be after?  Anyway, I had fun thinking about pleasant work-break activities.  I offer my favorites, and encourage my readers to spend some time coming up with their own.  

1. Coffee with my husband
2. Yoga
3. Meditation
4. Reading
5. Sitting outside in the sunshine, dark, early morning, late afternoon, midday
6. Walking my dog
7. Swimming
8. Running
9. Biking
10. Playing my piano
11. Doing crossword puzzles
12. Knitting
13. Gardening
14. Reading to my grandson
15. Reading aloud with my husband
16. Watching movies
17. Listening to music
18. Sitting in front of a fire
19. Calling my sister
20. Shopping at garage sales, consignment shops and Goodwill
21. Playing games with my family
22. Going to the library
23. Cup of tea
24. Relaxing conversation with any of my three kids
25. Writing poetry
26. Listening to radio, especially This American Life, Speaking of Faith
27. Reading blogs (Some of my go-to blogs--Beyond Blue, The Happiness Project, 1000 Awesome Things, Think Simple Now, Unclutterer, FlyLady, Wildmind)
28. Hammock time
29. Singing
30. Dancing
31. Watching comedy reruns

So, now I'm done with my post for this morning.  I should just about have time to squeeze in one of these before heading out to work.  I think I'll take my list with me, just in case.

Procrastinating 101: The Importance of Not Being Earnest

My favorite almost-three-year-old and I spent some time yesterday reading Ducks Don't Wear Socks, by John Nedwidek.  In this charming story, Emily, "a serious girl," encounters Duck, whose increasingly outlandish apparel, and whimsical explanations for same, succeed, eventually, in inspiring her to lighten up.  Neil Fiore, whose book The Now Habit:   A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play we have been examining in recent Procrastinating 101 posts, would approve.  Of Emily, of her friend Duck, and of me and my small companion.  


In his chapter on "Guilt-Free Play, Quality Work," Dr. Fiore points out the essential role of fun in taming our not entirely inner procrastinators.  He maintains that procrastinators and workaholics have in common a "push" approach to work motivation, with its emphasis on negative consequences.  For both groups

Being taught that work is unpleasant and that we are lazy leads us to believe that we need the pressure of "have to's" and "should's" to keep us from escaping to play.  And the loss of guilt-free play in our lives makes the tasks of life seem more onerous, depriving, and difficult than they need to be. [p.84]  

Fiore goes on to describe what is to me an all-too-familiar way of thinking about and approaching work:

When we approach a difficult project, we typically think of tackling it in big chunks that require long periods of work in isolation.  But the anticipation of extended isolation from friends and recreation is likely to promote procrastination.  The effects of such work habits on your mind and body are similar to the experiences of prisoners in solitary confinement and subjects in sensory deprivation studies, who are wrapped like mummies to minimize sensation.  Each of these activities drastically reduces physical movement and visual stimulation, making the mind ripe for any anxiety created by self-criticism, fear of abandonment, and threats of failure.  

We are more likely to work productively when we can anticipate pleasure and success rather than isolation and anxiety.  Demanding twenty--or even four--hours of tedious work involving confinement and struggle is hardly calculated to get us motivated, especially when there are so many more pleasurable alternatives available.  [p. 84]

Fiore advises us to restructure how we think and talk about work, incorporating pull factors.  Here, it is important that we be able to look forward to immediate and definite rewards.  These should include aspects of the work itself that can bring enjoyment and/or satisfaction if relieved of perfectionistic standards and defeatist long-term views.  But we also need to build in regular time for play.  

In other words, to control your work habits you must make the periods of work shorter (less painful) and the rewards more frequent and immediate (more pleasurable)--interlacing short periods of work with breaks and rewards.  [p. 85]

And here is my favorite part of Dr. Fiore's program.  The "cycle" he recommends, in order to achieve "higher levels of quality, creative work," begins with "guilt-free play."  The resulting "sense of freedom" about our lives clears the way to engage in "a short period of focused, quality work."  This, in turn, builds confidence in our ability to solve problems and get things done, making it possible to enjoy the re-creational activities we have earned.  


I experimented with this scheme yesterday, with good results.  I started the day with coffee and puzzles, as I have been doing for the past few weeks.  Throughout the day, I interspersed enjoyable and/or relaxing activities with scheduled tasks.  I managed to begin work on one particularly dreary and resented task that has been hanging over me for weeks (to be honest, months), and to complete a few others.  My mood was better than it's been for awhile.  Granted, Day 1 is hardly a test.  But I'm game to continue.


I'm working on finding the play in my work, and watchful for my tendency to turn even play into shoulds.  I'm planning to hang out more with  toddlers, and sartorially witty ducks.  That should help keep me real.

Putting Off Fun

It has dawned on me lately that one of the most important things I have gotten in the habit of postponing is fun.  And how smart is that?

I have spent some difficult years raising challenging children, trying to function in a “blended” family that feels a lot like living in a Cuisinart, and coping with a credibility-defying series of crises at work and at home.  I have dealt with it by channeling my Super-self, and by hunkering down as if I were under siege. 

My fun diet over this period was like the emergency subsistence food allowance set up by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to determine food stamps allotments and poverty levels.  Meant to keep one alive, in the short run—not to nurture health or supply the energy long-run for enduring, let alone improving, one’s circumstances.

My husband has been complaining about this deprivation for years.  And I have been complaining that he isn’t helping me fill the sandbags!

But I am beginning to see that my soul, and my marriage, have been starved by my stoicism.  I am running out of steam, and nerve, and humor to continue slogging through the bogs of everyday troubles. 

What kind of nut puts off having fun?  Where did I learn that taking my eyes off the prize for an evening, or a weekend, was something I couldn’t afford to do, was too risky to consider?  What kind of example is this for my children?  And what feats might I have managed with a tad more smiling, and some spirit-feeding enjoyment under my Wonder Woman belt?

Tonight I am going to a Broadway show, albeit in New Orleans.  And to dinner.  I plan to drink, moderately, and to be merry.  And I plan to get used to this kind of  happening.