After being away for almost 5 months, today is the day I am back to being a blogger. I have missed the creativity flow of writing every day and still I needed the time. I had so much going on I had to cut on some activities and although this would have been a great thing to have as I can share feelings and write about anything, I had zero creativity as my mind was concentrated for months on organising and planning.
I haven’t stop writing because I had nothing to talk about, in fact I kept thinking about how to describe on the blog a specific trip I just had, or a book I just read, or a self-improvement class I just took. I wished I had time to do it, but as soon as I finished an activities it felt like I had something else to attend or to plan.
What I hadn’t understood is also that when you move in with your partner it is very hard to find time for yourself. To have alone time I mean. When you live together in a 2 rooms apartment, you cannot just ignore the other person, plus you are tempted to do what he is doing in the name of sharing. I am really happy to have moved in with him: although it has been 5 months already, last saturday was the official date I gave back my apartment to my now former-landlord to move in my new-landlord! At the beginning coexisting in such a limited space, when both of us have spent more than a decade living on our own, with our rules, on our own terms…well, it’s no picnic. Then, as always, things find a place on their own, rituals emerge, cohabitation gets sweet and it feels like it has always been this way. Except you forget how you used to be able to blog every week, run on the week-ends, knit scarves in 2 days, generate new business ideas all the time. Now I talk, I share, a lot, and I love it, our relationship has grown so much more in 5 months than in a year. But what we need now, is to carve time for ourselves, distinctively, to remember who we are. I am a better person with him, I am calmer, less messy, more tolerant and generous, but I am less creative. I mean, I still have fantastically idiotic ideas that he has to follow me on now, but these ideas won’t be helping me creating my business (yes, it is still the plan)! They are helping me having fun though, and that is why I haven’t rushed back to working on “me”, we have been having a lot of fun together, and with our families and friends. It feels that we have never stopped. So I accept that I have had a break on being creative every day, but now it is time to be back in the game. And writing is not a step per se,but writing started my big change last year and I love have a visual proof of all I did last year, so I’d like to pursue this to trace all my upcoming projects. And they are coming!
Two other things have also prevented me writing: traveling and spending all my awaken time looking for an apartment (that I still haven’t found). For the fun part, since February we have been home maybe 4 week-ends in total…the rest has been dedicated to visiting friends and family abroad: in London, in Corsica, in Brittany, in Normandy, in Italy, in Washington, without counting my 2 weeks in Argentina. It has been amazing, I love traveling, I would do it all the time if I had infinite resources (money and holiday-wise), but I am not a 4 Hours Work Week entrepreneur yet, so I do my best for now, but it is certainly one of the reasons I want to have a different type of job in the future.
London in March
Nancy in April
Lorient, Brittany, in April
Normandy in May
Corsica in May
Washington DC in June
Florence, Italy, in July
Sainte Marine, Brittany, in July
Bordeaux, in August
I have also been through some professional changes and might switch jobs again in the upcoming months. Although in the past I didn’t use to mind changing position and company frequently, I am starting feeling tired about it. It must be my old age speaking. It has been fun for a while and it was me who decided to leave my old job in July to start this new position that I consider “temporary” because I had no other options if I wanted to work during the Summer. But I am still working on changing in September, hopefully to finally work on a compelling job that can free me enough hours to work on personal projects, we’ll see. In the meantime, I am also planning to attend a 6 weeks program designed to “empowering people to redesign their worklife”. The concept is not so much about quitting your job and start your company than to shape your current job & life into your ideal one. Maybe the problem is not the job but what you make of it, and what you don’t make with your personal time.
More at www.switchcollective.com
As my boyfriend puts it, all these months I have been scattering seeds all around and the results are starting to appear now. Which is why I am more and more interested in the concept of rituals, of small daily actions making big long-term changes. All 2018 has been about getting active on a lot of fronts and finally things are moving, I did it without thinking, and got frustrated about things going too slow for me, but I can see now why it had to be that way.
Hence now is the perfect timing to re-read What Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast, by Laura Vanderkam. I liked the concept of the book before but didn’t really need to apply it as I managed my own time as I pleased. Now that my only time alone is early morning and late night, I can see the appeal of doing things before my beloved half is awake. That is why I “started” running in the morning for instance. Ok, it was once, 2 days ago, for 20min. But I was so excited I need to do it regularly. And, proof that it is essential to always speak about your ideas to motivate friends and open yourself to other new ideas, I had a drink with a friend (which is also a 5mins walk neighbour) and we decided to give it a try together. Try to run every other day for only 20min before everybody is up: it would also be a perfect time to see each other as she is my neighbour but I only see her once every 2 months because of our busy schedules. Just by speaking about it I found a way to exercise and to see more of my friend! and this is all this blog is about! speaking about my projects, advertise them, gives me an additional reason to actually do them but also to find people who could share the same interests: when I decided to run the other day, I said it to almost everyone I know! people bet me I wouldn’t do it!!and that is exactly why I couldn’t back down! because of pride! And today I actually read a paragraph about it the this book where Laura Vanderkam explains that people who make a promise in front of other people, that bet on it, that involve other people in their commitment, are more likely to fulfill it!
So much so that she even created a website (called www.stickk.com) where you bet on sticking to your commitment! If you don’t do it, you either have to give money to a designated person or to some “anti-charity”, a charity which values you don’t support (think about a political party).
“The possibility of losing money? A Referee who verifies your reports? Supporters who cheer you on along the way? Everyone’s different.
With that said…our data shows that creating a Commitment Contract with:
- A Referee increases your chances of success by up to 2x
- Financial stakes increase your chances of success by up to 3x
What will it take for you?” http://www.stickk.com
So my commitment today is to strat writing regularly again and find the time to work on my “own” projects daily. Now that my new life is slowing down, that habits are forming, I will be able to plan my days more ahead than these past months, although everything was achieved successfully, it has been a long rush. Let’s see how it goes!
52 Weeks Challenge 