I Need To Get Out Of My Own Way

Or I need to be kinder to myself. Or both? Somehow. 

 

I haven’t really written or published many new posts this year because I got injured and I’ve been focusing on managing it (and glorious side effects such as pain, fatigue from pain and allergic reactions). Which means whenever I look at what I need to do online, it all feels really overwhelming. I know there’s a lot “out there” that I’ve let go. 

 

Everything also feels overwhelming because I’m trying to fit my physio stretches into my day but also being able to move enough to exercise again. I feel like I’ve had so many (but also not) random illnesses (iron, tonsils etc) over the years that my gut habit is to conserve energy as it will be gone soon. And I’m wondering how I go back to the gym when it’s also the busy time in my day job. I guess like most things right now the answer is slowly and carefully. 

 

I am finding the space (mental, physical, emotional, who-knows-ical) to read again though. That’s one step. And what I read recently was this blog post on regaining time and energy. To me, the most important part of this article is the internal to do list. It’s where I find my overwhelm comes from. I use digital and physical notebooks/reminders but for me, getting things OUT Of my head means scribbling them all over paper. This is also something I’ve found with working with people via my coaching side of things, Embrace Shiny. To put it simply, most people really do have their shit together. It’s just hard to see on your own. Which is where someone like me comes in with my coaching. But it’s also something you can do yourself if you don’t want a coach right now. I do it to myself often. I was wondering how I would do ALL THE THINGS right now online. Then when I started brain dumping onto paper… actually not much came out. 

 

I’m sure a part of that is that I tend to go with what I want to do online rather than a giant list of rules and do’s/don’t’s, but I think it’s also that I’m getting better at trusting myself and filtering out the shoulds. And speaking of shoulds, the book, Fuck Should. Sigh. Big, big sigh. I need to work out what I’m doing with it. I’ve progressed from “can’t publish it until I do big thing A” to “well it’s kind of done but is it done enough?”. And of course the answer is that nothing is ever done. So maybe I need to release the damn thing and then if it doesn’t feel done enough, I can update it or work on a sequel (the word sequel sounds weird for non fiction, interesting). 

 

No one gives you a roadmap to any of this. No one plans to be injured. The key thing with nearly anything is trying to adapt in the way that suits you. Doesn’t matter if it’s a busted shoulder or a blog post or a social media plan. You do you.

 

4 Replies to “I Need To Get Out Of My Own Way”

  1. Thanks for the mention! You got this and yes you need to be kinder to yourself. Most of us do.

    1. Vanessa Smith says: Reply

      It’s easy to forget to be kind to ourselves.

  2. You do what you’re going to do. With the level of pain you’ve had, just getting through each day is an accomplishment. Getting down 3k words of creativity is outstanding.

    1. Vanessa Smith says: Reply

      Perspective helps. 3000 is still a lot. I guess 😉

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