It's About Time! by DL Larson

I know all about time management; I've led classes on rearranging time for this, and allowing time for that. Making time takes effort, a commitment! We all have the same 24 hours in a day, blah, blah, blah. Yet time slips out of my grasp as fast as my hard earned money! I want to throw my hands out wide and shout, "STOP!" For just a moment, can't we all just take a deep breath and do nothing for sixty seconds?

One, two, three .... feel the calm, it's coming ... five, six, seven ... don't rush it for heaven's sake, it's only sixty seconds! Breathe in, deep, think lamaze here, and exhale. Doesn't that feel great? Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen ... I'm nearly ready to cope. I think so much better when I'm calm. The hazy fog is lifted, I feel in control again ... twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven ...

I remember what I used to tell others, set a goal, a short-term goal. I struggle to accept my own advice, yet every time I set a goal and then reach it, the feeling of accomplishment is monumental! Thirty-seven, thirty-eight, thirty-nine ... It doesn't matter the size of my goal, it's the journey I've traveled to reach the end. Or the mini-end if I have a small goal set for myself.

Two weeks ago I set a few minor goals. I promised myself I would tend to the task of working on proposals for my completed work and I would then go fishing twice a week. By fishing I actually mean I would send queries, proposals out to publishing houses and/or agents. I always think of it as fishing, I'm never sure if I'm really in the right spot or dangling the proper bait, but research and a dash of determination has landed me at that particular publishing door and so I pitch a hook, cast a line. Fishing!

So far I've met my short-term goals. I've sent the desired number of proposals out each week; I continue to search for possible matches, a tedious task, not unlike fishing, but essential if I want to succeed. I'm back in control with a set purpose in mind! The papers may be falling off my desk and the floor around me may be littered with debris, but my goals keep me focused. I'll make clean-up a priority another day! Right now I'm basking in the good feelings of accomplishment ... fifty-eight, fifty-nine, sixty ...

Oh, that was a short minute! But I've also rememebered I'm more in control than I recalled at first. So what was the real exercise, stopping for sixty seconds or simply taking a moment to assess what has already been accomplished in my hectic life?

Sometimes the simplist action makes a powerful difference.

Til next time ~

DL Larson