Conquering Self-Sabotage

I’m happy that I can at times laugh at myself. Not always, but sometimes. My brother loves to tease me about my lack of focus and the other night I saw first hand that it is genetic. I might not have gotten it from my parents, but I most certainly gave it to my daughter. Ok, so maybe it’s not nature as much as it is nurture. Perhaps my daughter’s lack of focus stems from seeing me flit around our place taking on a dozen tasks at the same time and not completing any of them.

Last night I had my daughter take her clothes from her drawers, determine what still fit and put her new school clothes away. I was surprised at how many times I had to remind her to finish the task at hand. She doesn’t seem to do this at school, but when she’s home with nothing engaging to do she is so easily distracted. I gave her a goal to work towards. If she finished her task on time she could make zucchini bread with me. She did complete her task with several gentle reminders at what was at stake.

Today I sat down with a serious deadline. I have five days to put a proposal together. What I find really interesting is that I pushed hard to get my project to a point where I could pitch it to a viable entity. I had a great meeting with the power’s that be and now all that’s left is to put this proposal together. Pretty easy, right? Not so much. This is where I begin the self-sabotage. I guess I’m ahead of the game, because I have realized this about myself.

The trick now is to do something about it. I’ve noticed that some of the biggest attention sucks for me are social media, household chores (which I normally don’t want to do), mindless internet surfing (under the guise of important research) and brilliant brainstorming of new ideas.  It’s not that I haven’t been exposed to time management and project management skills and resources. It is a fundamental refusal to sit down and focus on the one thing that could lead me down the road to success. Yes, this is how fear of success manifests in my life.

My plan for battling this attention deficit behavior is to block off periods of time where I ONLY work on this proposal. That means I’m not looking at every tweet, Facebook mention or text message. There will be no surfing the net unless it is actually research that is required for this proposal. Everything else can and will wait. It’s alright to be creative, but at the end of the day I need to be able to focus long enough to execute my dreams.

I deserve success and abundance, as does everyone else on this planet. My goal is to overcome whatever bad habits or subconscious demons I have accepted in the past, so that I can be successful in my immediate future.

 

 

The Long Walk Home – Finding My Inner Xena!

It’s just pain, right? That’s what I kept telling myself on today’s run. I’m not sure what happened or why today was so tough, but I’m glad it happened today and not Sunday. In preparation for Sunday’s 5K race I’ve mapped out my (3.2 mile) route. A few minutes in I knew I would be lucky if I even made it to the 1.5 mile mark that I hit on Monday.

The first 2 minutes were tough, but I though I just needed to warm up. The following 4 minutes were just as hard, which is surprising. Usually once I get going I settle in and find my zone. Not today. At the 10 minute mark I was thankful I hadn’t dropped or stopped. My legs hurt and didn’t seem like they wanted to keep going. The thought of another 20 minutes was not a happy one…but I kept going.

Now the full route deposits me right in front of my house. If I only get half of it done I get to walk the rest of it home. Maybe it was thinking about the long walk home, my achy legs or the work that was waiting on my desk that had me off my game. Who knows? It just happens like that sometimes.

At minute 12 I summoned my inner Xena Warrior Princess and channeled all of my West Indian ancestors. I said to myself, “Why you crying? HUN???? I’ll give you something to cry about!!!!” and kicked up my pace. I figured if it was going to hurt I might as well make it worth being out there. I should point out that these were stiff muscles and aches from trying something new, not pains that should cause me to stop and see my doctor.

What I discovered about myself, as I fought to finish the last 9 minutes of today’s jog, is that I am capable of truly accomplishing great things (I did make up time and at least matched Monday’s distance). Sometimes I need to remind myself to stay in the moment, to focus on the very next step and that’s it. One day at a time, one step at a time and one task at a time.

Today I will not focus on the aches and exhaustion, I will remind myself to celebrate that I jogged 30 minutes straight, through pain and doubt.  I will also celebrate the things I have done in support of being a great mom and successful entrepreneur.

Don’t forget to give yourself a pat on the back today.

Some Days You Lose.

Day 4 blogging and I am sitting down to write at 10:30 pm. Sigh. Yesterday was filled with focus, risk taking and task slaying. Today, however, has been filled with one necessary yet endless task. Everything seems to be taking longer than usual. Add Week 7/Day 2 of my 5K101 training (http://runningmatemedia.com/), an evening conference call and a pile of work still on my desk and you have a nice case of exhaustion. I wish I could click my heels and be in a theater watching a great new movie – Rio, Something Borrowed, Thor or Green Lantern. Alas that is today’s pipe dream.

Instead I started my day listening to a meditation podcast about cleaning and organization. I can’t really say that I lost today, it just feels like it. I look around my place and STILL see piles of paper on my desk, the same clutter on the kitchen island and about 20 new emails that need to be addressed. Back in the good old days I’d just stay up till I dropped, some days I still do but I can’t afford to do that anymore.

I’ve learned that my patience is directly related to the amount of sleep I get. When I don’t sleep and am stressed out my daughter ultimately is the one who loses. Life is full of stress, but she didn’t sign up to have a disconnected overwhelmed mom.  So…what gives? Judgement.

I’m not a bad mom or a terrible homemaker because “IT” didn’t all get done. Reading to my little one at bedtime was just more important than handling a pile of filing. I did a lot of stuff today. Important stuff that is in line with my vision and achieving my goals. It needed to be done and no one else is coming to my place to do it. The life lesson? Live in the moment, appreciate the challenges and be grateful when I get another chance tomorrow.