Wednesday in government (class) we had 19 minutes because it was a half day. We watched the above 14 minute video on procrastination. It is absolutely worth the watch. Plus, the rest of this post will make sense if you watch the video.
I don't really possess an instant-gratification monkey. I have said several times before that I am bad at free time. It's true. I have goals and while I do procrastinate a bit here and there, having goals and deadlines makes me productive. Lots of things count as deadlines for me. Having a custom order is like a deadline for me. I don't like to make anyone wait longer than a week or two for their dolls. If the order is complex, or if I am extra busy, it might take me a bit longer to get the doll finished. At that time my panic-monster will wake up. I definitely have a panic monster. He's loud and insistent and is often telling me that I am slacking off. My panic-monster is mean.
I have had a lot of people ask me, or just wonder, how I get so much done. Some of it is deadlines. And goals. A lot of my deadlines and goals are completely arbitrary. There is really no real reason I HAVE to get a doll done within a week or two. I have just decided that is how it should be. I don't like to make people wait. I love getting orders, but having them in my book is stressful. I want to get them out of there as quickly as possible. I don't HAVE to get a ton of items made for my live sales. But I figure if I am going to go through the effort of putting together a sale, which is a ton of work, I might as well make it worth my while and worth the while of everyone who attends my sale. I like to have a big variety and at least a handful of each type of item. So when I decide on the date of the next live sale I figure out how much time I have before the sale. I then decide how many dolls I want to have available. I break it down by how many I HAVE to make per week. And then I start to work. I don't really procrastinate, I am more likely to try to get everything done NOW. When I am judging a photo show I will often get it done in a day. I figure, if I can judge a live show in a day there is not a lot of reason I can't get a photo show done in the same amount of time. Or maybe 2-3 days. The problem, for me, comes when I clearly cannot get everything I want to have for a sale done right NOW.
The panic-monster wakes up.
He's not too loud, or too mean, right away. He just whispers at me. He tells me I am behind. I don't have enough stuff made. I don't have it planned out well, I will never make it. My panic monster comes at the beginning of a project, not at the end. It upsets the whole system and I have to work ALL THE TIME. I have to see if I can get 6 dolls finished in a week (the answer is yes, I can). I have to also work on the small stuff at the same time, I can't focus on just dolls. The result of that is several months before a sale, I am super busy and freaking out part of the time. It's rough.
I don't have a solution to this. But I am working on it. Over the quarantine I was working on doll things, helping Ethan with the house, but I also made sure to take all the opportunities to hang out with my guys. For this live sale that just passed I did not reach my doll goal, I was 2 short. And I was OK with it. It was important to stop. I told the panic-monster to zip it and that it was fine. I had enough stock, I had planned enough, and done enough. And I stopped. I watched Criminal Minds with Ethan and didn't do (much of) anything while I was doing it. I did end up answering sale questions in emails and messages, but not too many. I spent time with Travis. We went and did errands, went and got a music stand from my mom. Just spent some time not working on dolls. I worked on judging the Field of Dolls Online show. I have still not seen all of the photos since I am only currently looking at the divisions I am judging. But damn, I wish I could give prizes to everyone (oh wait, I can!). The amount of creativity in the show is amazing. And seeing the photos has been a nice break. And technically I guess I am still working, but it is different work.
Anyway, this was just a long-winded ramble with some hints into how my brain works. I believe in goal setting and doing my absolute best to meet my goals, as soon as possible. I am also bad at slowing down some of the time. I do spend large portions of the year doing much less, but I do work a lot. Sometimes. I have another couple of weeks of frenetic activity, but then I can chill a bit. I have already started. This week I need to work on shipping the stuff from the Black Friday sale and working on some math for the show. Saturday is the live stream of some of the results. Then the week after will be shipping show prizes. But then maybe a break. I am definitely still working on being better at free time.
No comments:
Post a Comment