I guess it’s actually time to write another blog post, when what I really want to be doing right now is making oatmeal butterscotch cookies. Oh, well. Writing now, cookies later.
2021…was not a spectacular year, and the last six weeks were so colossally bad that I enter 2022 with no small amount of trepidation. The optimist in me (which is like, ninety percent of me, if you want the truth) is fairly certain this new year must be better than the last, because it certainly can’t get much worse. The ten percent of me who is a pessimist is always thinking, “Oh, God, what now?” and is just as certain that 2022 will bring more of the same–or worse–crap than 2021.
I hope the optimist is right, but now I’m just taking it one day at a time. It’s really all I can do.
I’ve written here before about how I am a list maker. I used to make long lists of things to do on the weekend, and have a real sense of accomplishment as I crossed those things off. In the last month or so, those lists became too overwhelming, so much so that–though I continued to add things to the list–I was too paralyzed to do any of it.
On New Year’s Eve, I made the tactical decision to change this process. On that day, instead of making a list of ALL the things I needed to do, I made a list of three things. One of the three things on todays list: write blog post.
Now, now about one thousand years ago, I attended a seminar on workplace organization (a thing I didn’t really need, and have no idea why they sent me). The instructor of that seminar (and I’ve heard this many times since), said that on the average work day, you can hope to accomplish five things. That is both easy for me to do and remember, since I usually list EVERY thing that needs done (except the super easy things, like waking up and drinking coffee) and five is both my favorite and lucky number. But now, even just five things seemed like too many things, so I knocked that down to three.
And for now, three things is manageable. I’m not sure it’s sustainable, and only doing three things means I don’t do a lot of other things, but that has to be okay. For now.
And if you’re wondering, making oatmeal butterscotch cookies is NOT one of today’s three things. But I think I’m going to do it anyway.
Vickie Jarman 
Truly you are doing more than 3 things. You are dealing with a massive amount of things and so healing is happening (which you don’t always notice and it can be exhausting to heal). Be kind to yourself. And three is the magic number.
LikeLike