Days where you don’t want to do much of anything – Day 92
May 11th, 2010
I’m bad about giving myself vacations. Do you think 90+ days of writing and such warrants a vacation?
I have a bit of a cold thanks to Chris, but it’s sweeping through my immune system rather quickly. Fine by me. It’s only day two and I’m already with a drippy nose and hacking up a lung. That means the end is near! I’ve never gone through a cold that fast. It boggles the imagination.
To be honest, I didn’t do much work today. I’d like to blame it on the cold, but I know I can’t. It’s just me. All I have is an outline for Delusion #3, some rough prose for it and a little more of the new jinked theme for this blog. I didn’t do much else. I feel kind of rotten because of it.
It’s all about validation. Ever since I quit my job in February, I’ve constantly had this voice niggling in the back of my head, screaming at me, “You had better not slack off. You may never get to do this again in your life. Make something of yourself. Make something of yourself or die.” It’s why I started this daily blog writing, to get the validation that voice needs. To prove I’m not a slacker.
I don’t know why I feel the need to prove this. I don’t owe anyone anything. I could sit on my butt all day and play video games if I really wanted… but I don’t. I can’t. I feel like I have to be this big success and that everyone is counting on me to change the world in some way. It’s a heavy feeling. I hate it.
I’m still working through these overwhelming perfection-validation issues I have. Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve always felt that in order to prove my worth as a human being, I had to succeed, I had to be perfect, and when I wasn’t I would hide it away deep inside and let that failure gnaw at me until it grew into some red-eyed nightmare. I was twelve, maybe thirteen when this started. Kids shouldn’t be thinking about things like that when they’re that young! They should be thinking about riding bikes and summer vacation.
No wonder I’m a masochist.
I’m trying to outline what I need to do tomorrow, but right now I really want to say to that voice inside me, “Screw it. I’m reading zines all day.” I have plenty to catch up on. For sure.
You know what I”m gonna say right? What I told you before, as long as your happy and you feel satisfied with who you are and what you have accomplished then screw everyone else. You can not please everyone except yourself. So stop being so hard on yourself, oh and tell that little voice inside your head to not make me go in there and beat its @$$! Cause I will ;-) Your awesome chica don’t forget that!
Sometimes doing ‘nothing’ is exactly what you need to do, right? Disconnecting and unplugging yourself from the day to day routine can be refreshing and rewarding. I feel like this at least once a week. Doing ‘nothing’ is somewhat of a recharging phase for me. So your a masochist? No wonder your so hard on yourself! Setting your acceptance bar too high could be a good/bad thing, so just remember to have fun while doing it. Your setting your standards high, so you definitely want to reward yourself mentally. Go enjoy yourself hun!
That voice in your head is like your own personal html validator huh? That’s a pretty interesting concept I’ve never thought of it that way. Try to find that balance between ‘work’ and ‘play’. Inspiration comes from living life, new experiences fosters creativity and new ideas, then express those with in your work. In the mean time, sit back, take it all in and get better! You’re talented, keep up the awesomeness :-)
Noe I couldn’t of said it better. Just like he said, your brain becomes like a blob if you stare at the computer for too long and most def great ideas come from being out in the real world and taking a walk to the park etc. Specially for a writer I think its very important to put yourself amongst people and observe and well a great idea might come from just looking at people walk by. ;-) But Noe is right on ;-)
Why is it so hard to impress ourselves? Why do we push ourselves so hard? The levels of quality and creativity are so much higher then our own, how can we possibly compete? We set our standards so high, and tell ourselves “its not good enough!” So we try and out do ourselves to pave way for new standards. We’re never happy with “good enough” and strive for perfection. Is it just the type of people we are?
You’ve already changed the world Nichole, just by being born.
The world is a better place because of what you bring to it. You bring joy and love to those around you and you receive joy and love from those around you. I would say that, that is being a success.
Your friends have very good advice. I hope you are listening to it.