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From The Growing Life:

"The process of baselining

involves writing down everything you don’t have to have, be, or do, to live a happy and fulfilled life (for more on this, see here). For example, I don’t have to own nice furniture (thrift store furniture works just fine) or a house, I don’t have to finish graduate school, I don’t have to be able to tell a coherent story about how I make money. If you’re serious about doing a thorough job of baselining, you’ll download this spreadsheet and write down how much money and time you’ll eliminate by doing away with existing possessions, obligations, and self-images...What I’ve found is that my dreams naturally emerge after I’ve eliminated bullsh*t assumptions about what I have to be, do, and have in order to be happy (if this doesn’t happen for you, then simply do some dreamlining after you’ve done some baselining)." Read the rest of this entry »

Cynicism is a form of resistance, a walling off of the possibilities for transformation. Mary Pipher

Challenge Update (Friday): Here's an example of a typical to do list back in the days when I used one of those:

Now here's what Day 7 of this adventure looked like.

The difference I am seeing between the days with a list and the days without a list is that I am tackling bigger things on these list-free days. Previously, I would right down those little details to remember: call someone, email someone. I would get up in the morning, glance at my planner, see a list of five things to do besides my normal daily activities, and think I just don't have time for anything major today. I was planning myself out of being productive.

Details are tricky that way. I've forgotten a few details over the last week because I haven't written them down. I haven't gotten all of my daily tasks done everyday. But I have accomplished some bigger things at the expense of details and daily tasks. The priorities have shifted. The big projects now take precedence over the details. Is it dangerous to forget the details? Sometimes. It is much easier to catch up on details than it is to catch up on big projects. I can sit down and pay bills, answer emails, or return phone calls in about thirty minutes. Nothing bad has happened because I dealt with those things later rather than sooner.

Thoreau said, "Our life is frittered away by detail... Simplify, simplify." (He also said, "We should distrust any enterprise which requires new clothes," and while that doesn't apply to this discussion I think it is sound advice. No charge for that extra.)

Simplify, simplify. Some details are important, necessary, and life will suffer if we neglect them for very long. Brushing your teeth, for instance, or buying groceries, bathing your child (and yourself), talking to your spouse. Important details. Many details are unimportant fillers. We pay attention to them because they seem urgent and they give us a sense of immediate accomplishment. They are busy work, distractions, tools of the procrasinator, impediments to our larger goals. In their right place, they cause no harm. In the wrong place, they are the pebbles we trip over that cause us to fall back down the mountain.

Better Life Tip: Put your details at the end of the day. Devote a half hour to "detail clean-up." Don't let them distract you from accomplishing the bigger projects.

11 February - A Better Monday

Success today, though not entirely because of my own efforts. Robbie is sick with this nasty cold and he woke up 4:30 congested and still feverish. I don't usually feed him until around 7:30, but I am of the persuasion that, when sick, the more breast milk, the more antibodies, the better. So he ate and I was thoroughly awake after a couple of coughing fits of my own.Accountability, whether real or imagined, is a powerful motivator. Knowing I will write about my success or failure in a public outlet, after having committed to a monthly challenge "out loud," makes this less of a personal process and more of a promise, a guarantee.

Sadly, in the past I've not valued the promises made only to myself enough to keep them. One reason for that failure is the bad habit I have of making too many promises. I want to do so much, try so much, be so much. I forget that I'm not SuperWoman.

A lady I admire very much told me once that every Yes is also a No. Yes to another activity, event, workshop, writing assignment, job, whatever, is No to dinner with family, time with kids, date with husband, relaxation, rest, home priorities. There is a price to pay for every commitment I make: the time and effort required plus the value of what I am unable to do because of the commitment.

Some things simply aren't worth it. Even an overwhelming sense of obligation (where does it come from?) doesn't change that fact.

I want to get in the habit of saying Yes to my family and No, or Wait, to everything else until I know it's worth the price.