Aug 5, 2024 - What to Write About

“We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand.”

~ Cecil Day-Lewis

Journalling, even my personal journal, has taken a break for too long. As usual, it wasn’t intentional. As a result, I find myself struggling with what to write when normally I struggle with too many ideas that need to be untangled. I know that there were many things I wanted to jot down in my journal to go over later, but it just didn’t get done. Life got in the way… and I let it.

So, I guess I’ll just talk about my goal of decluttering since that is the most fresh in my mind at the moment, after spending nearly all of yesterday (Sunday) decluttering. Turned on the YouTube and Podcast playlists and listened to things that supported decluttering while I worked. For those who are curious about which ones I listen to it was Dawn from the Minimal Mom, Cass from Clutterbug, and Cal Newport from Deep Questions. Listening to shows like these helps keep me motivated. Also picked up Cal Newport’s books Slow Productivity (reading this) and Digital Minimalism.

My lament is that it’s taken so many years before I learned about all this. Now, here I am, a grandmother, decluttering a lifetime of accumulated things and habits. It’s interesting work, learning how to change and understand yourself.

One thing I notice about myself is that I do best when I can concentrate on one thing. The problem is, when I do that, other things that need doing slip. Such is the case with Kung Fu training lately. I’ve been concentrating on decluttering so much that I let it slip. When I concentrate on the Kung Fu other things get left undone.

That said, it feels like the more I get decluttered the more room I have to breathe, think, and work. My meditation (a goal from last year) is still averaging at least once per week (usually more). There’s less stress, and I gain more patience, which demonstrated itself when I recently looked after my grandson, for the first time… for a week.

So, while my numbers are abysmal, progress is still taking place. It feels like each day I’m a little bit better version of myself than I was the day before.

Note:

This is another blog post that stayed in my files, unpublished. Why I keep doing this? I don’t know. Anyway, numbers will be posted with the following blog post shortly.