My first big move

Hmmm. Well admittedly, this section of the blog has been slower to take off than the last. I blame this slow adjustment period on a few things. First of all, starting a new job has distracted me more than I thought it would. Secondly, the holiday season happened to coincide with said first point… where free time becomes a hot commodity to be thinly spread between gift-buying-and-wrapping, house-preparing, loved-one-visiting, and everything in between. 

But actually, I know these are excuses. When it comes right down to it, I should have plenty of free time left over to spend on this project. It’s not like I work 14 hours a day, or spend morning until night decking the halls with boughs of holly. It’s simple math. There IS extra time to be found in there, and lots of it. So where on earth does it go? Good question. Sometimes it’s like you lie in bed in the morning, blink your eyes a few times, and before you know it, you’re back in bed again. What happens in between is kind of a blur, and when you try to look back on it, all you can actually remember is a few moments – the highlights, sort of like a sports reel.

 

However, over the past couple of weeks, I have become increasingly aware of one thing that seems to monopolize more of my time than quite possibly sleeping, eating, and walking combined. No, it’s not spending time with family or friends, or work, or chores, or anything useful like that…shamefully, it’s my computer. It’s like I’m married to it. It’s the first thing I go to when I wake up.  It’s the last thing I interact with before I go to bed. And now that I’m spending my whole day at work on the computer (for now), the amount of time I spend in the evening on the computer has become increasingly more noticeable, and more repugnant. I feel like one of those boat slaves from ancient times who mindlessly rowed to the beat of a drum from morning until night… except there’s no drum and nobody’s forcing me. Which makes it all the more ridiculous. 

So now I've identified the problem: the single biggest barrier to me living in a more fulfilling way is my freakin' computer. This means that I’m about to make a move of epic proportions - a leap that is monumental, heroic, nearly unfathomable (description slight dramatized for extra effect). Starting tomorrow, I will limit my free time on the computer to one hour per day.

To you, that still sounds like a lot. To me, it’s earth-shattering. My mind is already complaining: “What are we going to do instead?!?!” Another part of my mind is excited: “FINALLY!!!!” (This is the part of my mind that has always known the computer is a total soul-sucker.) This restriction obviously won’t include work computer time… but as soon as I’m at home, the computer will be on for one hour per day only and be turned off otherwise. It’s not going to be easy. Once the novelty of it wears off I already know I’m going to be tempted to fall back into old habits, longing for the passive easiness of wasting my nights away on facebook and youtube (sigh). However, I have a feeling this experiment is going to reveal a miraculous goldmine of time. I’m not a big TV watcher, so I’ll literally have hours when I get home to take care of things I need to do…read….play music…exercise… relax... and god knows what else.

"Boring!" "Amazing!!" "You'll never pull it off!" "We can do this!" says my mind. And yes, it often has a split personality like this. Constantly oscillating between growth and stagnation.

Well, there's only one way to find out...

xo Janine