Small steps

I haven't written in here for a very long time. I feel a bit sheepish. Whatever that means.

So I re-read "Crowds of Grass" (a post from January), and am freshly inspired.

For what it's worth, I haven't done much running, weightlifting, or housework either - just been feeling kind of unmotivated.

I've done alot of Sudoku though. There's something pretty satisfying about that, when the numbers all start to cascade and fall into place after long, patient figuring. I find it strangely comforting.

This morning I put my shoes on. Which means I intended to work today, and not just do sudoku. I went downstairs and did some weights. It felt so good, why do I stop? But I know why I stop. I stop because I have days when I have little or no energy and the mere idea of lifting a weight is too heavy to handle. So I don't.

I think it would be so much better if I did it anyway, if I said to myself, "Do it badly. Lift a 2lb weight and only do it 10 times." Instead I don't do it and then a kind of inertia sets in. The next day I don't want to either because I am still feeling icky, and besides, I didn't to it the day before. Then the days slide by and it's a week, or a month. Then I have to start all over again.

There are a number of things in life which, to do well, need to be done regularly. Lifting weights for three hours every once in a while would only cause strain or injury. It would not strengthen. Whereas lifting weights a few times a week, even poorly, would.

Housework is kind of like that, too. So is prayer, well, except that a long spell of prayer wouldn't cause strain or injury. But if it is not accompanied by regular, or constant prayer, it is of so much less value.

Other things that are better for being done often are: writing, and parenting.

So that's pretty much my life. Most of the things I really care about are things that require constant attention. I keep trying to schedule them all in, between homeschooling, church activity, time with my husband, and down time. Sometimes I don't do so well. I guess this past month has been a month of catching up on down time. Which is okay, I tell myself, and not at all related to list-making, quitting list-making, or passing or failing as a human being.

What I want to learn, though, is to give myself permission to do a thing poorly, if that is the best I can do for that day. I really believe that doing the thing at all is what encourages me to do it again the next day, and that doing it often is what causes me to get better at it.

I would love to leap over the mountains but if I simply cannot do it, then I would rather climb them by many small steps than stay forever in the valley.