The Movings of My Soul
My mind doesn’t need to think about what to do next since my life is built on habits and routines. Ever since I planned my days down to the minute, I’ve stopped thinking about what I needed to do with every day I lived. Some external system took care of all that thinking, and ever since then, I’ve been happy. It’s been easier for me to trust my systems because I created them. I devoted time in not only thinking and planning them, but also living through and tweaking them as I went further along. By removing the friction that an unplanned and disorganized day can bring, I’ve been able to accomplish so much. I really recommend anyone who feels ready to tackle their life with vigor and enthusiasm to spend all the necessary time — be it days to weeks to even months or years — in creating a system, experimenting with it, and sticking with it for the long term, even if it’s something as simple as writing everything down in a spiral notebook. As long as you have a system that you trust, you can accomplish anything.
I write everything down because I have a bad memory. My OmniFocus database contains tasks that most people find routine enough not to write down, but I do because I don’t want to think about them. All I want to remember is that I have to check my todo list to see what I want to get done today and focus on just those tasks. If more tasks come to me throughout the day, I add them into the database, process them, and let the system bring them up later. I write in my journals because I want to express the movings of my soul as honestly as possible to help me live life now and to aid my memory from reviving those emotions later. I write notes in Vesper and in my various pocket notebooks so that I can remember my thoughts now. I truly believe that by writing all of my various thoughts down and printing them on paper, I can devote my mind toward deeper reflection and meditation on diverse subjects like ideas, my life, and other things.
Here are a few things I’ve been thinking about:
- Writing a short story a week. I read that Ray Bradbury wrote a short story a week just to get something down on paper and to get used to writing stories. I’ve been thinking about doing something similar for years, but I’ve never gotten around to it. A thought I had today was to spend my already established habit of writing in the afternoon on writing a short story instead of my novel. But one thing that has stopped me is my next point.
- Writing novel first drafts as quickly as possible. As I’m close to finishing the first draft to my second novel, I’ve realized how important it is for me to finish my first draft as quickly as possible. First drafts are always shit, and the sooner I can get to the rewrite and revision phase, the better and happier I’ll be. I’m really excited about getting to my rewrite because of all the ideas I’ve written down on how I can make my novel better. I know I can produce one good thing in my life, and I want it to be this novel.
- I should leave young girls alone. The girl I have a crush on is only 18 years old, and I’m almost 29. No matter how attractive she is and how attracted she is to me, nothing will change her age and the fact that I work at her school. No matter how much I deserve a girl, I have to resume my search elsewhere. I’ll try to wait until she graduates, but I don’t want to hang my hopes on that.
These are just a few thoughts I thought I’d share. There are more, but that’s why I have over 150 days left before I consider slowing down my pace. <HR> Thank you for reading, and if you have any thoughts you’d like to share, please comment below!