Yay! I'm back to work again!

I'm so excited - I'm back to work on my book after weeks of inactivity!  The last words of  my last post were prophetic - 'and this too shall pass'.  And it did - for a surprising and unexpected reason.  Today I decided to edit  'just for five minutes', one of my favorite anti-procrastination techniques.  So this morning, when my brain was fresh, I started work.  At first it was not fun - I felt irritated, lost, confused and wished I was doing something else.  The dishes!  The laundry!  Even picking up dog poo from the yard!  Anything would have been more enjoyable.  But I was determined to stick with it for 5 minutes.  That meant stopping at 8.55. 

When I next glanced at the clock it said 9.43.  I was amazed!  Not only had I lost 48 minutes, but I'd managed to solve the problem that I'd been stuck on the last time I looked at the chapter.  I'd also created a table that made it clear where I was up to and what I needed to do next, so I wouldn't feel so lost and confused the next time I worked on it.  And obviously, in the course of doing this I went into flow, that wonderful state of being so absorbed in doing something you lose track of time.



Psychic Lisa Williams in action



And the strange and unexpected reason I started today?  It's incredibly random.  While waiting for a TV programme to start yesterday I caught the end of the show before, 'Lisa Williams Live' or somesuch.  I'd thought it was a stand up comedian, so was surprised to find she was a psychic.  One of the messages she gave an audience member was 'your daughter needs to work harder.  She has got stuck on something and has just stopped trying.  If she keeps chipping away at it she'll break through.'  No, she was not speaking to my mother!  But her words reminded me that in the past I've felt like I was getting nowhere with a long piece of work, but when I kept chipping away there would be a sudden breakthrough.  While talking about someone else's situation she prompted me to keep working on my own, and put me in touch with memories of breakthroughs that motivated me to keep going.  So thank you Lisa Williams, whoever you are!