My blogs are back up and running! Not that I had stopped doing stuff. WLP and my Meetup group shows that I’ve been busy. But as I gain sage status in life, I have begun to practice what I preach. I have learned enough, apparently, to put into practice the things I know to be true.
With each passing day I am getting better at priority-setting, better at determining whether a task, action, or request, falls into the green light area between enough to keep me busy on the best of days, and not so much as to overwhelm me on the days when I function less than optimally.
So the last year has proved challenging in ways I could not have anticipated. No surprise that there were surprises. Life is not predictable at other than as statistical patterns at a very large scale.
Prioritization via Must, Should & Fun to Do
If something is not a top priority, at a must get done level, it often does not get done. It does not mean that I do not value the thing, project, or process. It means that I know my constraints, both limiting and enabling. I prioritize in a three tier system, must – should – fun to do.
Should Do
I ignore the shoulds in life. The über parental should statements sound in my head all the time, but I relegate them to background noise. Woulda, coulda, shouldas only create stress and doubt. I don’t need either of those in my life, so… out they go!
Fun to Do
I give myself lots of time to play. I need it. It is therapy.
Playing online games is a major way I relax. Except for my right arm. My right arm never relaxes.
Relaxing for me means getting outside my own head, a very difficult process for me to do. My thought process always seems to run at full tilt boogy speed. So the click, click, click of computer games is a comfortable speed for me, but keeps me from thinking deeply about other stuff. I clears my mind of thoughts and just engage in meaningless pattern recognition. I love it. It is important for me to do things I like. I did not always have the opportunity to do so.
I was also rather isolated as a child, so playing games with others online is rather like a bunch of kids who don’t really know each other but know the rules of the game fulfills something I missed out on as a child. That is comforting.
And the most important aspect is the positive reinforcement I get from playing games. I like winning. However, positive feedback, other than receiving good grades, is not something with which I had much experience until I was well over thirty. Until quite recently there has been the tendency to be a catalyst in people’s lives without recognition of my role. So the instant acknowledgment and positive reinforcement and feedback of gaming is quite alluring.
But now that I have my blog back, more on that in a sec, my stream of consciousness writing may make a return and decrease the gaming – because I love writing. It clears my head too. Sometimes putting something down on a piece of paper is the only way to get it out of my head.
But this is all context for the meat of assessing priority.
Must Do
This week I was finally able to get my content transferred to a new server after a year long battle with a hosting company.
Until I had the Women’s Legacy Project underway, and had several personal tasks completed, the WordPress cleanup for my blogs, while quite important, was not as important as WLP due to financial investment and potential ROI from that project. The ongoing Meetup for the online women content creators has reached a level of success with monthly educational and social gatherings, and weekly writing and co-working sessions.
As long as I advanced on each project, and dealt with the crucial events and processes in my personal life, I could attend to non-essential but high priority items that did not absolutely have to be done that week.
Success
I prioritize within a weekly framework. This allows me to succeed, even if I have a bad day. When I am on a roll I get a lot more than the top items on my lists finished. When a roll turns into flip, flip, clunk, stop, I get the top items done. I know myself well enough to know that it is important to set myself up to succeed.
There are many organization and priority assessment tools available. If one does not fit the bill and promote your success, try another. Some tools help the user focus at a detailed level. Others promote action at a more global level. Use what works.
Content & Server Success
I’m just glad I was finally able to initiate the flow of action so the changes at the server level happened, then get the content transferred, change the dynamic name servers, update the platform version, and get all the plugins upgraded, activated or deactivated and deleted as necessary. And I’ve begun posting again. What a relief!
I do need to finish up and do a re-check to make sure c-panel level settings are what they should be. I’m further along now than I thought I would be at the beginning of the week.
It feels great to be able to write about process again. It helps me evaluate and it might help someone else.