Running Behind But Well on My Way

Throughout my holiday, I found myself getting up to the sun. I woke up several times before the sun did. In fact, I laid in bed wide awake watching TV. But more often than not, I did not climb out of bed and face the day until my alarm told me it was time to give Senior Cat his 9:00 a.m. dose of medication.

This strategy really messed with life as I know it.

The quiet of the morning is when my brain waves are keen and fresh. There is something about early morning solitude, combined two to three cups of coffee and knowing I have a few hours to myself that makes my fingers fly across the keyboard and spill the early-morning thoughts of my brain onto the page before me. 

Waking up at 9:00 a.m. provided no such guarantee.

Numbing my brain with early morning television programming is the death of me. I can feel my own thoughts and words evaporate into thin air. By the time I walked out of my room into the vastness of the quiet of (what was left of) the morning I barely wanted to read anyone else's words. Let alone write a few of my own.

Towards the end of my holiday, I grabbed my coffee and morning smoothy and went straight to the love seat in the living room.

I had an end table nestled right up to the spot where I reclined with all the remote controls required to watch whatever combination of live, recorded, Netflix or TV on Demand combination I craved. Along with these remotes, were the house phone, my cell phone, our new iPad and a book. Oh, and my coffee.

I sat still and went with the flow of inertia. 

Inertia doesn't flow well.

I made no voluntary outbound calls, texts or emails unless it was absolutely necessary. I picked up the phone if I knew who was calling. I replied to texts. I took a few people up on invitations out of the house. But for the most part, I simply wanted to curl up in my favored lounging spot of the day and absorbed the input of the 'world' I created.

Beware of the world you create for yourself.

When my world is full of goals, ideas and dreams I feel limitless as to what I can do, accomplish or 'be'.

When I drown out my own thoughts, I become a shadow of who I am and what I feel I can accomplish.

For me, turning on the TV turns off my brain. And with it, my ambition, my self confidence and my own thoughts which define who I am.

Television creates an alternate universe for me. I lose myself. Sometimes that is a good thing and exactly what I need. But when you are a person who is trying to create alternative income sources through writing, tuning in the TV and tuning myself off is not something I want to become a habit.

Maybe that is why I have been drawn to the HGTV channel. Home renovations = retirement and income options for me. The one thing I learned about myself when I took a tentative step outside of my home in an attempt to earn a living in the great big world outside of these doors, is that I want to make my home become a source of revenue for me. Whether that is by running a daycare, taking in a border, opening up a B & B, renting a level of my home or setting up a home office for writing &/or bookkeeping. Working out of my home is where it is at for me.

Thus, my dreams don't die and the ideas don't wither up and go away when I watch house hunting and home renovations.

Something deep inside of me knows 'home' is where it is at for me. I just have to ensure I keep the television turned off and maintain my early morning writing ritual. My fingers know more than I do when I let them fly uninhibited in those dark and quiet early morning hours.

How do I know this? Because when I sat down to write this morning I was going to write about my hair.

Maybe tomorrow. Today is about fulfilling my writing, dream and work quota. I'm running behind but I'm still well on my way.

See you next time! You have been warned. It could be about my 'hairrowing' experience at a new hair stylist tonight. I must trust that I am in good hands. My trusted, tried and true hair stylist has had to abort this career and has referred me to someone he believe best suits my needs.

More on that another day. In the mean time, turn off the TV and tune in your inner self. See who you find inside, when you aren't even looking.