There is nothing that saturates the brain and excites the spirit like a fresh new idea. The adrenaline pumps you into action. The action creating an unfolding of not just possibilities but realities. The new idea or new pursuit feels like the world is at your fingertips and passion radiates a hopeful new reality. The challenges are ahead but your eyes are on the top, the place you just know you will be standing. Your gonna make it, you HAVE to! This is the defining piece of your existence in this exact moment. It makes sense, this makes sense, it fits, and you were made to do this.
It’s a rush. Every time this happens to me, I feel more alive than I thought I did the time before. Life is full of all the colors, vibrant colors. I feel UNSTOPPABLE, then… I stop. Not with everything, but with lots of things. My shelves filled with dusty books half-way finished, new hobbies that barely hobbled, potential certifications, the material left un-studied, and countless side hustles that never hustled. Ugh, the spark that’s no longer sparkling. This very blog contains more drafts than actual pieces I published. I have no clue what to do with those. Maybe they began with inspiration and then fell splat on the floor like ice cream no longer attached to the cone. Many of these ideas or inspirations my conscious mind has forgotten, yet I recently realized that my subconscious is not so quick to dismiss. They say “ignorance is bliss”, and I often wish I was ignorant to the things I never finished. “You can’t do everything”. My mother’s words radiate through me. Maybe my stubbornness catapulted me. I had something to prove, so I tried to do everything. It was through those years of therapy when I realized that I meet things with an unprecedented amount of enthusiasm, which was then followed with an equal amount of disappointment. The cycle continues. It does not just stop at disappointment, for my mind keeps track like tally marks of all the things I believe I left un-done or didn’t fully manifest into a success. Tally Marks. Marked. Marked failures. I imagine I am at my end, standing in a room with different piles from my life. In the corner, the largest pile sits with a sign reading “Bummer. You suck.”
GAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH. It can paralyze me. Depress me. I hear the countless encouraging words I tell my children as they start, stop, start, get distracted or start something new. Yet, my personal record keeping reflect little grace, or freedom to change direction. I disregard the mountains I have climbed and adventures I have*
*Intentionally left undone.
Try all the things, start all the books, have all the new ideas. 🌻
Totally relate to this, Sarah. Feels like I could have written that first paragraph. Yet you are doing THIS thing — which is such a commitment and great example of something so many have said: “you know, I should…” — but didn’t. And your fitness challenge a year or so back, super dedication to see that through. The problem might (if you’re anything like me) be that you have too many creative interests, and your mind sparks in different directions— but there are lots of real-world things that dampen the ideas, or the execution of them. Time, resources, human support. Just other responsibilities. Imposter syndrome. For me, fear of succeeding especially has been a big (silent) one to overcome. And I get overwhelmed with the ideas and the options. But even as I sit here working on a new idea right now, I say — pick just one. Write the others down, but pick the one that seems to be picking you, that you think more about than the others. Then do one task per day related to it, even if it only takes a minute — until it gets woven into your schedule. But then work on giving yourself that grace for the others you’re not doing. :)