Sneak Up On Your Dreams

One of my most comforting exercises when I’m anxious about something is to go over the worst-case scenario in my head. This economic crisis makes me wary.  I am fine now, as I keep my debt and standard of living low, but I did start worrying for a while that the entire U.S. economy might go under.  Much of what I did in that situation is think about what I would do if that happened.  I decided I would probably organize local co-ops to trade whatever people needed and avoid the monetary economy entirely.

Currently, I’m still panicking about my job change.  I researched and learned the steps necessary to become a regularly published writer and am following those steps.  For some reason, though, I’ve recently started panicking about being successful.  Every time I send out a query, I think that the magazine may accept it and I may have to write an article.

I’m clear in my head that I’m not competent enough to write articles for national magazines.  I’ve decided that everyone in the world is more capable than I am.  It’s not even that I’m intellectually unaware of the fact that this is probably not true and that I’ve already been successfully published in local newspapers and magazines, it’s just that my emotions take over and my brain is left out.

That’s where imagining the worst-case scenario comes in.  What’s the absolutely, positively the worst thing that could happen?  I could get a publishing contract and then not be able to do the article.  I would then not get paid, the magazine would be annoyed, and that would probably be the end of it.  I’m probably not even the only writer in the world who would have done that.  It’s of course possible that I will be able to write an article and everything would be OK.

What kinds of things are your fears keeping you from doing?  What kinds of things have you decided anyone but you could do?  Try to come up with the worst-case scenario for each of these goals and see if it is dealable.  Worst case scenarios are generally not the most fun outcome of any situation, but if they’re survivable then you, at least, have tried to achieve what you want.

Often the problem with attaining goals is not thinking them up or even doing the tasks necessary to achieve them, it’s finding the time and energy to do the necessary tasks.  Just about everyone has to work hard to maintain their basic standard of living. Everyone has to earn enough money to live, while also taking care of all their other responsibilities.

After a long day teaching at the high school, I would arrive home drained. I had just spent seven hours jousting with teenage attitudes and defiance, designing curriculum then presenting lessons to the my classes in the most interesting and engaging way that I could.  I felt like a juggler up on a ball.  When I arrived home I had my two kindergarten sons to take care of as well as a part-time job teaching college online.  The boys had just had a long exhausting day at school, where they had to follow all the rules and behave well. By the time they arrived home they had (as my friend explained it) “used up all their good.”  They wanted to kick up a ruckus when they got home.  I didn’t have much ruckus-kicking prevention energy left.  In addition, I had to cook dinner and get everything ready to do it all again the next day. I certainly didn’t have much energy left for extra activities.

The problem, though, is that I wanted a different life in the future. For that, I knew I would have to add some tasks to my day.  When I first began working on my goals they weren’t all that clear.  I knew I wanted to try to be a writer, but it seemed like a distant, nebulous goal for the future.

Part o f sneaking up on your dreams includes just keeping your eye on your goal. It’s not magical, though, it just helps you stay aware of the opportunities that might help you along. For example, one time a friend asked to write an article for a local newspaper that she didn’t have time to write. I accepted right away and wrote that article and a few others for that newspaper. It helped me get my first few clippings.

I was able to do a few things here and there, but finding the time and energy to do everything necessary to become a writer was difficult in a catch-as-catch-can method; I needed a way to actually get small parts of the goal done in very small amounts of time.

The most important thing to do when you are low on time and energy is to have preplanned tasks that are easy to do in short segments, all ready to add to your schedule.  To do this, consider your overall goal.  Are you trying to pay down debt or save for something or become an artist or change jobs or something else? Think about what tasks would help you towards your goal.  For example, for paying down loans, having a lot of extra money would help towards this goal, for changing jobs education and/or experience may hold the keys.  When you’re already busy trying to live your life, these tasks probably seem overwhelming.  You can’t necessary get an extra job or go back to school full-time.  Many people feel that if they can’t do everything then they won’t be able to do it at all. Also, the time factor blocks some people. It’s hard to think about attaining your goals in 2 or 5 or 10 years.  People feel that something that far away may never happen.  They don’t necessarily want to put the energy into something that may never happen.

Try to forget about all that.  Put $5 a week extra into your debt. It may not seem like much and it isn’t much, but it might be painless to do and without thinking about it you’ll decrease your debt over time.  Take whatever goal you have an break it down into small pieces. What small action could possibly help you along?  You need to define the action.  I do very little when I set a goal of “sending out query letters.”  I need to be much more specific.  I need to decide on an idea, then write the letter, then figure out where to send it.  When I’m busy I can’t think up all the fine points of my task.  I need to have the goal one day of deciding on an idea, then another day of writing the letter.  It has to be obvious to me what needs to be done and when I can consider myself finished.  Pick some small and completely definable activity that will move you closer to your goal even if it’s only minutely closer to your goal then stick it into your routine.  Make it a habit.  When you are comfortable doing that try to do just a little bit more.