I skipped writing last night because I was tired and really couldn’t land on a good topic. I tried to push myself to just write something, anything, and I did. And man, it really sucked. So I deleted it. I wrote another paragraph and that was even worse. Delete. I even tried writing a sappy poem. Um, yeahhhhh. Delete. And the whole time I was struggling with it, one of the #nerdlution mantras was ringing in my head, “If it makes you happy…” I was not happy. Forcing myself to write crappy stuff was making me the opposite of happy. So I quit. And I was mostly okay with it.
Here I am tonight. Back from a work trip, tired, don’t want to write. But in my head I’m thinking: Skipping one day is one thing, but skipping two? That’s some else entirely. And then I asked myself: Is there anything I do every day that makes me happy? I couldn’t think of anything. Of course my mind instantly went to things like eating, exercising, writing, etc. and most of those things I don’t even do every day, and most of them don’t make me happy every time I do them. I do them because they’re required or I have a goal I’m trying to reach—which will presumably make me happy—and that’s the way to achieve the goal. Sure, sometimes I enjoy those things, but there are plenty of things I just do because it’s good for me.