I’m not exactly sure what to write for this one, so I’d like to start with where I’ve been. It’s not pretty, but I promise more pictures in the next one! In the last month…
I’ve successfully returned from a New Zealand adventure. I’ve also (mostly) successfully taken a week from social media. This time TV was excluded from my rest, as my body clock is off and I wanted an excuse to sit around NOT running. I finished a couple books and also didn’t successfully finish my NaNoWriMo challenge, for the first time in several years. I ended at midnight of the thirtieth with 42,456 words. I’ll return after a month’s break in January to finish the first rough draft. My goal for December is to work on illustrations for my graphic novel, combining the ideas that I completed over summer and fall into visual and digital representations of my story. I’m excited to see it start coming to life, but as I’ve explained before, this will be a long-term project that will span several months, potentially a year, depending on how I change the format or rewrite scenes.
I learned the hard way that traveling to another country with a group in order to run and explore the area is not very conducive to quiet times to write. In fact, there was only one night that I was ever alone on that trip! It created a gap that I fell into and never recovered in my NaNo challenge, and while I’m disappointed, I still wouldn’t change the location or the travel decision.
At the moment I’m starting to plan my goals for next year, which was something that I started a couple years back. I’m always surprised that usually I come close to completing my goals, or just complete them in a different way. I ALWAYS find something that I accomplish that wasn’t even on my list at the beginning of the year! That looking back each year, combined with my trips like the Appalachian Trail, Peru, and even Europe have taught me that fast is not always the best thing.
Circling back around to my trip to New Zealand, it was amazing. However, I noticed that each moment was constantly filled with something to do. Even two years ago, this would have been right up my alley. I love staying busy. But now my outlook has changed. I want to have time just to sit and take in the beauty, to spend hours in coffee shops with my pen and paper, to savor thirty minutes in the bookstore even when I know I will not buy something, to chat with an unexpected face because they happen to be in line in front of me. My brain still works just as fast, but I’ve learned if I allow my body to stop, then I can actually focus more deeply on the present. I am learning slowly but surely to take in these moments of life. Even in my job, I have found this conscious effort to pause keeps me from becoming stressed. Life is not perfect and especially with teaching it is almost always hectic! But it doesn’t have to make me frazzled. Instead, I can take a step back and consider, what is the most important thing in this moment?
I won’t always finish everything.
I can slow down.
See the beauty in ordinary things.
Write the wrong words.
And yet, it’s still okay! C’est la vie!
Work in progress,
Hannah Marie.
