Absorbing

I didn’t feel like laboring during Labor Day weekend so there was no post on Monday. Yesterday I reviewed my monthly activities, and while as usual I was pushing myself each day/week to do more and be more (feeling a bit social media shamed here and there—everyone else seems so much more productive), overall the month, which felt like a bit of a goof-off business wise, has been extremely full.

It was mostly touristy vacation time spent with visitors, but I got some Etsy listings in, and NEW is getting traction as well.

Generally I like blogging thrice a week because it gives me a routine and holds me accountable to manage my time. It also helps me observe my surroundings with more engagement, because I constantly think of what would be fun to share with the world of Marvelers (even if they’re just family members and friends).

Sifting through my weekly experiences via photo reference also helps me process events and reflect on their meaning, the companionship, the joy and the gratitude. I have a private journal of course, but this public chronicling of my life is a great memento and a nice track record of my new life journey.

But when there’s been a lot of activity and you need to let it all sink in a bit more, posting that often can become a drag and a chore. Just like anything else you have to prioritize and determine where time is best spent.

I took a few days off Facebook because I was starting to feel pressured to post something meaningful or give people a play-by-play of an event, when that is just artificial. It is better to savor the moment in the real world than to worry about how we present ourselves to the online world.

Meanwhile, there are so many ideas for future posts I haven’t had a chance to flesh out, which makes me want to blog more often. But I have art to make and to sell and networking to do and calls for art to respond to, since this blog doesn’t monetize itself.

I’m really curious how the last four months of this year will unfold. I feel a bit antsy about what remains on the to-do list since January 1, but there was much more that organically transpired without the glimmer of a plan. Many Fall events are percolating in spite of this feeling of being on pause.

As much as we want to count and track and boost the numeric aspects of life, productivity and success can’t purely be measured by those (ac)counts alone. Life is hardly ever linear, no matter how much we try to structure it.

September will be a month of re-establishing routines and determining efficiencies while also implementing many ideas I haven’t gotten to yet. We’ll see how these intentions pan out over time.