This morning I found myself thinking about four kinds of stuff: (1) stuff that I do, (2) stuff that I want to do more, (3) stuff that I want to do less and (4) stuff that I make myself do but for no particularly good reason. It seems pretty obvious that I should be actively working to try to do more of (2) and less of (3) and yes, it might be obvious, but that doesn’t make it easy. In fact, such is my utterly perverse approach to things that sometimes it seems as if the more I fixate on (2) the less of it I do and the more I do (1), (3) and (4) instead. Dare I say that I find myself wondering whether I do some things purely so that I don’t have to do things that I say I want to do more in case I find out that I am not very good at them – which is a classic perfectionist procrastination strategy to avoid ever having to be disappointed with your level of achievement… [albeit one that doesn’t work because I AM disappointed with my level of achievement.]
One thing that is certainly the case is that there are some things I force myself to do even though they don’t really have any clear benefit or rationale for being done – category (4) stuff. For example, I have recently developed my slight obsession with keeping ‘streaks’ going, as evidenced by the Streaks page of this blog (morning exercises, science reading, mindfulness meditation, WRITING THIS BLOG, running 25 miles a week). With some of these activities it is fairly easy to see why it is a good thing to do them – exercise and meditation practice both contribute to my overall well-being and, in theory, should make me better able to do all the other things I want to do. However, it can easily be argued that it is not actually essential to do them every day (or every weekday) apart from the goal of firmly establishing them as unshakable habits. I guess habit building IS a legitimate reason to keep doing something – regular science reading and running can be put into this category, they are good things to be in the habit of doing. The problem though, is that there is no real value in heaping pressure on myself to do these things every day or to a certain level. If I only run 22 miles in a week does it really matter? (No) If I miss a day of reading what is the problem? (There isn’t one). The more I think about it the more I can see that having to maintain these streaks is not a source of energy or fun, rather it is a source of completely unnecessary pressure – just another thing to judge myself with.
Of particular interest in this list of streaky stuff is my desire to write an entry on this blog everyday. I do this in the knowledge that almost no-one reads each entry and I tell myself this doesn’t matter because I am writing here just as a means to write something somewhere. But what IS the point of writing in that way? If I want to write then surely it would be better to put more care and thought into writing less frequently so that when I do write I have something more meaningful and carefully structured to say. Or, if I want to just write something everyday why don’t I just write a private journal of some sort? The answer to that question is that I suspect that without any kind of external visibility and accountability I wouldn’t bother to write at all, but doesn’t that tell me something – that writing on this blog is a completely unnecessary diversion away from other activities? So, if I am honest, I guess I have to admit that writing this blog IS about getting noticed by people, even if this only occurs once or twice a day and the people doing the noticing have absolutely no connection with me or my life (in fact in many cases they are probably just trying to drum up traffic on their own blogs). I’m not saying that everyone who visits this blog is like that and I am certainly not judging them, rather I am commenting on my own bizarre confusion. By the way – ‘hello and welcome’ if you are reading this!
All of which is to say that after almost 60 days of writing on this blog once per day I am not at all sure whether I will keep this going. It might be argued that there is a middle ground – just write something every now and again when I have something particular I want to say – but I am not sure that this would work for me and suspect that without a daily habit this blog would die a natural death, as it has done on various occasions in the past. The other possibility is that I come up with a good reason to keep it going, some goal for why I want to put my thoughts out there for others to stumble upon, and not simply write them in a private notebook. I am using good time and energy to write these entries and so if I value myself I ought to have a good reason for using myself up in this way.
So, this entry maybe the last entry on this blog, or it might be the last entry for a while. But it might not be. I suppose we will all find out tomorrow!
Tim O'Hare 