Lists and Journals

I'm feeling a little overwhelmed right now by all the things that need attention. Last night I made a list, since that usually helps me start to feel more in control and at least I stop worrying that I'm going to forget about something.

I also read an article in the April issue of The Writer about keeping a "treadmill" journal for writing. The author, Gregory Martin, suggests that writing is like exercise, and that the best results come from regular, planned effort. He also finds that keeping a journal of this sort helps us overcome our personal "evasion strategies."

Oh, evasion strategies. I know all about those. I've been feeling particularly worried of late by the amount of time I seem to spend a) procrastinating and b) wasting time. They are not necessarily the same thing, although they can be. I seem especially good at them when I have a lot of things that need attention all at once. Things with deadlines. Like now.

So, I'm going to try Martin's plan. I dug out an old writing journal (only a few pages filled and the last entry is from May, 2000) and will use Martin's 5-point entry system. These daily entries include the time and date, how long I plan to work, what I plan to work on, a brief report on how it went, and when I will work the next day. The entries are brief, so it's not daunting. In the "how it went" section I intend to include ways I procrastinated or wasted time when I was supposed to be writing. I'm choosing to do it in a paper journal instead of online because for anyone but me, it would make extremely dry reading.

Should be interesting, if I can keep it up for a while.