Getting back on the horse

Wonderful people have expressed concern for me because when I stopped writing, I shared that I was going though difficult circumstances.

Those circumstances are not in my life anymore and I’m doing fine…so why am I not back in my routine?

I didn’t really have an answer for that. Until now….

Writing this blog is very important and incredibly special to me.  But nothing I was doing was helping move in the direction to resume doing what’s so important to me. I had managed to get in my own way and couldn’t see it until now…I had a lot of excuses instead.

What I realize that what really kept me off my horse was this belief completely based on fear. The belief stole all inspiration and motivation from me. It set me up to fail and disappoint myself. The belief said, “After taking a long break from your routine, what you write needs to be profound…it needs to be brilliant…well, at least it has to better than anything else I’ve written thus far.”

The belief made me feel a sense of shame for not picking up my routine as soon as I was able to. It shamed me for not doing everything I can to be my best.

My response to the shame and pressure of this belief was to think, “Blog. What blog? oh, look at all that I’ve written. It’s like a book. Hmm…I’ll go watch TV now.”

In all my other writing, I simply did my best and hoped it was useful for my readers.

But this pressure put me between a rock and a hard place.

So I kept putting off these feelings until tomorrow.  A month passed and I still had nothing to say that was better than anything else I’ve written and I got good at ignoring shame.

I woke up thinking differently today.

Today I said to myself, “Write something.  It doesn’t even have to be good.”

Here are some ideas of how to get back on the horse:

Big Challenges:

  • We have to do something that we’re not doing right now in our lives.
  • We have to change.
  • Pressure to do it well or even better than before.
  • Hard work
  • Waking up earlier
  • Compromise or sacrifice
  • Lack of inspiration or motivation
  • Fear of failure or fear of success
  • Disappointing ourselves and/or others

Response to these challenges:

Do something.

Do anything.

It doesn’t even matter what you do.

It doesn’t even have to be good.

You just have to get back on the horse.

My invitation to everyone who reads this who is struggling with either starting or getting back into a routine is….DO SOMETHING…IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE GOOD, but it will get you on your horse.

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