The thing about taking a “short” break, is they tend to turn into long breaks.
And when you’re done with the break, even if you haven’t finished all the tasks you set yourself, you have to get back to into the swing of things.
Somehow.
Swing of Things
Sounds good, but turns out to be a very poor work analogy when the Cambridge Dictionary defines “swing of things” as
to start to understand, enjoy, and be active in something
Or things.
By the time you’re back at work, you’ve forgotten how to do your job, and you didn’t leave yourself any notes to remind yourself where you were up to.
(Or maybe the last person in the job cracked the sh*ts and stormed off leaving you to pick up the pieces).
You don’t know what to do, and you don’t know when you’re going to need another “short” break, but you know it’s there just outside of your foresight vision.
All you can do, is your best.
Which is what I’m about to do.
Habits
And why I’ve been thinking about Dean Wesley Smith‘s version of ground effect, in which writing feels easier when you make it a daily habit. (I’ve mentioned this a couple of times).
Like most habits – you fall into your well run rut groove, and just keep going. Like a unicycling clown on a monorail.
I haven’t worked for someone else for well more than a decade, but I still come to my desk to turn my computer on before going to the kitchen to make another cup of coffee and scroll through my emails as I drink it.
As I have done for maybe the last thirty years (that’s one well worn groove).
Dean also has a plan for what he calls life rolls – when life takes a sudden turn and you fall off the swing.
Start slow, and build up pace.
Which is what I’m going to do.
This paltry excuse of a first blog post, will be followed by a slightly better one, and the one after that will be better still, and soon enough I’ll be back in the swing of things again.
But first, I need to go buy some more tea – writing isn’t the only swing I’ve fallen out of.
