I’ve been pretty stressed this past week. I’ve had lots of important tasks looming over me. Most tasks are just things to be done. Tasks don’t start to loom until they should already have been done. The added layer of guilt/anxiety causes a normal task to loom. Once a task is looming, I start being afraid of it because it is so big. This week I had multiple sets of tasks all looming and I couldn’t think clearly enough to clear any of it away. Another side effect of having looming tasks is that in an effort to pretend that the looming tasks weren’t there, I would focus my stressful feelings on something else. The looming stress of not-quite-finished storefront had me cleaning out my file cabinet and fretting over the fact that the storage room is a mess. The file cabinet and storage room both need to be done, but the level of stress I was expending on them was out of proportion.
Yesterday I took the evening off. I hauled raisinfish over to my house and completely ignored every single thing on my to do list. We made cookies and talked. Giving myself the space to goof off got me out from under all those looming tasks. Once I was out from under them I could see the strings that held them over my head. Little strings that I only had to snip and then the looming task would be gone. For example: There were a last few fixes left to do on the store, but I had poked around my administrative site for hours and been unable to figure out how to do them. This meant that I had to place a call to Volusion customer support. One phone call would remove a whole cloud of loom from over my head and yet I kept avoiding that phone call rather than getting it done. It turns out that at least 5 of my looming things could be solved with simple phone calls.
I started today on the phone. Snip snip snip. I cut those looming tasks down and they aren’t hanging over me anymore. The last “prepare for preorders” task that I have left to do is figuring out how to export information from my store into my quickbooks file. That task was looming, but one of those phone calls helped me see how I need to proceed. Now it is reduced to a set of smaller tasks that I can tackle singly. I can see how to do it. No more loom. Managing the quickbooks export is big on the list of things to do tomorrow morning. After this morning’s loom clearing, I deserve some afternoon time off for good behavior.
who/what is raisinfish?
Vorn
who/what is raisinfish?
Vorn
The lj username for a friend of mine who is good cookie making company.
The lj username for a friend of mine who is good cookie making company.
Just relax a lil…
Yeah, I know that it never helps to have people tell you to relax… What do you want from me, huh? Intelligent advice? *shucks* Think again, sister…
Anyways, just think about how fast those 300 sketch copies went for the first book… Now think that there’s a full, lovely, wonderful 24-hour period for us to flood you with an extra 10 bucks on top of what you make off the books… THINK of it…
Granted, a lot of that will go to whatever treatment Howard will need for his hand (Maybe a staple gun for when it falls off?) , but still… 🙂
I hope the upcoming launch of pre-sales isn’t only stressing you out. I hope it’s at least a little exciting, and that you enjoy this too…
We want to pre-order, but if it’s driving you insane… Well, you know our stance on whatever it takes to make things easier for you folks… Whatever it takes. Honest.
Boy I hope I can get to the signing party again this year… This time I’m staying at a near-by hotel, so I can stay longer…
Just relax a lil…
Yeah, I know that it never helps to have people tell you to relax… What do you want from me, huh? Intelligent advice? *shucks* Think again, sister…
Anyways, just think about how fast those 300 sketch copies went for the first book… Now think that there’s a full, lovely, wonderful 24-hour period for us to flood you with an extra 10 bucks on top of what you make off the books… THINK of it…
Granted, a lot of that will go to whatever treatment Howard will need for his hand (Maybe a staple gun for when it falls off?) , but still… 🙂
I hope the upcoming launch of pre-sales isn’t only stressing you out. I hope it’s at least a little exciting, and that you enjoy this too…
We want to pre-order, but if it’s driving you insane… Well, you know our stance on whatever it takes to make things easier for you folks… Whatever it takes. Honest.
Boy I hope I can get to the signing party again this year… This time I’m staying at a near-by hotel, so I can stay longer…
Maybe one third of the stuff stressing me was related to store and preorders. You needn’t feel guilty or worried at all. Besides, today was better.
Maybe one third of the stuff stressing me was related to store and preorders. You needn’t feel guilty or worried at all. Besides, today was better.