Day 366: Coda
First, all the Thank Yous!!! Thank you most especially to Jesse for so much care-taking in the past year. The kids. The cats. The house. The endless doctor’s appointments and playdates and trash-taking-out and birthday list compilation and distribution. You have been The Man in the ultimate way. We have actually NOT split the emotional labor and “steering the ship” of our family in the past year–you have taken on all the work, planning and mental load of our family, and kindly doled out assignments to me in tiny doses. And not been too mad when I still didn’t complete them. (Fellow moms/wives, perhaps this alone provides sufficient incentive to try the 365 hour challenge!!)
What’s more, watching you blossom so completely into the person you are meant to be over the past few years and seeing how truly joyful you feel now has given me strength and courage to keep pushing toward myself, even when the path feels terrifying and overwhelming.
Thank you to all the friends who have supported me and offered kind words and encouragement. Thank you to all the new friends (and even new family!!) I have met along the way. This past year has brought me into new communities that have welcomed me without hesitation, comforted me with belonging, and inspired me to ask “Why not me?”
Finally, thank you to everyone and anyone who is reading this now, who has clicked on my blog or read an entry along the way!
Moving forward, I plan to spend even more time writing in the coming year! I will also incorporate other activities such as reading and research into my writing time, but aim to maintain a ⅔ ratio of actual writing.
Also, I hope to integrate a few longer writing retreats and perhaps some travel to facilitate writing in 2023, as well as some weeks and weekends specifically scheduled for writing.
In the mornings, I may actually aim for closer to 90 minutes on weekdays, because in writing for a longer stint each morning these past few weeks, I realize it allows me to reach more of a flow state.
However, I do not plan to track my hours as much. I will rest assured knowing that 90 minutes per weekday and one hour per weekend day equals 9.5 hours per week, give or take, plus extra on my writing retreats. Fifty-two weeks times 9.5 hours will bring me close to 500 hours for the year, which represents a hearty chunk of my 10,000 hours of deliberate practice.
Next, I am facing the reality that I need to do more composing directly on the computer (sigh). This necessary-though-undesirable adaptation will facilitate my future editing, searching for material and sharing, as I can’t recall how many times this year I have thought, “I wrote about this exactly!” and then failed to locate my notes among my thousands of notebooks. Plus, any writing I wish to share will eventually need to be in electronic format.
Finally, I plan to take a few weeks off to celebrate reaching this key milestone (I made it! YAY!) and to facilitate starting again on a meaningful date for me–my adoptive dad’s birthday, Dec. 10th. In his fascinating book, When, Daniel Pink writes about the power of choosing a meaningful starting day for important endeavors. But, he emphasized that multiple days can represent a sort of beginning: the 1st of the month or 1st of the year, your birthday or someone else’s, even any given Monday, Sunday or Saturday, depending on what you consider the start of a week.
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SO! If you want to start your own 365 day, 365 hour challenge:
Consider your endeavor. What speaks to you? Refer to yesterday’s post for a list of ideas.
Get in touch with me!!! E-mail me at 365hourchallenge@gmail.com or click to join the 365 days, 365 hours private facebook group I created for folks attempting their own challenge! This way, we can chat, share ideas and offer support.
Consider your incentive/disincentive. What extremely unpleasant thing will you do if you fail to complete your 365 hours? It may feel more meaningful if it reflects the number 365 in some way.
Choose a meaningful day to begin. What day in the next few weeks holds personal meaning for you? Alternatively, you can make preparations to start on January 1st (the ultimate beginning, but sometimes a bit too emotionally loaded) or you can start TODAY, as there is no time like the present and doing something inspiring for yourself as soon as possible is always meaningful.
In the past year, I have learned that if you make a one-hour per day commitment to something you really care about, despite the myriad challenges of everyday life, you will find a way to make it work. And where it leads will be wildly unexpected, wonderfully magical–and 100% you.
I will keep in touch with *hopefully* much good news throughout the next year. Thank you all again for the love and support!! Good luck with your journeys.
Meredith Seung Mee Buse, out.