So I woke up this morning and thought about the things on my to do list, felt the audible “oh fuck” in my stomach and rolled back over. As I drifted off in the predawn light, I thought, “Be gentle with yourself.”

Well, that is some handy kind of permission to duck the work. Be gentle with yourself. It’s a new age dictum. (Or Nu-Age, if you use the commercial, store front spelling, which is funny because if you take out the hyphen in that misspelling, the word is nuage or cloud in french. New age, Nu-Age, Nuage…like the whole notion of New Age is a cloud puff of an idea. Or some cloudy thinking. You choose.)

But I digress.

Here’s what’s on the list:
Continue drafting the MG
Prep ACC class
And then some errand-y stuff, which I could happily put first. Errands are so good for feeling productive while not getting the main stuff done.

No, it’s those first two things causing me the ‘oh fuck’ nausea dread and ‘be gentle’ would not get the work done. Be gentle would lead to more oh fuck nausea. I know this cycle.

So what’s reasonable?
What would give me an ounce of joy?
What could I find a little enthusiasm and curiosity about?

Here it is:
1. Read through the middle grade; reconnect with it (December gets a little busy); find the next step.
2.Read through the ACC power point. Make a list of things you want to change, do, spiff up.

Way to break it down.
Way to lessen the dread
Way to turn the work into bite size pieces that I won’t choke on.

Way to make me a little bit curious.
A little bit hungry.

How nu-age of me.