I'm Wasting My Time Here

Many of my regular daily activities can be stress-relieving, but are a huge waste of our greatest resource - time.

I think you know exactly what I'm talking about. Television, Internet... not all aspects of the two are a waste of time but more often than not I'll realise that I've spent the last few hours watching shows I don't care about, browsing sites I have little interest in, and otherwise tuning out from the real world.

I believe that escapism has it's place. I love a good movie and I love to read. I read every night before I go to sleep. One of the things I enjoy most of all is being able to lose myself in a good book or story.

This past year my reading time has been quite limited so I made the decision to start reading more consciously. If I'm not feeling captivated or interested in a story after a few chapters, I don't finish it. I will never be able to read all the books in the world, probably not even all of the books that I mean to get to someday. So why waste my time on a book that I'm not connecting with?

Now if only I could get that attitude to carry over to my Television and Internet usage.

I've been back at work for two days now. I'm far from having my new routine figured out, but the reality is that I only have about 5 hours of awake non-work time to myself now, and that is including the time the kids are still awake. So somewhere in there I have to figure out how in the world I'm going to keep up with one of the things I enjoy the most - blogging, and thus writing!

The answer is quite simple. Reduce the number of garbage e-mails I read by unsubscribing from everything I don't need. Don't get distracted by browsing from site to site. Turn off the television. Write write write!

Now here is something that I hope will help me stay in touch with my creative writing inspiration, a Christmas present that is on it's way to me from my Mum, via Etsy.

GetSassed on Etsy

It should easily fit in my purse without taking up too much room and has just a touch of my favorite color purple. I hope to take advantage of times such as when I'm stuck on the bus going to and from work, and to be able to jot down ideas as they come to me. Yup, one of these days I'll probably end up writing about the regular characters that I see on the bus such as... 80's hair guy.

In the meantime I will continue to unsubscribe from nearly every miscellaneous e-mail that appears in my Inbox, think twice about what tv shows I watch or record, and try to remember that there is a whole lot more to the world than mindless, pointless, escapism.

Reverb 10: What do you do each day that doesn't contribute to your writing — and can you eliminate it?

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