Goals
It is way past time for my quarterly update. Rereading my second quarter progress report was eye opening in many ways. Needless to say, I was highly ambitious plus I left out a lot of important information. I forgot to mention that I was simultaneously planning to teach two local courses, teach a short seminar at the Northern Virginia Pagan Pride Day, priestess the Connect DC Samhain and on top of it all pop up to Dover, Delaware to teach a seminar at Bell Book & Candle. Phew! And are my arms tired … rimshot please!
No wonder my butt has been dragging these last few weeks. I have a very full plate. (Please note the way I am understating the problem as a way of pretending it is not as bad as all that.)
So to summarize, in addition to the above, I am also …
- Teaching at Cheery Hill Seminary
- Actively collaborating on two (2!!!) major web site designs
- Planning the 2009 Reflections Intensive – Answering the Call
- Running a Mystery School – Reflections
- Writing a book – Psychology & Magick
- And oh yeah … living my life in the midst of all this busyness!
Aiiieeee! These last few weeks have been really rough on me at so many levels. So instead of jumping right back into the fire, I decided today was a day for me to not only relax but also to reflect.
[Jumping to the end] And so I just crossed several items off my list of goals for this year. Yay! And the remaining items had to pass several gating factors. First gate: Do I have juice for it or will it give me juice? Second gate: Are they part of My Work or are they a part of my Radical Self Care?
All of the items I have mentioned above passed the first part of each gate. I have juice and they are a part of My Work. What was missing was the latter half of each gate, i.e. gives me juice and Radical Self Care. I reviewed my weekly tracking cards for the last few weeks, and discovered that the reason I felt so bad was not just all the work, but also that I started dropping the very things that would help me feel better not only now but also long term. Hmmm …
So I spent the day mostly sipping tea, journaling and finally just now … laying on my yoga mat and breathing. The few productive items that I managed to do today were all of the two minutes or less variety. And I only had two or maybe three of them all day. Yay me!
I have to admit that this year is really different from previous ones. I have never had so many things on my plate that were all items that reflected my mission and priorities. At the same time, it has been challenging because too much of a good thing is still … well … too much. As I look forward to next year, I will need to keep this in mind. But for right now, I am going to continue to reflect about how to get juice and Radical Self Care back into my life.
Katrina
Posted in
Submitted by katrina on Mon, 10/20/2008 - 9:06pm.
I was sooooo busy, I had to wait till I finished my series on using dreams and symbols to navigate your productivity before I could do my update.
So although I reviewed my second quarter in July, I did not write up this report till now. The first thing I noted was that I needed to drop several of my previous goals. Secondly, that several of my goals were essentially completed. And lastly, and this one is a biggie, I have substantially changed trajectory and I need to re-evaluate all my remaining annual goals.
I review my Long Term Goals every quarter. But I review my annual goals every single week. And the slow change in focus has been obvious to me for a while now. So of the goals that are left, I need to consider just how many of them reflect my current focus.
I could go back to my original annual goals list and modify it as needed. Or I could restart the process and determine new goals for the last six months of 2008. I have decided to do a little of both. First I have updated my annual goals list with the current status. Below are the remaining open goals.
Remaining 2008 Goals
I have added two major additions to my annual goals
- Teaching at Cherry Hill Seminary
- Active collaboration with P (a web guy) to produce major web site designs
Which when added to my existing major projects of …
- Psychology & Magick book proposal, final draft and literary agent
- 2009 weekend intensive for Presidents Day weekend 09
- Reflections Mystery School (+Plan 2009 school year & school portal upgrade)
- Connect DC (+Complete web site upgrade)
… gives me a rather full plate for the last half of 2008.
I am thinking with these major items on my already full plate, these two goals may be too much for me this year.
- Answer requests for short term Drupal assistance on local job boards
- Let more folks know that I am available for out of town classes, workshops, festivals and conferences.
But I will hold on to the following goals, since they represent items that could be generally seen as representing home, health and finances. And those three areas usually represent a challenge for me in terms of motivation and focus. Although I may trim back my list of home projects for this year.
- Walk 30 minutes three times a week
- Baseline weight closer to ~200 lbs
- Build up my cash reserves
- Will and Power of Attorney documents
- Repairs and reorganization – Maybe three items from the list below.
- Kitchen (3 projects),
- Bedroom (3 projects) and
- Closet (2 projects)
The remaining goals concern advertising my classes, workshops and intensives. I will most likely advertise the annual intensive as planned, but I will reconsider advertising my regular classes. I will review this area again in September.
- Create a Reflections Mystery School brochure
- Advertise classes and rituals in local newsletters such as the Hill Rag, DC North, Takoma Voice, etc.
- Advertise annual Reflections intensive in regional and national publications
I have already dropped goals that represented my old business focus and goals that would be difficult to accomplish with the upswing in business and a full teaching schedule.
So now all that is left is rescheduling the remaining items and updating my project files.
Conclusion
I have accomplished an awful lot this year already. But if I did not review my annual goals and drop ones that no longer serve me, I would be setting myself up for disappointment. Because things have change substantially in my life compared to earlier in the year, re-examining my goals helps me to refocus the second half of the year.
Posted in
Submitted by katrina on Mon, 08/04/2008 - 9:00am.
This is part three of an exploration into how I navigated a recent difficult period. The first in this series is, Distorted Nostalgia.
I awaken with the following listed on my internal chalkboard …
- Nothing is actually wrong.
- Web design is my business. And as a business owner, I have to step up to the plate and meet deadlines. It is my job. I am a professional, and this is what professionals do.
[… break to catch a design idea for one of my clients …]
- I am a priestess, shaman and warrior mystic – this is my vocation. This is my calling, my great opus. It is who I am.
- I am not missing out on life. This is my life. And there is nothing wrong with it.
- This is exciting times. I am in demand. I have customers beating a path to my door. This is the life I had hoped for all these years.
Yes, I am scared, worried, and filled with anxiety – but this is what success looks like.
[…break to catch an idea for a personal goal…]
And on toward my day …
…next morning … from my journal …
Whoa! Yesterday was really hard on me. The quick fix I had hoped for did not materialize and I feel as if my entire day was a wasted effort.
And all my dreams last night were about (1) Disasters and picking up afterwards, and (2) Getting lost on a road in the middle of nowhere and dealing with it.
In the first dream, I had to pull out the carcasses of the dead and work with what was left. In the second dream, I had to find a way to care for these orphans without causing myself even more problems.
This week is impossible! Too much stuff on my list! And now I need to add in what someone forgot to tell me about as well, Aieee! This is all very stressful!
[ .. oh and here is an idea for some future classes ..]
Omigod, can [you] stop already? … sigh …I have enough ideas … really.
next ... run away child...
Posted in
Submitted by katrina on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 3:04pm.
I have been really busy with my business lately. Almost all of my time has been spent doing web design. I have paying clients and a ton of new design work on my plate. Almost half involves me learning how to do new stuff, which is exciting. But at the same time, I found myself stressed beyond all reason with the enormity of it all. I also had this nagging feeling that I was falling hopelessly behind in everything else.
And if that was not enough, I also kept beating myself up for being stressed out. Geez, maybe I would not be so stressed, if I wasn’t also stressing about how stressed out I felt.
My next few blog entries will explore my process for getting through this difficult period.
This first one follows weeks of waking up to a mental list of everything on my plate. Sometimes I woke up with a new algorithm or a new code fragment, but after a while the message was often just “… gotta go, gotta go, now, now, now ….” And throughout this entire period, I felt this deep regret at not living up to some past level of true efficiency.
... from my journal ...
Woke up thinking about coding again or at least that is what intruded immediately to my waking mind. But I somehow knew that I had not been dreaming of code, so I settled back to sleep after my bathroom run intentional walk. And slowly an image began to emerge.
I saw myself being pulled along by a dog on a leash. A dog hunh? I am being pulled along by a dog? Instantly, I heard my father’s voice, “Never let a dog drag you!” So I pulled hard on the leash. Instantly I was awake again … then I slowly began drifting off.
This time the image was of a car, an old car, an old ivory colored car but it looked brand new. It was long, spotless and gleaming. It even had fins and fancy grillwork. But something was not right about this car. The proportions seemed off. It did not seem to have room for the wheels or they were completely hidden.
The image is distorted. How would you change a flat tire for instance? It is like nostalgia, what parts that are remembered are off in many ways. Hmmm …
The nostalgic car is impractical and impossible to maintain. So whatever I am imagining of my old ways of handling things is not only distorted it is non-sustainable.
After my chiro visit, I sat with my journal in my favorite haunt and pondered the meaning of my morning images.
I remembered hearing myself arguing with myself the day before…
“Ivo has a business along with all his teaching and counseling.”
“But I am not Ivo. He is healthy and still he works really hard at keeping up with it all. Plus his store has staff and a kick ass manager. And he lives with all these incredibly talented and dedicated people who are also pulling long hours”
And.
“I like having real deadlines to work toward.”
“But not if it means nothing moves forward for me personally. And the reasons these deadlines are real are because it involves someone other than you. What does that say about your commitment to achieving your own personal goals, aspirations and dreams?”
Later that same day, my healer elder said that I needed to listen to my water self during this fiery period. Which is interesting because in my system of elemental classification, my water self is also my child. So in effect she was once again calling attention to my child self.
I decided to listen to what all the parts were saying:
Parent/Fire
“You gotta work hard and keep commitments to get ahead in this world. All this lollygagging is getting you nowhere. Get busy, time is money.”
Child/Water
“I am tired of all this work. I need more down time, more rest. Even my playtime is filled with, ‘Do this! Do that!’ I can never have time just for me.”
Adult/Air
“ I am out of balance. Yes, there is a lot on my plate but the way we handle this is by getting enough down time, rest, good food, and by focusing on home and hearth. And of course taking care of my physical self. This is not the time to walk away from Radical Self Care.”
Beloved/Shadow/Earth
“Naptime!”
So I decided to take an afternoon nap. I also spent the rest of the day relaxing and watching some of my favorite TV shows. I think I also made myself a chocolate sundae.
Next time, the morning after…
Posted in
Submitted by katrina on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 12:41pm.
I'm troubled, though, to see the same canards that were used against the ERA back in the day deployed in favour of Prop 8 out here in California. It suggests that those arguments still have traction, and could be used against the ERA all over again.
My own amendment fantasy is similar: I'd like to see a move for an amendment explicitly guaranteeing a right to privacy, creating a solid legal ground for Roe and countless other vulnerable legal decisions.
There's dancing in celebration of Obama's win in the streets of Austin! YES!!!!
No wonder I never get to see you! Sheesh.
Kick back, my dear, put your feet up and do nothing at all, yes??
And btw ... happy happy happy. I am so glad you were born. Now chill out OK??
Cool site.