accepting that I can’t do everything

I stumbled on The Writer Librarian’s blog a couple of days ago (hurray for Twitter!) and read a fantastic post that she published on trying to have it all and accepting that sometimes you can’t, but you can appreciate what you can have. It made me stop and reflect because I have been trying to have too much. Between work, working out, writing, and juggling “me” time and “Bchan” time, I’m drawing myself far too thin.

I’ve been working on a writing project for far too long but it’s almost at a stage where I can call it a complete first draft. It needs a lot of polishing, but it’s something I told myself I would stick at until I was satisfied. I also gave myself a deadline–I want to finish before NaNoWriMo so I can actually take part this year (as I rambled on about a few posts ago). I’m not sure this is going to happen quite the way I want it to, but that’s something I have to accept. I’ll do what I can, when I can, and plod along until it’s finished. And I’ll give NaNoWriMo a shot, even if I don’t reach the full word count.

Unfortunately, this goal means giving up some things. Realizing I barely have time to spare (writing this post meant sacrificing reading time), I resolved to un-enroll from a programming course on Coursera. There’s no way I can dedicate an extra 6-8 hours a week on learning a skill that will be fun and challenging, but will just fade into memory when the course ends. Until I decide to go for a full tech-related position, there’s only so much I can do to gain new skills and keep them active. I’ll wait ’til January and take the philosophy course I signed up for instead. It’s the sort of “useless” knowledge that’ll help me with all those philosophy questions freshmen tend to ask.

Tomorrow, I will workout. And I will attend a Hell’s Kitchen finale party (with trifle in tow). Tuesday will be writing day.