It's the first Wednesday of the month, and that means it's time to convene another meeting of The Insecure Writer's Support Group. Our esteemed leader Alex J. Cavanaugh has assembled a great group of co-hosts for this month: Joylene Nowell Butler, Jemima Pett, Patricia Josephine, Louise - Fundy Blue, and Kim Lajevardi.
Be sure to check out the IWSG website for great writing tools and advice!
Today is a big day in my house. My oldest son is 13 today. I can't believe how fast the time has gone. He's almost my height, and it'll probably be mere months before he surpasses me. He likes to say that once he does, he doesn't have to listen to me anymore. Ha ha! We both know that isn't true.
It's a pivotal time in my home in a lot of ways. In a few days, it'll be one year since we purchased the home we're living in now. Due to various reasons, it felt like we'd be renting forever. Finally being able to own our home gave us a sense of pride. We did it. Our house isn't perfect (it's 114 years old, so it's bound to have its imperfections), but it's solid and spacious enough for our family. I love it.
My other son is about to finish 5th grade. That means he's starting middle school next school year. I have a daughter starting Kindergarten in the fall. And my youngest daughter is starting preschool at the same time. My husband is successful in his career. I've lost 35 pounds and remain committed to my fitness journey.
So many great things. Yet, when it comes to my writing, my confidence is low. One issue is that I have a lot of demands on my time. I need to keep up with exercise and housework. I cook daily. Someone always needs help with their homework. These are all important things, and it's easy to use them as excuses.
One thing I've had to learn is that it's important to take care of myself. It's so easy to put myself on the back burner when so many others need me. My health started to suffer because of that. Now I'm trying to do better. But health isn't just about physical health. It's also about mental health. It's about doing the things for yourself that bring you joy. One of the things that brings me joy is writing, but I haven't devoted enough time to my writing lately. I've decided to carve out time to write and submit a couple of short stories in the next month or two. While I may not have a ton of free time, surely I can make enough time to accomplish this small goal.
Remember to take care of yourselves. What small things bring you joy?
I'm glad you're going to try to carve more time out for your writing. You can accomplish a lot even if you just squeeze 30 minutes of it into your day.
ReplyDeleteBut everything else you're doing for your family is important too. Your time with your kids will go fast, and you don't want to lose out on your time with them. My daughter's 25 now and doing great. But I miss those years when she was a kid, and we lived together.
Well said!
ReplyDeleteThat's great the kids are growing up and you're staying healthy and you guys have so much room now.
35 pounds is great! Don't fall back into bad eating and exercise habits and it will stay off.
ReplyDeleteSometimes we have to balance a lot of family life first.
Hi, LG! You have so much on your plate! I admire your determination to carve out some writing time for yourself. It's so easy to let the pressure of priorities in other areas of your life to crowd out time for you to do the things that bring you joy. I'm someone who sacrificed taking care of myself to take care of other things. Not good! So I'm focusing on setting boundaries which has always been hard for me. It's getting better. Please continue to take care of you!
ReplyDeleteCongrats on your son's birthday; 13 is a milestone in many cultures.
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree with you: despite all the demands our loved ones put on our time, we need to carve a little bit for ourselves. Be it writing or music or sport, we need to take care of ourselves too and not dissolve into a single role of a family caretaker.
Short stories are wonderful. Go for it.