If I experience X, I will do Y.

lizshine74by lizshine74

In A Room Of Your Own, Goals, On writing, Yoga.

If I experience X, I will do Y.

I’ve got a stretch of days with extra solitude. Chris is in New York geeking out over baseball and making memories with his siblings. Of course, I’ve turned it into a stay home writing retreat. After all, I am trying to meet a deadline, it’s summer, and this summer in particular creativity is my theme, my experiment, and the garden I’m growing this year. 

I woke up this morning and poured about an hour of my time down the digital drain. But then I kicked myself in the ass and set a timer. Setting a timer to focus on just one thing for a set amount of time works for me. It’s a damn miracle, to be honest. It seems to kick invoke the little kid in me who showed up with everything she had when the teacher set the timer for a page of math equations or paragraphs to read. Oh, hell yes. Do you doubt me? Set that timer and watch me go. 

Once I set the timer then I was in it. I stayed in it until it was time for yoga class, though it did get hard a few times when my mind landed on that old track that never has anything nice to say and wastes all her juice worrying about what other people will think.

Our yoga teacher invited us to “create space for ourselves” and described what setting a boundary looks like: “If I experience X, I will do Y”. Always need that reminder. For reals. You have to practice that shit all the time, and if you don’t use it, you lose it. Getting good at setting boundaries is not only good for you. It’s good for the people you take care of in your life too. That’s one thing I try to remember when I need to set a difficult boundary. Boundaries are an act of love and service to others. They give others permission to do the same. They make space for other people to do the work, solve problems, and take action. 

I was so grateful for this nugget offered mid-retreat today. When doubts about the worthiness of my story come up, I will keep writing. If I worry about the structure, I will keep writing. If I fall into contemplation of the publishing industry as it is, I will keep writing. For today, I will keep writing like I’ve got something to prove that is even more important than proving that I’ve mastered math facts. 

More retreat time tomorrow and the next day, with the goal of finishing a new draft of a novel I’ve been working on off and on for almost a decade. This summer is about tying up loose ends so that I can start a fresh book in the fall. Whatever it is you are working on, I am here for you. Let’s make time.

Interested in hiring me as a coach to get you boosted with your writing goals?  Find free resources and information here.

Some past posts to keep you making time: 

Adjust your pace accordingly.

It’s about the routine and how you shake up the routine

There are things you will have to give up

See it to achieve it

Washing the dishes

Write slowly

A celebration of the pause

Monday, a run through the driving rain

Zen accident

Get out of your comfort zone

lizshine74

lizshine74

Liz Shine teaches high school English, writes, edits, and coaches other writers from her home in Olympia, WA. When she begins to feel overwhelmed by it all, she simply looks up at Mount Rainier in the distance and gets back to work. If that fails, she heads to the ocean. She is a founding editor at Red Dress Press. Her Substack Make Time is her gift to writers, like her, trying to magic time in this crazy, busy world. All of those posts are cross-posted on the blog here. You can see more of her writing at lizshine.com and find her on Instagram {@lizshine.writer} cooking, traveling, and in other ways seeking moments of awe. She has been an active participant in communities of writers since the early 1990s. She’s learned that two things feel truly purpose-driven in life: writing and coaching other writers. In the in between (because one cannot be driving for a purpose every moment), she enjoys looking for wonder and connection. She is a lifelong yoga student, an enthusiastic walker along streets and trails, and an amateur gardener and vegetarian cook. She lives in Olympia, WA in the USA. She believes in the power of practice and has been practicing writing since some time in the early 90s when she became an adult in the rain-soaked city of Aberdeen. Writing began with journaling, as a way to understand a confusing, sometimes violent coming-of-age. She writes mostly fiction, some nonfiction, and poetry, and holds an MFA from Pacific Lutheran University’s Rainier Writers Workshop. She has published in Shark Reef, Dual Coast, and Blue Crow Magazine. She is a founding editor at Red Dress Press.