My busy, hectic, messy life

I've had a Filofax day planner for ages, but this year, upon discovering that I couldn't buy the refill pages I wanted, I went and purchased a passion planner. And I love it!

It has a monthly section so you can have a high-level view of your month, as well as a week-on-a-page. It also has a whole section for planning out how you're going to achieve your goals for the year, monthly check-ins so you can reflect on what you've accomplished so far, and extra sheets for making notes, doodling, or whatever you need them for. And there's a pocket in the back for holding lose papers (or in my case stickers!). 

I was curious as to how other people were using their passion planner, so I looked at pictures on their website, Instagram, Facebook, and twitter. And the vast majority of the pictures I found appeared to be more marketing-related--perfect handwriting, lots of happy things, clear tasks for each day...not the crowded, scribbled mess that my weeks become (which is understandable for advertising purposes--there are times I look at my week and think hell, no!). And then I found Xandra, and I discovered she was using a passion planner, too! She introduced me to the idea of highlighting completed tasks instead of crossing them off, which makes my passion planner look so much prettier!

But still, I thought, does anyone out there who uses a passion planner have a real job, and a crazy life? There were so many pictures of people who seemed to only have four things to do a day. And I wanted to shout IF YOU ONLY HAVE FOUR THINGS TO DO A DAY, YOU DON'T NEED A PASSION PLANNER. YOU JUST NEED TO GET UP!

I'm a financial analyst for a software company (one you've actually heard of). I'm training to run a marathon. I'm writing a novel. I have various other projects I'm working on, I'm in a bookclub, and oh, yeah, I also want to spend time with my husband, my family, and my friends. I have a very full life, and my passion planner helps me keep it organized. 

So I thought I'd publish some photos of what my passion planner looks like, in case there was anyone else out there who wondered how people who have multiple goals manage their schedule.

This is what this week looks like. Note: this does not even contain all of the meetings, etc. I have for work. This is just my life outside of work.

This is what next week looks like!

This is the following week--not busy...YET!

This is my monthly view of March. 

These are the chocolate chocolate chip cookies I made today. Because I'm an over-achiever like that!

So much to do, so little time

As I was preparing to write this post, I was actually thinking, is this worthwhile, or should I not post about this and instead move on to something else? But then I remembered that I actually liked blogging, and that in the time I was spending thinking about doing it, I could just write the damn post. You're welcome.

As you many recall (or not, since I'm an inconsistent blogger), I am working on a year of transformation. One thing I've been working on is learning to see myself accurately. This is important to me for many reasons, but one of them is that I'd like to grow my career. I'm very smart. This is not the problem. But I know I don't have the interpersonal skills I need to get where I want to go. Because frankly, I don't like people. What I'm learning, however, is that I don't have to like them to get along with them.

Anyway, because of all of this, I've been reading a lot about how the brain works, especially as it relates to emotional intelligence. Which is one of the things I could be doing now if I weren't writing this.

I recently asked a friend how a would-be-writer (this is how I would classify both of us. We've both written books. We don't have agents. We know we can write. This whole rejection letter thing is just part of the process)...anyway, I asked this friend how would-be-writers managed to have day jobs (because: bills! standards of living!), find time to write, read about the art of writing, read books in their genre, query agents, and do functional things like exercise, laundry, and grocery shopping.

Her response was: poorly. Then she noted that this may be why writers are over-weight alcoholics. (Before you get all worked up over this accusation, I seriously doubt writers, as a population, are more overweight and alcoholicy than non-writers, it's just that working in more-or-less isolation makes you forget that no one else is particularly good at adulting, either.)

I'd like to get back to the "poorly" bit, though, because everyone I talk to, specifically all working women I know, feel like they have too much going on and/or they are dissatisfied in some aspect (or aspects) of their life. So much, in fact, that they don't think they're doing anything well. Obviously we're all doing stuff "good enough." Our bills are paid. Our families eat. We have jobs and dental insurance.

Here is a list of stuff, in no particular order, that I'm not doing as well as I'd like to:

• Eating food that's actually good for me
• Exercising enough to meet my goals
• Sleeping enough to not be a bitch
• Whatever my job is (I just changed roles, so I'm sort of off the radar as work is transitioned, which is nice, but also makes me feel like I'm not contributing enough)
• Blogging enough to have a following (why do I need a following? As a social media platform for that book I haven't published yet? I don't even know)
• Editing my book into something that can be published
• Outlining my new book so editing it will be easier than this one (ha ha ha!)

I know. My mother is going to take a look at this list and tell me to cross half of it off as unnecessary. Honestly, this is too many things to focus on. So what I'm actually working on is getting enough sleep. 

I've been doing a lot of reading about sleep (sleep, the brain, and yet my next book is about zombies. I'm not really helping myself here at all). Everything I read says, in a nutshell, that sleep is THE THING that will make everything else better/easier/more efficient/prettier/more baconier/and in general more awesome. Sleep helps curb food cravings. Sleep helps your tummy know when it's full. Sleep makes exercising easier. Sleep makes thinking (presumably part of my job) easier. I'm sure sleep will help me focus enough that this blog isn't a rambly hot mess, sleep will make me a smarter writer. And sleep will make me less bitchy. If only I had a nap desk!

If you can't articulate a problem, does it exist?

What do you call it when you have educated intuition? I'm actually not even sure if that is a term, but it should be, or at least there should be a term for it. What I'm talking about is not the sixth-sense sort of intuition, but more the sort of intuition you have about something you're familiar with.

For instance, I know a woman who bakes a lot of bread, and she can look at the dough and say "Not enough yeast" or "It's too sticky" or even "I can't make bread today--it won't rise in this weather."

So far, she's never been wrong with these assessments, but I can't see what she's talking about. Bread-making is not my skill-set. (I am very good at baking, but bread-making is a whole other branch of culinary chemistry.)

In general, this educated intuition is good--it's why I can do a high-level review of files and find the error. It's how cooks know to add a little more of one seasoning and not another. It's how we make a lot of day-to-day decisions that we may not even realize we're making.

But this educated intuition can be frustrating, too, when either you don't have it, or you can't access it fast enough.

I was recently at a writing conference where possible titles were being suggested for an as-yet unpublished work, and I knew that the facilitator was listening for a certain rhythm, or cadence, or structure as he rejected titles or put them on the mental "maybe" list. But I am not a professional writer (yet) and I don't have years of experience (or any at all) in the publishing industry. I couldn't hear the difference between suggestions like "The Stone of God" and "God's Stone." (Which one would you be more likely to buy based on title alone?) (Also, if you google image these two phrases you get some similar, but mostly different results. Crazy, right?)

This is frustrating because as a would-be author, I want to market my writing in the best possible way. I want a title that works for the book, catches publishers' and readers' eyes, and is easy to promote. But I have no idea what this sounds like.

Similarly, I work with a woman who is very familiar with her field (we call her a SME--subject matter expert. Oh corporate America and your acronyms!), but when we're in meetings lead by strong personalities, she sometimes pauses before she speaks and by the time she decides what to say, the meeting has moved on to a new discussion point. When I asked her about this, she told me that sometimes she hears an idea, and it clicks around in her brain for a moment or two as she processes it. So she's nearly always a beat behind.

This is unfortunate in two ways: when her educational intuition says "that's won't work" but she can't pinpoint why, people move ahead with plans that have already been tried, or don't have enough data to be useful, or have some other limitation, when a more useful solution could be found if the matter were discussed a little longer. Secondly, when she hears something that sounds workable she doesn't speak up, so the rest of the room doesn't know that they're on the right path.

So obviously, in the first example, experience is a huge help, but it's also fairly easy to google book titles in your genre, or *even crazier* go to a book store and look at what sells (fantasy, for example, has a lot of titles where the structure is The [object] of [some location, person, etc.] as in The Sword in the Stone, while historical fiction uses a [Main character's name]:[His/her unique identifier] model, such as Elizabeth of York: A Tudor Queen and her World.

But what do you do when you can't access the data quickly? Should you interrupt the meeting and say, "I think you're going to find some problems with that suggestion, but I'll have to get back to you on them"? That sounds pretty lame. And you don't want to schedule another meeting to resolve something you thought was already resolved but turned out it wasn't, although this sort of thing happens all the time.

The problem, it turns out, is in the ability to articulate the problem.

Getting rid of stuff that's not working

As part of my Transform campaign, I'm working on making some changes in my life. But this process is largely trial and error. After reading Gretchen Rubin's book about habits, Better Than Before, I learned that the reward system largely does not work (e.g. If I lose 10 pounds, I can buy myself those cute shoes). Nonetheless, I still harbor the idea that if I do all of this hard work, I should get some sort of treat. I really don't know why this is.

I did learn that I am motivated by external sources, not internal (this was a bit of a surprise to me, too!). This doesn't necessarily mean other people--I love watching the little arrow progress around the treadmill's track signaling that I'm closer to completing another lap. But, this is also why I'm doing a sugar-detox diet with friends. Left to my own devices, I think I'd only be eating scrambled eggs and veggies. And I'd be doing a lot of crying. And I'd probably give up after about 5 days.

Part of this Transform journey is figuring out what works, but another part is figuring out what doesn't work. As it turns out, I really don't like exercising in the morning. When I lived in Oregon, I could manage it because I would work out with friends who lived in the same apartment complex, and we would use the complex's gym. Convenience, it turns out, is super-important to me. I am more likely to exercise at work, even if they don't have all of the equipment I'd like to be using, than I am to drive to my local gym. Mostly because I'm already at work.

I'm more functional when I have time to get up slowly. This morning I got out of bed at 6:40 am and left for work at 8:40 am. I'm pretty sure most people do not spend two hours getting ready to go to work, but I like to sit at the kitchen table and read while I eat breakfast, and whenever I don't do this, I feel sort of off-rhythm all day. Sometimes I do productive things before work, like pay bills, but most of the time I just read.

I've discovered that meditation does not work for me, at least not right now. It simply became another thing for me to do, and while I was meditating, I really, really struggled to turn off the "monkey mind." In theory, that's sort of the point of meditation--to be able to turn off the monkey mind, but I actually found my pulse speeding up while I meditated instead of doing whatever it was I needed to do IMMEDIATELY AFTER I FINISH MEDITATING. So I decided to stop trying to meditate. I might try again in the future, but right now, it is not a good fit.

As it turns out, this Transform project is also a project of self-discovery!

Career Change: It is hard

Another post, that, for one reason or another, I stored away as a draft.

About six years ago, I graduated from a private university with an MBA in Finance. That I have not used. You see, prior to that I had been an accountant. Being an accountant is very boring, but I liked working with numbers, so I thought finance was a natural transition.

As it turns out, it is much, much harder to move from the world of accounting to the world of finance than really makes any sense at all.

So, I started reaching out to people in finance at my company. They offered the normal suggestions--networking, informational interviews, and taking on project work to gain experience. I've done all of those things. Okay, technically, I have not taken on project work--I've offered my time to a variety of groups, but no one has accepted.

I joined the women's network at my company, the Lean In-style circles offered by my company, and I've participated in a mentor program, all to try to gain exposure to different people, different career options, different options for how I should proceed.

Then, I reached out to someone at my company who has successfully made the transition from accounting to finance. And he had the same advice--namely, informational interviews, project work, and the like. All of the same stuff that hasn't been working for me. He did, however, have some ideas as to what "additional experience" I would need, as well as some of the non-technical barriers to entry. It was actually the most useful conversation I've had on the topic.

While I would like to stay at the company where I'm currently working, I've realized that staying might not take my career in the direction I want to go. I've set up a meeting with a recruiter to see what sort of outside next steps I can take, or what other career options there are for me.

A few weeks ago, I googled how to leave a career in accounting, but most of the advise was directed at people who wanted to leave public accounting--and nearly all of it focused on getting a job in the private sector.

In a conversation with a self-employed friend, she pointed out that women are more likely to say things like "I was very lucky..." and men are more likely to say "I did this..." when talking about how they shaped their career. My company really pushes employees to "own their careers" but it's a little bit of a trap. I've discovered that what they really mean, but don't say, is that they want employees to own their careers within the parameters management prefers.

Unfortunately, I think luck plays a very big part in successful career change. A lot of it seems to be being in the right place at the right time with the right people. I'm still trying to figure out how to make my own luck, but I've stopped working so hard at doing all of the things I'm "supposed" to do--it was too much effort with little payback.

I do have some feelers out there for different prospects, and I've been thinking way more outside the box about what I want to do. I'm trying to make some big changes in my life, which is a little scary, but I also know that I'm more scared of staying put.

Transform

A while ago, probably around December or January, back when everyone was thinking about New Year's resolutions, I read something that resonated with me: a suggestion to pick a one-word theme for the year. Rather than a list of things to do (or not do), pick a theme you wanted to permeate your year. For reasons I still can't articulate, I LOVED this idea, but I couldn't think up a word at the time.

No big deal, I figured. I don't really buy into the idea that you can only make changes to your life at the beginning of the year, and I knew from experience that keeping resolutions is really, really hard. Then, over Mother's Day weekend it hit me: Transform. That was the theme I wanted for my year. So what if my year now ran from Mother's Day to Mother's Day in stead of New Year's Day to December 31? I realized that all of the changes I wanted to make had to do with transforming my life. And the word, transform, sounds so positive, so rejuvenating.

I started my transformation in the most obvious place: sleeping on my husband's side of the bed.

Captain America said, "What are you doing?"
"Transforming my life," I replied.
"Why are you doing it on my side of the bed?" he asked.
"If you recall, this side of the bed USED to be my side" I told him.
"If I recall," he retorted, "you're annoying."

A few weeks ago, I read an article on Facebook (that arena for all things important and cat-video related) about a capsule wardrobe. This was back before I came up with my Word of the Year, but still the idea resonated with me as something I wanted. The idea is that if you put together a wardrobe of your favorite pieces, that all mix-and-match, you'll have a nearly infinite number of outfit combinations without shopping or having an over-packed closet. (Okay, okay, I know, a mathematically finite number, but NOT THE POINT!)

I HATE shopping, and dressing like a grown-up is not my forte, despite my completely Corporate America job as an accountant at a software company. But, I figured, if I don't have to think about what I'm going to wear, getting dressed will be so much easier! Captain America was concerned I'd get tired of wearing the same things over and over (despite the fact that I'm perfectly content to wear my Harry Potter pajamas every day of the week). (I have matching pants. And I bought them at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter when Captain America took me as an anniversary present. He really does love me!)

Captain America was also concerned about what we'd do with all of my other clothes, but I pointed out to him what the blog pointed out to me: most women own a ton of stuff that doesn't quite fit properly, and therefore they rarely or never wear it. I could just get rid of all of this stuff. The rest I put in those giant vacuum bags and stored under my bed. Because in a few months, I'll probably want to update my capsule wardrobe for fall.

I also realized that while I thought I didn't like wearing dresses or skirts, what I didn't like was shaving my legs. I already knew that I didn't like shaving my legs, but I didn't associate it with my perceived dislike of dresses until on a whim in Target I bought a pair of tights. As a kid, I LOVED tights. As it turns out, I still love tights.

So here I am in one of my capsule closet outfits. I didn't take this picture until the end of the day because I thought it was a little monochromatic, but I received so many compliments at work. One woman even told me I looked like a model! (To be fair, taking selfies is not my forte, either, and so you can't tell, but I'm wearing 4-inch heels. I'm pretty sure that this is what inspired the "model" comment.)