Is it Saturday again, so soon? How quickly the days seem to fly, yet how long it can seem if you are in the middle of doing something you don’t want to do, like organize your files. When I’m writing music, I often feel like time is suspended. I’ll look at the clock at 8:30 and say, ‘I have time before I got to bed to work on this’ and I will get so focused on what I am doing that when I look at the clock again, and see that it’s after 11, I am shocked.
I think it’s got to be good for us to be that engrossed in our creative endeavors. Nothings worse than watching the clock wishing recess would come. While I think it’s good to organize time into things like hours and days, I also think we spend too much time worrying about time, and we need to let that go. But I’m not sure how we can do that in such a busy life as most people have.
I try to have at least one, preferably two, mornings a week without an alarm being set… so I can just wake up when my body is ready to wake up. I also try to have one or two mornings a week with no urgent things to be done right away. Most particularly, I try to have one day a week that is just for me, where I book nothing but me-time. Me time to sleep in, to have coffee in bed with the newspaper, to walk, to read, to be.
I’ve also fallen into a kind of organization of time that I guess you could call time management. I update my schedule and email my students and answer emails from prospective students on Friday or Saturday. I also write weekly emails to friends and family on Friday or Saturday. Saturday or Sunday I write and post my blogs. In the mornings, when I get up, I do yesterday’s dishes. Sunday nights, when the weekend composing or writing is over, I back-up my data. If I can, I try to pay all my bills and rent at one time, at the beginning of the month. I try to shop once a week and get everything major I need for the week’s meals and supplies.
Every night, I ask myself to write at least a page of script before I go to bed. That’s this month’s goal. If it was songwriting, then I’d ask myself to write a verse or a chorus, or try to finish something I started. None of this is a hard and fast rule, it’s a routine I favor that helps me deal with the stress of having a million things to do, and sometimes looking at the calendar and feeling overwhelmed.
The biggest thing I need to work on is sleep. I’ll just get myself organized and with it and something will happen – like a late night out at a show – and suddenly my sleep pattern is thrown off and I find myself going to bed later and later and later. So I have to get into a routine of a rather firm bedtime so that I get sufficient sleep. Lack of sleep isn’t good for creativity, or health, or living stress free.
Sleep, breathe... repeat :)
I think it’s got to be good for us to be that engrossed in our creative endeavors. Nothings worse than watching the clock wishing recess would come. While I think it’s good to organize time into things like hours and days, I also think we spend too much time worrying about time, and we need to let that go. But I’m not sure how we can do that in such a busy life as most people have.
I try to have at least one, preferably two, mornings a week without an alarm being set… so I can just wake up when my body is ready to wake up. I also try to have one or two mornings a week with no urgent things to be done right away. Most particularly, I try to have one day a week that is just for me, where I book nothing but me-time. Me time to sleep in, to have coffee in bed with the newspaper, to walk, to read, to be.
I’ve also fallen into a kind of organization of time that I guess you could call time management. I update my schedule and email my students and answer emails from prospective students on Friday or Saturday. I also write weekly emails to friends and family on Friday or Saturday. Saturday or Sunday I write and post my blogs. In the mornings, when I get up, I do yesterday’s dishes. Sunday nights, when the weekend composing or writing is over, I back-up my data. If I can, I try to pay all my bills and rent at one time, at the beginning of the month. I try to shop once a week and get everything major I need for the week’s meals and supplies.
Every night, I ask myself to write at least a page of script before I go to bed. That’s this month’s goal. If it was songwriting, then I’d ask myself to write a verse or a chorus, or try to finish something I started. None of this is a hard and fast rule, it’s a routine I favor that helps me deal with the stress of having a million things to do, and sometimes looking at the calendar and feeling overwhelmed.
The biggest thing I need to work on is sleep. I’ll just get myself organized and with it and something will happen – like a late night out at a show – and suddenly my sleep pattern is thrown off and I find myself going to bed later and later and later. So I have to get into a routine of a rather firm bedtime so that I get sufficient sleep. Lack of sleep isn’t good for creativity, or health, or living stress free.
Sleep, breathe... repeat :)
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3 comments:
I have to say, I really like that idea of having mornings with no alarm being set. I have become such a "junkie" for getting up and really make use of my days, that I have started to set the time even for weekends.
In a way, I think, that even when you have gotten enough sleep, still that "knowing" of that you have set an alarm, well, I think it puts a bit of stress on you. Maybe?
Sleep well,
http://finding-silhouette.blogspot.com
Geez, good to know that I'm not the only one who is trying to manage the sleeping problem, specially a fellow songwriter.
And this whole thing of "time management" really sucks.
Sometimes I think that even if we won the lottery we would still be dealing with time management management...
I hate when inspiration strikes at 01:00am and I have to be up at 06:30am...
Aiya! Mae govannen, quel kaima... (Oh! Well met, and sleep well...)
There is a name, I think, for that phenomenon where you lose time when totally absorbed in what you love. It happens on stage too.
I would love to try an experiment to do nothing but write songs for two weeks straight. Wonder what that would be like? Nothing but music. Eat and sleep some, occasional walks. Shower once or twice a week.
But in the Real World we do our best with those clocks ticking.
Remembering to smile is a biggie that helps me relax.
I'd like to see the Time-Change abolished, that always messes me up for weeks, months even.
Got some good lyric work done on "Bring On The Angels" today.
Happy Jannie
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