One Perfect Step. ROCP. What is Behind My Obsession with Time? St(r)uck.

 I'm going to try and keep this short, but I just had a poignant thought.

After going through a deep design process for clarity around all my time stuff (wanting to use it better, more efficiently, etc.) I got down to the fundamental point that I don't care about time itself, but I care about it because I want to live a life without regrets. I want to live a life that feels deeply meaningful. (As do we all, or just about all, I would think). Therefor, I don't want to waste time. Time waste is life waste, as my Teacher says.

But that's not even the poignant thought, deep though it is. Having come to this clarity, it then followed that the most essential missing thing was having a clear vision of what a meaningful life looked like (and felt like) for me. I had, several months ago. I guess almost a year ago at this point, started a process with Jon Young (a very skillful and inspiring student/mentee of Tom Brown Jr., among other teachers he learned from) that he called "Renewal of Creative Path" (herafter ROCP). That was in essence skillfully attempting to uncover the answer to that question, along the lines of "what really lights you up?" but with many more elements and angles to it for depth and completeness.

I spent a lot of time on it, because it seemed so essential and important to me. And then, I ran out of time, and never finished it, ergo never got to actually use it.

Here I am, again reminded that the key missing piece right now, is that output from ROCP, and I'm st(r)uck by how my desire to "do it right/well" made the process take so long, that I never ended up finishing and being able to use it at all. A kindergarten level of skill and attention span would have been better than that, if it had at least produced some usable product at the end.

So, I'm rededicated to finishing it up, in as haphazard a way as necessary, to actually get it done and usable.

But also, it makes me reflect and wonder how many elements of my life have a shadow of that pattern in it: seeking perfection, and thus ending up with nothing, rather than accepting mediocrity, as the price for actual forward momentum. I need to remind myself, that I don't need to be perfect. Especially right away. Improvement can happen, as long as I'm moving forward, but if I'm paralyzed in place, waiting for that one perfect first step to reveal itself, nothing happens.

See my shpiels on 50 pounds of pottery for another perspective on this, and the importance of balance and common sense, along with Aristotle's vices of excess and deficiency, for cautions on taking this advice too far and thus making it harmful rather than helpful. (you don't want zero deliberation and planning before acting, you just want the right amount.)