This is something I wanted to share today
I always tell my kids and other people that sometimes you have to change plans. Sometimes you have to adjust and recalibrate. You shouldn’t stress when you do. In some ways, I am a living example of that mantra.
Vision problems made me adjust my original career goal. And then life interfered in various ways, changing my path again. Then I had another career goal, and then I got pregnant and adjusted again. And repeat. And repeat some more. Most of my life has not proceeded at all in the way it was planned.
Now my disabled, widowed self had a goal to launch the premier part of my website at the end of November. Over the last couple of days I decided that date needs to change. I just have to adjust a few weeks, but still it is aggravating because I hate changing my plans.
A whole bunch of things out of my control threw off my scheduling plans, and I’m just not quite ready. I need a few more weeks, but that runs the calendar up against Christmas and I don’t want promotion for my premium site to be lost in Christmas hubbub, so now I have to decide if it’s smarter to wait for New Year’s.
Ironically, there is nobody depending on whatever decision I make. It is entirely up to me, so there should really be no pressure. The pressure is entirely self-imposed. From In Here matters to me. It’s important to me.
A developing community of people scattered across the country have connected with me for different reasons, and in different ways. The next stage of my website is going to encourage that even more, with the goal being to create and nurture community between other people with common interests.
Are my efforts going to change the world? Certainly not – I don’t have grandiose imaginings. But for the people who I can make smile, think, nod, cry, laugh, encourage, support, sympathize with, empathize with … it’s important and it matters.
The work that goes into it all
From In Here is on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook. This week I just launched a Facebook community page. I have a wonderful proofreader who reviews my writings for typos and such. Also on my team is a terrific young man who posts for me some of the content I create onto a couple of platforms, and to whom I have assigned certain new responsibilities for the premium site. The team at the company that handles my website design and maintenance is patient and talented and work hard to make my vision come to life on the screen. A team at another company handles Facebook promotions, gathering and maintenance of subscriber lists, and conducting my random drawings so that they are truly random.
These people handle technical issues and execution while I am responsible for generating content and interacting with people who email me or message me or send comments to me. I also read an average of 5 to 6 books a week and review many of them, network, conduct interviews, and do research.
It’s just too much for me to physically have the time to do absolutely everything myself while juggling grad school at Georgetown and my efforts for other commitments … oh, and let’s not forget the incredible importance of the 3 Kids that I love and for whom I am completely responsible. I am not exaggerating when I say that I typically work 14 -16 hours a day 7 days a week on things related to From In Here. I suppose the one “advantage” of being a disabled widow is that I can really use my time as I see fit.
Reminding myself that adjusting a plan is OK
For all that autonomy of choice, as I type this I actually feel guilty because I pushed back my own launch date for my own premium site, and it’s not even pushing back the date that far. A matter of weeks.
Ironically, I am very aware that I frequently tell my own children that is perfectly fine to change plans sometimes, and that doing so is often a good thing. It is also a perspective I share with other people, and believe wholeheartedly. So, you understand why I’m so baffled about the disappointment I feel that I didn’t meet my self-imposed target date for launching the premium site.
My entire life has been changed radically by the tragic death of my husband, and by unfair progression of a disease that has stolen so much of my world. With a broken heart and a body that doesn’t want to function as it should, I still survive. You would think that adjusting a date would be no big deal. But it still agitates me.
We’re all entitled to our feelings. Don’t think that your problems or worries don’t matter because there are people who have bigger ones. The date change is ‘small stuff,’ and as the saying goes, “Don’t sweat the small stuff.” I’ll keep reminding myself of that, and I hope you do too in your life.