It’s November 11, and time for another monthly update on my year’s goals, my so-called “Groundhog Day Resolutions”.

Last month I had set a few tangible goals that, surprisingly, actually have come to pass. I’ve started getting moving on some new products to put on Amazon, got my snow tires, made a tiny bit of progress on my

1401.

Details after the jump.

What Got Done Last Month

Rather than exhaustively review my email and trello board (which I didn’t even maintain this past month with all the traveling), I decided to try something new: make a photo montage.

I made this by looking at all the photos I had taken from October 11 through November 10, and used a program called Adobe Lightroom to make a collage (or “contact sheet”, as it’s actually called) the captured the highlights:

• Post-business California visit with friends
• House concert at my friend Sid’s studio with musician Amy Petty
• A trip to Cambridge, Massachusetts early in the morning to meet a grad school friend
• The beginning of Autumn
• A local arts festival, ArtWalk Nashua, that I’ve been helping with
• New laptop bag, to replace an old laptop bag that wore out.
• Drawing spaceships
• Moving a couch back into the living room, which was promptly colonized by the cats
• Decluttering
• Some new acquisitions, a nice joystick/throttle unit for playing games, and an old Apple //e
• Making things for the November Challenge and starting to do more cooking.

What this doesn’t capture are some of the ongoing thoughts that have been the theme of the past 30-some days:

• Am I doing anything of value? – This was a surprise thought, as I’m generally content to plug away at my plans, brought on by an email from an agitated long-time (now former) reader responding to the last review. By that person’s reckoning, I’m a colossal waste of time and space because I’m not being customer focused or appreciative enough. This is possibly true, as I have recognized that I can’t be all things to all people, and although I was sad to have disappointed someone, I also know it is creative death to worry about doing things “wrong”. So in a way it is an affirming challenge, but it’s interesting just how just one ding can sour one’s attitude toward a personal endeavor for a long time afterwards. Life goes on!
• How can I improve my attitude toward difficult work? – This is an ongoing challenge. This month I have been thinking a lot about how my tendency to not ask for help may by limiting my “human experience” by not forming connections. To be part of a circle of receiving and giving is, I have suddenly realized, is to be embedded in humanity in a healthy way.
• Worrying about time and uncertainty is a waste of energy – I’ve also been aware that some of the challenges I’m facing, particularly when trying to motivate myself to do something that I don’t find particularly enjoyable in the face of guaranteed uncertainty, have much more power over me than I would like to admit. I’ve been thinking of a form to help deal with it in a therapeutic way, which I’ll probably work on sometime this week.

Other than that, I’ve been primarily focused on client work and the November Challenge. I really like doing the challenge, thinking less and reporting more, not caring too much about anything other than making SOMETHING new every day. It’s a little too early to tell what I’ll ultimately take away from this, but I think I might be learning to relax a bit more about it. I used to think a lot about “identity and my work”; this has shifted more toward “the work” as something I just do without the need to justify it.

Next Month

There’s just one more month of Groundhog Day Review, which ends on December 12 and then breaks for two months for the oncoming Holiday Madness. My to-do list is pretty short:

• Major Project deliverable in January
• Making Stuff for November Challenge (underway)
• Health Stuff (quite a lot of this)
• Family Holiday Stuff
• Shipping new Amazon Products (underway)

Perhaps for Christmas, my model of work/life balance will be further refined? That is where it seems to be going. In particular, the themes of “learning to let go of my worries” and “being part of a cycle of giving and receiving” seem to be what I have been missing. We shall see!