Other Musings

Results

There’s an expression: “Do the same things; get the same results”

I was thinking about this in the pool today. It may be true on some levels in a negative regard (i.e. sometimes things don’t change unless you actively change them), but a lot of the time, the complete opposite is true.

When I learned how to swim laps, I did essentially the same things repeatedly. My muscles and lungs became stronger and I became faster and I improved. I repeated the same basic movements but had a different result over time because my capacity increased through repetition.

Similarly, in piano, the pianist masters a piece of music through repetitive practise. That doesn’t mean that nothing changes. Technique may need to change. But skill increases by doing the same useful thing, not by doing something completely different.

And when I built my business, I employed a few different methods of advertising and what not, and I repeated them and my results increased. So the result was not the same. The result effectively improved.

Now I am trying to sell myself as a writer and I am asking myself the question: do I need to change my methods to increase results, or do I simply continue what I am doing and expect the results to multiply over time as they have in so many other areas of my life?

What do you think?

 

Time: Spent VS Wasted

Sometimes I have to remind myself that I am not wasting time, I am spending time.

Being a writer means having to do at least some amount of research: reading, googling, discussing, learning. This can take up a considerable amount of time and sometimes feels like it is leading nowhere or there is nothing to show for the hours spent with my head in a book; eyes roaming a computer screen; or ears engaging in an outpouring of verbal information.

Even when I don’t find what I’m looking for easily and minutes creep into hours and hours creep into “coffee/chocolate/lunch break,” OR even if I scrap the idea all together and move on to another topic: time spent being a writer – being who and what I am and love – is always time well spent!