I think venting yesterday helped me feel a bit better. While it doesn’t necessarily solve the problem (and whether or not it’s a problem is another debate), the ability to stop brooding is a good one. For instance: after work, I came home and watched an episode of Doctor Who. I then puttered about on the Internet for about an hour (more than I meant to, I’ll admit). Once I’m done writing, I’ll watch some more of the Oplomachia DVD in an attempt to prep for fighter practice. That should leave me enough time to eat and make it to practice at a reasonable hour.

Part of my problem is that I tend to have trouble breaking projects down into manageable bits. I see the enormous pile (literal as well as physical) of things to do and just have no idea where to start. This has been the case in school as well as day-to-day life. Part of me always feels I should be able to DO ALL THE THINGS, paying no heed to causality or the limiting nature of time. After all, I want to do a bunch of stuff: why shouldn’t I be able to?

This is not the most rational train of thought, I will admit, but it’s what goes through my subconscious most of the time. As such, I’m usually thinking about what else I could be doing while I do something else. Add the fact that I hate making decisions (when a choice is made, all other options are closed off), and you’ve got quite the complex. Well, I have quite the complex, but you know what I mean.

But if I make myself do things I have to do at the expense of too many things I want to do, it just breeds resentment and encourages unproductivity in the long run. That’s why today was interesting: I made a point to do something I wanted (Doctor Who, webblagging the intartubez) before moving on to things I needed to do (writing, prepping for practice). I’ve been cautious about using this approach in the past, since I seem to lack the self-discipline to make decisions and timelines stick, but this time it seemed to work. Sure, I spent a bit more time surfing than I needed to, but I’m not going to split hairs: progress is progress.

So maybe if I can do a little bit of what I want each day I can feel like I’m making progress. It’s not like I have any deadlines (aside from the Big One) for most of it. And besides, isn’t the point of life to enjoy it? Who says everything I do needs to be productive? I do, apparently, but that part of me is dumb and wrong.