“Get your ducks in a row.”
~Anonymous
I’m not a griper, at least not an out-loud griper. My griping is done in the privacy of my own little head – it’s all internal chatter. And I am so sick of it. I get hooked into playing a Spiral Mind Game that keeps me in a swirling “ain’t it awful” loop. By the end of the day, it has successfully sucked the life out of me.
It gets me off course, I lose my true aim, and I feel like I should just give up. Ugh.
I know, I know. Griping about a situation is a waste of time yet, there I was, doing it. Griping had a tight grip on me. I was complaining, grumbling, grousing, protesting and, my favorite, whining.
“But I promised myself I would write daily. I’ll never get the draft of You’ll Never Find Us finished by December 31, 2015,” I whined in my journal. I thought I had paved the way to easy writing by getting obligations off my calendar and saying no to meeting requests unless they furthered my book and/or my health.
Well, it sounded good at the time. Here’s the reality of it.
It has been a frustrating ride writing this book. Life still gets in the way of writing. When I fell off the proverbial writing wagon the chatter in my head kicked in almost instantly. It sounded like the quacking of a duck telling me: give up, you’ll never write the book, it’ll always end up on the back burner, you’re not good enough.
I needed help to shut the duck up.
I needed something to help me recommit and move me forward.
And then the weirdest thing happened.
As I continued to journal, whining about the plight of my book and questioning my worth, who shows up on the page but an unfamiliar “voice”—one I’d never heard before. It was Big Mama: bold, full-bodied, with a loud mouth and very funny – very funny.
You know what she said? I’ll tell you what she said. She said, “You need to let go of that garbage, girl. Get a grip! Stop listening to that quacker.”
Startled, I asked, “Who are you?”
“I’m your new best self. You already got enough crazy voices in that head of yours. You don’t need another one. And you don’t need permission or anybody’s approval to write your book, and you sure don’t need to kill yourself or work your fingers to the bone proving your worth. You’re a worthy girl, you hear me?”
I told her I felt like I had a new spine.
“You’re my baby now and we’re gonna take baby steps when the crazies start getting to you. Got it? If they show up, just ask yourself, is this making me feel better about myself? If not, shut them up and start writing. I’ll check in with you tomorrow.”
“Wait,” I wrote. “What’s your name?”
It was as if I could hear a big, deep belly laugh when she responded, “Honey, just call me Rita.”
I got a grip and plan to keep my aim true…and write that book. Rita and her sense of humor have saved me.
What saves you?
If you hear yourself complaining about the same thing over and over again, I’ll send Rita your way and have her get in your face, or at least in your head.
Those other voices don’t make you smile. Rita will—if you’ll listen to her.
