The One With a Gentle Kick to the Shins

You know, when you start into a project, everything looks golden and sunny.

You have a plan that you think is downright genius and you press forward with the enthusiasm of a child at Christmas. Each aspect of your project excites you and you almost can’t sleep at night due to you unquenchable brain activity constantly thinking and rethinking how you will accomplish your goals.

But life is messy.

After several weeks, especially if certain events don’t turn out the way you would like them too, your resolve and drive start to fade. Plans fail and have to be rethought. Your revolutionary ideas start to fade to the background and become something you berate yourself about on a constant basis.

That’s the saddest part for me.

Because I’ve been feeling that lately with this project, that it used to be something that riled me up to a passion, but now just makes me feel guilty because it has fallen down further on my list of priorities. And I hate adding this to the list of things that I berate myself for, because I have a tendency to beat myself up on a regular basis for mistakes I make. I would loath to see these elements that I love (mythology, editing, web design) transform to activities that I despise doing.

So I remind myself again, life is messy.

It’s okay if less important stuff distracts me. Part of life is learning what works for us and what doesn’t, and how do we learn if we don’t try different things?

All we need to do is keep pressing forward.

So after exams and a pleasant, relaxing holiday break, I find myself in a new year, a new semester, with 7 fantastic pieces for P&G to edit and polish. I find myself in classes that remind me of how much I love the written word and want to work with it. This project has definitely not gone at all in the direction that I thought it would go. Am I nervous? You bet. But am I also excited beyond all reason to grow along with it? Why yes, I believe I’ve discovered that I still am.


PS- I'm still accepting submissions for the website! Submissions accepted at this point won't be included in my senior project presentation but still would be published on the website at some point. So please keep sending me your work!