As mentioned over at Walk in Silence, plans have gone just a bit awry this week due to multiple unexpected PC issues, thus sending the new one to the shop and the old one out of closet storage for temporary work. I’m finally catching up on writing work, though access to my music library isn’t all that doable right now. I’m just going to wait until the new PC returns.
Which got me thinking about what’s been bothering me this year: distractions. I’ve been too easily distracted in various parts of my daily life despite my wanting to avoid them. Staring at my phone during work breaks and elsewhere. Carrying around a small notebook to write some of my thoughts I may have but forgetting to do so. Pulling the usual ‘I’ll do it after I finish looking at this for a few minutes’ which invariably wastes a good half hour. Making life choices but putting them off for one reason or another.
I mean, I’m not trying to be one of those crunch-obsessed people that always has to be working every single waking moment, far from it. I’m totally fine with taking time off for fun things and enjoying life in various ways. I’m just tired of being passive and distracted, is all.
Which lends to the other half of this blog title: detachments.
Things I don’t want to do anymore. Things I don’t want anymore. Things I don’t need to be anymore. Letting go of what no longer works and moving on to something new. And right now I know what new directions I’d like to go in. This is about my writing, but it’s also about the personal as well. Life changes are always exciting and terrifying in equal measure to me, because I love the idea of trying out new things on my own and I’m also afraid of completely fucking it all up if it doesn’t work. But if I’ve learned anything in 2023, it’s that I’ve made my peace with some extremely personal things in my past, enough that I have the strength and the will to leave them behind now. To detach from that part of my life once and for all and look forward.
The one thing that’s kept me from doing so in the past is self-made distractions. It’s getting that dopamine rush of playing with my music collection or watching dumb videos on YouTube or reading the latest dumbass thing on social media. Deciding to make needed changes in my life but never getting around to the follow through. I hate that I’ve always been passive about it and yet I do it anyway because of that small rush, and then I feel frustrated for wasting time afterwards. And if I’m going to succeed in stopping those distractions and excuses, I need to detach.
And I’m now at a point where I’m strong enough to do that. And I’ve already started stepping towards that goal.
It’s time to say goodbye to parts of my old passive life once and for all, and embrace the new.
Even if it is terrifying.
Welcome to Bridgetown 