But there comes a point where I ask myself, in my personal life, do I need this? How much value does it have to me? How much value does it have to my readers? Am I overloading us both? Am being redundant? Am I just saying whats already said to several mediums just to stay relevant, but not even really being relevant?

I feel like all this technology and access has prevented us from doing more and instead made us monitor more. How much of your day is just catching up on what other people are (uselessly) doing? How much of your information intake is actually propelling you to a better life? How much is just a big time suck but you feel like you just have to keep up with your friends, comment on their status, read that popular blog post or contribute your own for fear of being irrelevant, seeming unhip or worse, out of touch.

- Alex Beauchamp, Girl at Play

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Indeed.

In my own life lately, I’ve had to ask, What are my priorities? What’s truly important? My answers were happiness and health — which break down more specifically to writing, friends & family, and sleep. Note that spending lots of time on the internet is NOT anywhere in there. So all these social media — blogs, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc. — they’re fun, and they can be useful, but are they worth of the bulk of my time? No. But are they getting it? Um… yes.

So, a restructuring is in progress. I’m trying to eliminate the inessential, yes, but more importantly I’m just trying to allocate the right portions of time and energy to each aspect of my life.

Granted, this isn’t the first time I’ve said something like this, and it may not be the last, but progress is a process and self-improvement is a journey. They are not buttons to be pushed or switches to be flicked.

My fear, of course, is what I might lose when I make these changes. Isn’t that why any of us stick with the status quo? But what I have to remember is the greater fear: what I might never gain if I don’t make these changes.

I’ve asked myself all the “what if” questions this past week like: What if I don’t make money? What if I get lazy? What if I end up like so-and-so who has talent but sits around all day afraid of the world? What if I really don’t have talent? But I figure the only what if question that really matters is: What if I don’t try this?

What if?

- Girl at Play, Alex Beauchamp

Girl At Play has more great advice in her post “Living well is more than organic fruit.”

Please go out there and do. Live. Don’t be the same as yesterday. Don’t live vicariously online. Don’t use language that has no meaning or talk ideas you don’t really live. Don’t hide. Don’t copy others or live their ideas or life. Don’t fear doing your thing. Don’t fear doing. Instead of reading a decorating magazine, paint that room. Instead of thinking of baking, do up a cake. Run, walk, bike. Put that self help book down and pick up yourself.

The whole thing is really motivating, but I didn’t want to just straight up copy & paste it here. Instead I’m trying to live it. I’ve reinstated my No Internet Till Noon rule, adding in Daily To Do Lists, and am finding success so far. I am DOING instead of just blogging about wanting to do. Imagine that!

For any writers out there, I also highly recommend “Typing Without a Clue,” an op-ed by Timothy Egan. (Thanks, Mary, for sending it to me!)

Most of the writers I know work every day, in obscurity and close to poverty, trying to say one thing well and true. Day in, day out, they labor to find their voice, to learn their trade, to understand nuance and pace. And then, facing a sea of rejections, they hear about something like Barbara Bush’s dog getting a book deal.

FOR REALZ. Anyway, sometimes it’s just nice to hear from someone on our side. Especially when that someone is funny.

I found more advice, in line with a comment left by Holly Jahangiri on yesterday’s post. This time, artist/writer/musician Summer Pierre serves up motivational, inspirational words of wisdom that pierce me straight through the heart. (Found via Girl at Play.)

Yesterday I sat with a friend who is a gifted writer, but isn’t writing and has been sharing with me for months and months all his PLANS and IDEAS and THOUGHTS about his writing, other people’s writing, and writing in general. I won’t say all the things–the BIG LIFE things–he has gone through in order to save him from his writing. Finally, after spending another lunch listening to his MACHINE OF THOUGHT, I stopped him and said more or less: BUT WHAT ABOUT SITTING DOWN AND ACTUALLY WRITING?

Her friend sounds just like me. Unfortunately.

The truth was I just needed to sit down and DO. What this required was [being] willing to feel like a complete loser, to be boring, to be really BAD…

Doh. I don’t like being bad at things. (Who does?) But I think maybe she’s right, that I’m petrified of being BAD. Especially after reading the impeccable Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri. When I finished that book yesterday, I was crying with sadness (and a little bit of anger) at how it had ended, but also, at the fact that it HAD ended. I wanted more of those characters, more of Lahiri’s quiet, masterful writing. I want to be able to create something that GOOD. Was she ever afraid of being bad in the same way that I am?

Ways in which blocks can manifest themselves: I need to do more research, I need more inspiration, a new place to create, more coffee, chocolate, a new place to live, more time, a new job, etc. Well, maybe you do, but when does that end?

Hmm, let me see if I can identify with this one. New job? Check. New chair? Check. New desk? Check. New laptop? Check. Finished novel? Uh…

I believe life is magical, but sometimes the most magical things are the most ordinary and boring like cold, hard, action. I told my friend yesterday that in order to get to the romantic magical part of it again, he needed to be willing to go through the dry, MEANINGLESS parts too. A commitment is not a single moment, it goes on and on and on. It may seem impossible, I know, but this is the toughest kind of love–to show up when it gets hard and say this means enough to me to try and have that be enough.

Alright then. This means enough to me to try. This is the only thing that means enough to me to try, to risk failure, poverty, embarrassment. I am only 23. I have only been at this, really really, for 5 months. I’m at the beginning of a journey, not the end of the line. I will not get discouraged, I will not be afraid, and most importantly, I will NOT be the one to stop myself from succeeding.

A commitment is not a single moment.