Day To Re-Group

As writers and editors, I find that most of us are pretty hard on ourselves. We have high expectations and high goals for our own writing and production and success rate.  Notice how I’m writing in the “plural” tense and including myself in this bunch. These expectations are not always realistic. 

For the last few days, I’ve had a fairly intense schedule of meetings with individual writers and speaking at the conference. Yesterday I flew home and reconnected with my wife (always a recommended step if you are married).  Some times there is no alternative with a schedule than to plunge right into the next activity.

If at all possible, I like to take a day and re-group. It always seems like I have a lot of follow-up work after any trip, bills to pay, email to answer and other bits of organization. If I don’t take these steps, then the matters tend to pile up and I have to attack it with several days of effort instead of a few hours of effort. From my experience as a writer and editor, organization counts. It’s important to keep track of new names and addresses as you meet people. It’s important to invoice for reimbursement (if needed) in a short amount of time while the information is still fresh. Otherwise something else is bound to interrupt.

Also since I had very little down time over the weekend (which I understood from the beginning when I was going to teach at a conference) I try and catch a few hours here or there in the next day or so. The process of reading or working out on my treadmill will help renew my spirit and help me to re-group.