Meandering Mind - Eva Dillner [15]
Eight
Discover your theme
Now let's talk about how you can go about discovering your own thread or theme. There are lots of ways to get there. When you read these instructions, you may come up with an even better idea. I think that's wonderful and part of the intent of this book. To get you, the reader, so involved that your creative juices start flowing and you build upon what I share here.
To discover my re-engineering thread I pulled out all my work records, and more. Performance reviews, job descriptions, projects I'd been involved in at work, home and for fun. I pulled out studies, courses, hobby activities, organizations I had belonged to and functions I had filled. I even went back to childhood to look at what activities had been my favorites then.
Perhaps this is the most daunting part. To pull together your experiences into one big pile before you start sorting. The effort will be worth it, so hang in there, practice some perseverance. And remember you don't have to do this in one go. You could designate a place, like a box or table, where you put all the stuff you find related to your thread search. Look at it like a treasure hunt and it becomes easier. For some of you it may make more sense to write it down as you think of it, in a notebook or on pieces of scrap paper. I use the scrap paper method a lot for my writing. I jot down an idea on a piece of paper, put it in a pile and then pull it out when I'm ready to write. That's when I sort through it, digging for inspiration and ideas.
“Now what?” you ask. “I've collected this huge pile of information but I haven't a clue how to make sense of it.” Well, here's how I deal with it. For me, it seems to be trial and error. I sort things one way, then I look at it from a different angle. I let it rest for awhile. I pick it up again, sort it a different way, discard what doesn't fit or seem essential and go at it again. It becomes an iterative process. The resting phases in between seem essential for the honing into wonderful aha's.
The important thing is to start, and to keep at it over time so you complete the process. As a first step, simply read through everything you've collected. Notice how you felt about each accomplishment or activity. Take all the ones you feel really good about and put them in a special pile. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks, this is your life, not your husband's or your Mom's or your friend's. What matters is finding the stuff that makes you glow.
Which activities give you the most satisfaction? This does not have to be work related, or make sense. If your joy is baking cookies, fishing, repairing cars, listening to stories in a bar, sex, telling others what to do, or not having to think, then write that down. Collect all the satisfaction activities and projects into one pile and work on that. If you feel ambitious you can go through your entire pile and note satisfaction threads. For most people that is simply too daunting, so just pull out the major happy stuff.
If you think about it, there are times when life just seems to click, or float. We do without effort, what we're doing feels so natural that we lose track of time. Some people describe it as, “easy as falling off a log.” When people express amazement at, “how do you do that?” pay attention. Often our answer is, “oh that's nothing” because it truly isn't an effort. What you are looking for are those things that you do as easy as falling