life without reading
currently in the middle of week four of the artist’s way which forces you to abstain from any and all reading for one week. i’ve been following the decree pretty strictly but it is HARD! today i remembered that i don’t need to read in order to write, so to satisfy my lust for reading, i will write about it instead.
what has life without reading shown me?
- i love reading – always have – but i never realized how MUCH i actually read nowadays since it is mostly on the computer.
- i’ve come to see that i waste at least two hours a day reading what i will call “casual” virtual content (blogs, op-eds, media of personal interest ).
- i have gotten SO much more done having the reading removed. at the beginning of the week i made a quick & dirty list of random things i could do instead of read and i haven’t even gotten to half of them. i plan to keep it visible to remind me of creative things i can do when i feel the need to break away from the computer screen.
- i never considered that too much reading could be a harm, but i see now the affect it has had on me in the past. i realized i will fill my brain up to capacity unconsciously with other people’s ideas to avoid having to synthesize and release my own into the world – it’s so much easier just to agree or disagree than to speak your own truth.
i am working as a freelancer exclusively now for the first time since (ahem) 2002. it is a MAJOR transition from “going” to work to “having work live with you” in your home space. i find it difficult, so i’m trying to figure out ways to behave myself, stay focused, avoid distractions and create structures for my time & energies to help me give shape to all the ideas spinning around my head & heart that want to come into corporeal form.
seems like restricting my casual reading would be a good tool to add into the mix of restructuring my life as a freelancer, especially when i think about what i could do with that time instead…
i love little insights like this.
