Sundays are Good for Studying
At thirty years old, I still find myself energized by the beginning of the school year. I sometimes wonder if I am the only person my age who feels that something in the atmosphere actually changes. What I mostly feel is a *need* to study and write and think and read. Theoretically, I love to study. That is to say, I love learning new things. I love delving into a topic and exploring it. I love to pause in the middle of a blissful study session and think about how happy I am to be surrounded by books and taking notes and using my brain. I love sipping tea in my office and jumping back and forth from one book to the other and then looking up the definition of a word and taking down a few notes about my thoughts on this person or that idea.
When I was out of school I thought it would be fun to just write research papers. Give myself a topic, study it and write about it. My trouble, it appears, is in the actually getting started. Seriously, it is a real problem. I have lots and lots and lots (did I mention lots?) of plans that never get started. These unfinished ideas usually turn into criticism in my head. I’m sure it must be pretty obvious by now that The Critic tends to run the show around this village most of the time. The hard part is that all the derision makes it even more difficult to get started. Needless to say, the voluntary research papers, my writing projects, my blog, studying for the GRE — it all tends to get waylayed by procrastination and its accompanying self-defeating litany of doubt and despair.
Once upon a time, I think these tactics probably worked. The Critic was born out of an empty space that needed filling. He played an important role in getting me motivated. Unfortunately what happened was that he started only truly being effective when it came to making other people happy — teachers, employers, friends, even family. This didn’t do a lot to make *us* happy, but it didn’t really matter if we were happy as long as other people liked us. Which, in this poorly laid plan, meant that we were pretty much stuck on the hamster wheel of approval and subject to the whims of everyone else. I think we are finally tired of running — and also of getting nowhere. But to change my life at this point, puts The Critic out of a job. And if nearly nine months of my husband’s unemployment has taught me nothing, it is that things start feeling pretty damn desperate when your job is on the line.
It’s easy for me to look around and feel that I’ve made very little progress. It’s easy to see all the areas that fall short. And it’s easy to blame myself for every single thing that is “wrong.” Then I notice that portly insurance salesman perched on my shoulder in his tacky tweed suit, whispering little cruelties in my ear, chewing on a big fat cigar and I think maybe it’s time to work without a safety net. I don’t really need insurance against failure, because, guess what — I am going to fail. Sometimes. That’s called being human. But I’m also going to do okay and sometimes, even great. And I don’t want to need fear to motivate me. And more than that, I want my own approval to be what matters.
This morning I was thinking about the GRE again and how I haven’t really manged to get the necessary studying underway. Some days it is easier to think without arousing the suspicions of The Critic. Sunday mornings seem to have just the right amount of casual to pull that off. I could tell, though, that he was listening in on the conversation, ready to intervene at a moment’s notice. And then, before he could butt in, it suddenly occured to me that feeling overwhelmed is a pretty natural response when all you’ve got is a big thick book, a few crappy practice test scores and absolutely no plan whatsoever. I thought, perhaps I shouldn’t feel so bad about not knowing where or how to get started when my idea of studying has been to just tell myself, “Okay, you have an hour, now go study,” without any direction or a sense of what my objective is beyond “Do well.” And then, just as quickly, the words Lesson Plan came to mind and I knew what I needed to do.
Today is the perfect day for studying…