TASHY DOES
October 28th 2018
Two weeks on and I think I'm getting the hang of this slowing down lark. Except I'm not sure I actually needed to slow down, I think I needed to do less and stop trying to worry about others. For the first time since about 1996 I am not even thinking about working with anyone else. All that matters now is what I want to do and, as a consequence, when I want to do it.
There is feeling of freedom, something I haven;t really experienced since the year 1990. It's weird in a way but now my plans for the future, be it tomorrow or 2023 only revolve around me.
I'm not sure whether everyone, when a child, was told to always think of other (or never split an infinitive) but I was, both. I'm sure it is a good way to live but the balance is to always think of you and not neglect, or worse still, harm others. That's the trick and I think it has taken nearly 70 years to work out how to do it.
The biggest feeling it gives is contentment, or that's what it does to me. The only deadlines are the ones I set. The only plans are the ones I make and the only person who will achieve them is me, alone. Don't misunderstand all this; the plans will still be big, the targets just this side of obtainable and the amount of work I do will actually not be any less nor probably any slower.
It wasn't that I needed to slow down, it was more I needed to sound proof my little bubble and get on with things. If only I'd realised I'd experienced the answer some 12 years ago
October 21st 2018
The way I was brought up meant that it was viewed as wrong to praise yourself or even say you did something well. My mother, with her great love of proverbs, would frequently come out with phrases like “somebody's trumpeter is dead”, meaning you should wait for someone else to “trumpet” you efforts. I think this attitude also worked internally and I always felt bad to even think I had done something really well.
However there have been several times in my life when I have felt good about something I had achieved. Getting the Maths prize at my primary school, buying my first car, entering my first rally, winning my first rally all came into that category. Holding my first child was an incredible feeling (the other five were just as incredible but weren't the first). Receiving my copy of the first book I ever wrote or seeing some of my poems in print gave me mixed feelings as I wondered whether my words, in whatever, format, were really good enough for people to read.
Perhaps one of the most amazing feelings was when I stood in a recording studio in Poland back in 2003 and heard an orchestra playing the song I had written. It still makes a shiver run down my spine as do the making of the 3 TV programmes..
The last week I have been adding a few refinements to the website I now run and suddenly I realised what an amazing achievement it was. Not only the fact that I had done all the coding, not only the fact that I had thought up the original idea, not only the fact that I had researched and written every word but mainly the fact that I had persevered when things got tough and now had this incredible learning resource. All the time I had been worried whether anyone would use it and not really thought about how the actual achievement was my legacy. I know people do use it, regularly, but that really doesn't matter. In terms of things I have done in my life I think it stands at the very top and, whether you like it or not mother, it's bloody fantastic.
October 14th 2018
My beautiful eldest granddaughter, and to a lesser extent her equally beautiful mother, are, shall we say, a bit on the clumsy side. Part of this is due to poor hand-eye co-ordination, although my daughter seems to have improved in this area but you only have to see the look of surprise on my granddaughter's face when she catches a ball to know she never expected to be able to find it was in her hand.
However another reason for their clumsiness is, I fear, genetic. They try to do things too fast and this is something I have been guilty of all my life. I may not share their clumsiness but even now, as I approach seventy, I still think the old hand-eye thing is pretty good and what's more the eyes still function without any artificial aids.
When I say “do things too fast” I don't mean doing the actual task but trying to get it done, if you follow. I have, in the last few years, taught myself, indeed made myself, slow down but the underlying need to get something done and go on to the next thing is still there. I suppose, as with so many things, I am doing it backwards. The time to speed up is when you get older because, by then, you most certainly have less time left.
For example, take my love of taking photographs. If I concentrate I can force myself to take my time, even stand in one place for half an hour or so just to get the picture I want. More likely though I will rush the photo so that I can move on to the next one.
This then is my new task, or one of them. Slow down, take my time, don't worry about deadlines. I think it was Douglas Adams who said “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by”. Here's to some nice whooshing sounds over the next few months or so.
October 7th 2018
A rather reflective week this week and some big decisions made. However, before explaining that, I want to refer back to last week's post as I had two emails, from widely different places, about that. It didn't refer to any particular incident, merely an example of how things might be. It was to show how I believe, despite all that has happened in my life, I still believe in the gut reaction, the first impression, my intuition, what my heart or soul or spirit, whatever you want to call it, says. Too often though, I have been loathe to correct that first thought and have tried to explain my second and subsequent feelings by excusing some behaviour I didn't imagine the first time, some behaviour I didn't like. That is no longer so.
This does neatly move into this week's post It is quite hard to be confident, I find, when people around you are so negative and so dismissive of you and your ideas. That can be made worse if, deep down inside, you have always sought support. Last week I got an email from a kid in Australia who had been following, and learning from, Owlbut's World of Learning website. He explained how he was using it to find out more, how great he found it and how clever I was to come up with such a good idea and then even “more cleverer” (the website isn't there to teach grammar) to write it in so such a fun way.
And this is when I began to reflect. The material was intended for people like him, and intended to do exactly what he claimed it was doing. Why was I listening to somewhat bitter old fogeys who wouldn't want to think someone might be achieving something?
At the time I was also talking to someone about possibly working together. They too had been through a confidence issue and were now becoming more confident, more about themselves and what they could do, not what others wanted them to do for them. It's unlikely two people at such a stage would gel well together however much you might admire one another.
I then looked back on what I considered my best achievements and realised I had actually done them all on my own. The song I wrote for a project I was running, no help there. The learning projects I wrote for kids and had such great feedback on, no help there. All the books and training courses I had written in the years I have been involved in education, no help there. The format and writing of Owlbut's website (not the actual layout), no help there. Even my favourite sports of tennis, skiing and motor racing are basically individual sports. Why was I spending time looking for someone to work with on my new venture? I could do it alone.
Of course it won't be easy. There will be no one to ask opinions of on a daily basis. I still have one person who I will always ask but they are not close at hand 24/7. But this is where I am now heading and, I have to admit, I feel so much freer, so much clearer and so much more relaxed. To quote my young friend from Australia, everything is so much betterer.
October 21st 2018
The way I was brought up meant that it was viewed as wrong to praise yourself or even say you did something well. My mother, with her great love of proverbs, would frequently come out with phrases like “somebody's trumpeter is dead”, meaning you should wait for someone else to “trumpet” you efforts. I think this attitude also worked internally and I always felt bad to even think I had done something really well.
However there have been several times in my life when I have felt good about something I had achieved. Getting the Maths prize at my primary school, buying my first car, entering my first rally, winning my first rally all came into that category. Holding my first child was an incredible feeling (the other five were just as incredible but weren't the first). Receiving my copy of the first book I ever wrote or seeing some of my poems in print gave me mixed feelings as I wondered whether my words, in whatever, format, were really good enough for people to read.
Perhaps one of the most amazing feelings was when I stood in a recording studio in Poland back in 2003 and heard an orchestra playing the song I had written. It still makes a shiver run down my spine as do the making of the 3 TV programmes..
The last week I have been adding a few refinements to the website I now run and suddenly I realised what an amazing achievement it was. Not only the fact that I had done all the coding, not only the fact that I had thought up the original idea, not only the fact that I had researched and written every word but mainly the fact that I had persevered when things got tough and now had this incredible learning resource. All the time I had been worried whether anyone would use it and not really thought about how the actual achievement was my legacy. I know people do use it, regularly, but that really doesn't matter. In terms of things I have done in my life I think it stands at the very top and, whether you like it or not mother, it's bloody fantastic.
October 14th 2018
My beautiful eldest granddaughter, and to a lesser extent her equally beautiful mother, are, shall we say, a bit on the clumsy side. Part of this is due to poor hand-eye co-ordination, although my daughter seems to have improved in this area but you only have to see the look of surprise on my granddaughter's face when she catches a ball to know she never expected to be able to find it was in her hand.
However another reason for their clumsiness is, I fear, genetic. They try to do things too fast and this is something I have been guilty of all my life. I may not share their clumsiness but even now, as I approach seventy, I still think the old hand-eye thing is pretty good and what's more the eyes still function without any artificial aids.
When I say “do things too fast” I don't mean doing the actual task but trying to get it done, if you follow. I have, in the last few years, taught myself, indeed made myself, slow down but the underlying need to get something done and go on to the next thing is still there. I suppose, as with so many things, I am doing it backwards. The time to speed up is when you get older because, by then, you most certainly have less time left.
For example, take my love of taking photographs. If I concentrate I can force myself to take my time, even stand in one place for half an hour or so just to get the picture I want. More likely though I will rush the photo so that I can move on to the next one.
This then is my new task, or one of them. Slow down, take my time, don't worry about deadlines. I think it was Douglas Adams who said “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by”. Here's to some nice whooshing sounds over the next few months or so.
October 7th 2018
A rather reflective week this week and some big decisions made. However, before explaining that, I want to refer back to last week's post as I had two emails, from widely different places, about that. It didn't refer to any particular incident, merely an example of how things might be. It was to show how I believe, despite all that has happened in my life, I still believe in the gut reaction, the first impression, my intuition, what my heart or soul or spirit, whatever you want to call it, says. Too often though, I have been loathe to correct that first thought and have tried to explain my second and subsequent feelings by excusing some behaviour I didn't imagine the first time, some behaviour I didn't like. That is no longer so.
This does neatly move into this week's post It is quite hard to be confident, I find, when people around you are so negative and so dismissive of you and your ideas. That can be made worse if, deep down inside, you have always sought support. Last week I got an email from a kid in Australia who had been following, and learning from, Owlbut's World of Learning website. He explained how he was using it to find out more, how great he found it and how clever I was to come up with such a good idea and then even “more cleverer” (the website isn't there to teach grammar) to write it in so such a fun way.
And this is when I began to reflect. The material was intended for people like him, and intended to do exactly what he claimed it was doing. Why was I listening to somewhat bitter old fogeys who wouldn't want to think someone might be achieving something?
At the time I was also talking to someone about possibly working together. They too had been through a confidence issue and were now becoming more confident, more about themselves and what they could do, not what others wanted them to do for them. It's unlikely two people at such a stage would gel well together however much you might admire one another.
I then looked back on what I considered my best achievements and realised I had actually done them all on my own. The song I wrote for a project I was running, no help there. The learning projects I wrote for kids and had such great feedback on, no help there. All the books and training courses I had written in the years I have been involved in education, no help there. The format and writing of Owlbut's website (not the actual layout), no help there. Even my favourite sports of tennis, skiing and motor racing are basically individual sports. Why was I spending time looking for someone to work with on my new venture? I could do it alone.
Of course it won't be easy. There will be no one to ask opinions of on a daily basis. I still have one person who I will always ask but they are not close at hand 24/7. But this is where I am now heading and, I have to admit, I feel so much freer, so much clearer and so much more relaxed. To quote my young friend from Australia, everything is so much betterer.
