Category — Uncategorized

If you achieve your monthly fitness challenge, Apple Fitness delivers a slightly harder challenge the following month. Achieve enough months in a row, and your challenge becomes something like, “Burn 60,000 calories per day for 14 days, and we’ll give you a digital badge.” When it gets to that point, I skip the month, and the challenges deflate back to something like, “Try to walk three times this month.”

I was close to skipping last month’s challenge when ChickieNob commented that it would only take three days of long afternoon walks to finish what I had halfheartedly started. To make my indoor walk more enjoyable, I switched from first-person walking videos (which are great but always make me mindful of how much time has passed) to rewatching The Crown from season 1, episode 1.

I love it so much. I got lost in the episode, and it made me notice so many things that I missed watching it the first time, as well as how much Elizabeth changes with age and experience.

I received my digital badge, so my next challenge was even more ridiculous. But I will stick with The Crown and see the whole series again from beginning to end.

I saw a super interesting idea online. The person is publishing their book one chapter at a time to make it the best book possible by allowing everyone to play editor. It’s non-fiction, which probably works better than fiction. (I cannot imagine incorporating everyone’s opinion on a story.)

The site explains:

As a reader, you can comment on a passage from the text, or respond to another comment. The author will accept or dismiss these comments. Once the author implements comments, a new draft will be created and the current one archived. Helpful commenters will be thanked in print at the author’s discretion.

So, like Wikipedia, collecting knowledge from multiple places/people, but with the goal to arrive at the best finished product.

I have nothing to add on this subject, but I think it’s such a cool idea that I will keep checking back to see future books unfold.

While my mending is not always as neat as newness, my dislike of change is so enormous that I would rather have some uneven stitches on my shirt than buy a new one. A case in point: I recently repaired the iPad cover with superglue so I wouldn’t have to switch the colour to a new one. (I also wanted to avoid going to the mall or ordering one online. So maybe it’s more than just change.)

I saw this on someone’s site, and I apologize because I don’t remember where. I’m passing it along in case you are equally passionate about fixing your own things. It’s a fantastic guide on how to fix things and when to ask for help from someone else.

Let’s pretend you’re reading a book and you’re enjoying it. So you go on social media to look up the author’s page, and she is rabidly against treating infertility. She thinks women who use fertility treatments are destroying the world, doesn’t believe children born from fertility treatments should exist, and actively works to support policies that remove another person’s ability to access IVF.

There is nothing about family building in her book, and she has two children, so she understands why a person would want to build a family.

The question: Would you continue reading the book?

I ran up against a situation like this recently and sat with the decision for a long time. I liked the writer’s first book. I was enjoying the writer’s second book. But when I returned to the page, all I could think about was the writer’s words. I couldn’t get lost in the story because everything felt flat, framed by the writer’s comments outside the story. That had nothing to do with the story.

I returned that book and started someone else’s book because it was a low-stakes decision. I could always return to the first book in the future, but this wasn’t the time to read it.

Social media gives us access to everyone’s thoughts and feelings. Sometimes that’s a great thing. Sometimes it’s not.

One of my favourite things is opening my feed reader and seeing a post from an old blogger who last updated their space months or years ago. They suddenly need to write, so they sit down and write. And due to the magic of the feed reader, we all know the post is up.

Nathan Bransford wrote recently about stepping back from writing , and the message reminded me of blogging.

It’s a psychologically risky business. And when you pause to pursue something else, the questions mount.

What was all the sacrifice for if I’m just going to give it up? If this is what I long believed I was meant to be doing, why am I not doing it? Am I really going to stop this far short of my ultimate dreams?

Let me try to assuage those questions. This happens. Do what you need to do. Writing will be there when you need it.

I love that message: “Writing will be there when you need it.” No one needs to rush and write. Writing will still be there for you whether you pursue it daily, once a week, once a month, or allow several years to pass between posts or stories.

He gives solid advice on how to step back and trust you will one day step forward again.