SimStoCreMo 2012: Pep Talk Two
Hello everyone! I'm not participating in SimStoCreMo this year, because I'm still slogging my way through the rebuild of doom (so close to being done with setting the new hood up, sooooooo close) and am not in any position to start on the next set of chapters, but when I was asked to give a pep talk to gee you all on, I readily agreed. So sit back and relax, as I hopefully, manage to help you with some tips that have helped me out in the past.
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“It is no good, I will never get this done!” exclaimed Bethany Howard as she threw her pen down on her desk in disgust.
Ezra looked up from the bed were he was sprawled, reading. It may have been considered odd, or even indecent for the two of them to spend so much of their spare time in their room, but that was where Bethany’s little writing desk was, and where Bethany was to be found, you could be sure that Ezra would not be far away. “What is the matter my love?”
“It is this damn,” she paused, “I do beg your pardon, this blasted, I mean, bothersome story I promised Aunt Carmen I would write for the parish magazine. I have far too much I want to say, and not enough space or, indeed, time in which to do so!” Her voice rose in panic as she spoke, and Ezra rolled off the bed went to her. She leaned against him as he stood at her side and put her arm around her. His heart ached for her. He knew how much it had taken for her to agree to write something that would be published (and under her real name, not a nom de plume) in the first place. Bethy had confided in him that she had been writing for years, but that he was the first person she had trusted enough to show her jottings to. It had come as a surprise then, when, during one of her afternoon visits with her mother and aunt, the subject of Mrs Legacy agreeing to edit the parish magazine had arisen, and how she was unsure of what, exactly, she should put in it, that Mrs Smith had suggested a short story might go down well, and perhaps Bethany could pen it. Bethany had told him later that her aunt had looked at her with such expectation and relief that, even though she knew she would not take offence, she felt she couldn’t say no.
At first she had quite enjoyed the experience. Plotting out the little story she would tell, and creating the characters and their back stories, but Ezra had noticed the night before that her writing had been more frantic than usual, and now, this.
Feeling that she had relaxed, he removed his arm from round her shoulder, and turned so that he was facing her, his left hip resting against her desk. He held out his hands for her to take. When she refused to take them, he fixed her with a stern glare. “Come on, Bethy, you need a break away from your desk.”
“But, I should be getting on with this,” she gestured uselessly at the sheaf of paper on her desk.
“Bethy, you are panicking. You won’t be productive in this state. Come walk with me. Let us spend some time together, and then you can get back to this, and work towards finishing it. Because I know you will finish it and it will be the best piece of prose to appear in the parish magazine since it was first published.”
She gave him a wry look before acquiescing, taking his hands and letting him help her up. She gave one last panicked glance at the wodge of paper on her desk as they left the room.
-----
Poor Bethany, she’s found himself feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed by what she set out to do, and how much she still has left to accomplish towards her goal. It’s something a lot of us are very familiar with; the feeling that you’re being too ambitious with what you’re trying to achieve, that you have no idea how you’re going to get this thing done, and that in turn leads to blind panic. It can be crippling, meaning that the sufferer can’t string together a coherent sentence, or remember where a basic pose is. I know. I suffer from it quite frequently. But it doesn’t have to be crippling, you can get past it, and I thought I’d share some tips on how to do that.
First things first, Ezra is right. Take a break from what you are doing. The longer you stare at something when you’re feeling overwhelmed, the more overwhelmed you will get, so take a break. Get up and make a cup of tea (or other beverage of your choice). Turn on the TV. Watch a video on Youtube. Go for a walk. Do something, anything to take your mind off what you are doing for a little while. And try not to feel guilty about it when you do. Breaks are good, and everyone needs to take them.
If you can, talk about what you’re doing, and why you are feeling so overwhelmed with someone. I often find that talking to someone, will help me to calm down and realise that I can do what I’ve set out to do after all, so drag your SO into the room, or hop onto AIM or make a post on LJ, or even just talk to yourself out loud, or to the cat. Getting your worries off of your chest can be a great help, and as a bonus, hearing someone else’s input, or even just having someone show faith in you, can make you realise that you’re not trying to achieve the impossible after all. It can be a great boost to your confidence, and when you’re feeling more confident, you can find that ideas come more easily to you, and that things don’t seem as daunting as before.
When you get back to your chapter, rather than focussing on what you need to do to finish what you’re working on, look back at what you’ve already done. If you’ve got 100 slides still to film, looking back and seeing that you’ve already shot 90, can be a great motivator; it can help you see that you can do this. Even if you’ve only shot or written a few, it can still help you by showing that you have started. And don’t forget about your previous chapters. I often find that I’ll look back at mine and think “how did I manage to do that?” and just knowing that I found a way in the past, will give me the strength and confidence to know I can do so again in the future.
Break what you’ve got left to do down into manageable chunks. If you’ve got 5 scenes left to film, over 100 slides, don’t think “argh, I’ve got 100 slides left to film, and I need to do this, and I need to set this up, and oh god, I forgot about this, and then I need to edit the pictures!” think “ok, I have five scenes left to film. Let’s take a look at the first scene and see what I need to do for that.” Then concentrate on that one scene, forget about the rest until it’s time to move onto the next one. Do the same for that one, and the next until you’re done with them.
To do lists can be a great help when doing this. Once you’ve written down exactly what you need to do, you may be surprised to see it’s not as much as you first thought, and seeing each item being crossed out, can show you exactly how much progress you are making, and help keep everything in perspective.
Reward yourself. I think that this should go for whatever you’re doing, but give yourself a goal of getting so much done on your to do list for a scene, and then take a short break and reward yourself, by reading a chapter of a book, or watching an episode of a TV show, anything that you like. Hopefully by stepping away from what you are doing every so often, will stop you from feeling overwhelmed before you start again.
The final thing is that if nothing I’ve said above helps, if you still find yourself feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed, maybe to the point where you can’t work on what you’re doing because you freeze up as soon as you think about it, then readjust your goals. This is meant to be fun, I'm not just talking about SimStoCreMo here, but everything connected to writing and sharing a sims story. If you’re not having fun because you’re panicking about it too much, then change it slightly. No one is going to hunt you down if you make things easier on yourself, and it’s not an admission of defeat or anything to be ashamed of. Besides, if you do decide to go about things in a different way, it’s entirely possible that you’ll end up with a better end product, or that you’ll find with the pressure off of you, you think, “hang on, I can do what I wanted to do originally after all,” and find that it wasn't a difficult or as daunting as you first thought.
So there you go. That’s a few tips that I find help me when I feel overwhelmed, and I hope that they help you too. If you have any tips yourself, I’d love to hear them if you want to put them in the comments. The important thing to remember, is that you are not alone in this. We’re all here for you cheering you on, and above all, have fun with it.
-----
“It is no good, I will never get this done!” exclaimed Bethany Howard as she threw her pen down on her desk in disgust.
Ezra looked up from the bed were he was sprawled, reading. It may have been considered odd, or even indecent for the two of them to spend so much of their spare time in their room, but that was where Bethany’s little writing desk was, and where Bethany was to be found, you could be sure that Ezra would not be far away. “What is the matter my love?”
“It is this damn,” she paused, “I do beg your pardon, this blasted, I mean, bothersome story I promised Aunt Carmen I would write for the parish magazine. I have far too much I want to say, and not enough space or, indeed, time in which to do so!” Her voice rose in panic as she spoke, and Ezra rolled off the bed went to her. She leaned against him as he stood at her side and put her arm around her. His heart ached for her. He knew how much it had taken for her to agree to write something that would be published (and under her real name, not a nom de plume) in the first place. Bethy had confided in him that she had been writing for years, but that he was the first person she had trusted enough to show her jottings to. It had come as a surprise then, when, during one of her afternoon visits with her mother and aunt, the subject of Mrs Legacy agreeing to edit the parish magazine had arisen, and how she was unsure of what, exactly, she should put in it, that Mrs Smith had suggested a short story might go down well, and perhaps Bethany could pen it. Bethany had told him later that her aunt had looked at her with such expectation and relief that, even though she knew she would not take offence, she felt she couldn’t say no.
At first she had quite enjoyed the experience. Plotting out the little story she would tell, and creating the characters and their back stories, but Ezra had noticed the night before that her writing had been more frantic than usual, and now, this.
Feeling that she had relaxed, he removed his arm from round her shoulder, and turned so that he was facing her, his left hip resting against her desk. He held out his hands for her to take. When she refused to take them, he fixed her with a stern glare. “Come on, Bethy, you need a break away from your desk.”
“But, I should be getting on with this,” she gestured uselessly at the sheaf of paper on her desk.
“Bethy, you are panicking. You won’t be productive in this state. Come walk with me. Let us spend some time together, and then you can get back to this, and work towards finishing it. Because I know you will finish it and it will be the best piece of prose to appear in the parish magazine since it was first published.”
She gave him a wry look before acquiescing, taking his hands and letting him help her up. She gave one last panicked glance at the wodge of paper on her desk as they left the room.
-----
Poor Bethany, she’s found himself feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed by what she set out to do, and how much she still has left to accomplish towards her goal. It’s something a lot of us are very familiar with; the feeling that you’re being too ambitious with what you’re trying to achieve, that you have no idea how you’re going to get this thing done, and that in turn leads to blind panic. It can be crippling, meaning that the sufferer can’t string together a coherent sentence, or remember where a basic pose is. I know. I suffer from it quite frequently. But it doesn’t have to be crippling, you can get past it, and I thought I’d share some tips on how to do that.
First things first, Ezra is right. Take a break from what you are doing. The longer you stare at something when you’re feeling overwhelmed, the more overwhelmed you will get, so take a break. Get up and make a cup of tea (or other beverage of your choice). Turn on the TV. Watch a video on Youtube. Go for a walk. Do something, anything to take your mind off what you are doing for a little while. And try not to feel guilty about it when you do. Breaks are good, and everyone needs to take them.
If you can, talk about what you’re doing, and why you are feeling so overwhelmed with someone. I often find that talking to someone, will help me to calm down and realise that I can do what I’ve set out to do after all, so drag your SO into the room, or hop onto AIM or make a post on LJ, or even just talk to yourself out loud, or to the cat. Getting your worries off of your chest can be a great help, and as a bonus, hearing someone else’s input, or even just having someone show faith in you, can make you realise that you’re not trying to achieve the impossible after all. It can be a great boost to your confidence, and when you’re feeling more confident, you can find that ideas come more easily to you, and that things don’t seem as daunting as before.
When you get back to your chapter, rather than focussing on what you need to do to finish what you’re working on, look back at what you’ve already done. If you’ve got 100 slides still to film, looking back and seeing that you’ve already shot 90, can be a great motivator; it can help you see that you can do this. Even if you’ve only shot or written a few, it can still help you by showing that you have started. And don’t forget about your previous chapters. I often find that I’ll look back at mine and think “how did I manage to do that?” and just knowing that I found a way in the past, will give me the strength and confidence to know I can do so again in the future.
Break what you’ve got left to do down into manageable chunks. If you’ve got 5 scenes left to film, over 100 slides, don’t think “argh, I’ve got 100 slides left to film, and I need to do this, and I need to set this up, and oh god, I forgot about this, and then I need to edit the pictures!” think “ok, I have five scenes left to film. Let’s take a look at the first scene and see what I need to do for that.” Then concentrate on that one scene, forget about the rest until it’s time to move onto the next one. Do the same for that one, and the next until you’re done with them.
To do lists can be a great help when doing this. Once you’ve written down exactly what you need to do, you may be surprised to see it’s not as much as you first thought, and seeing each item being crossed out, can show you exactly how much progress you are making, and help keep everything in perspective.
Reward yourself. I think that this should go for whatever you’re doing, but give yourself a goal of getting so much done on your to do list for a scene, and then take a short break and reward yourself, by reading a chapter of a book, or watching an episode of a TV show, anything that you like. Hopefully by stepping away from what you are doing every so often, will stop you from feeling overwhelmed before you start again.
The final thing is that if nothing I’ve said above helps, if you still find yourself feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed, maybe to the point where you can’t work on what you’re doing because you freeze up as soon as you think about it, then readjust your goals. This is meant to be fun, I'm not just talking about SimStoCreMo here, but everything connected to writing and sharing a sims story. If you’re not having fun because you’re panicking about it too much, then change it slightly. No one is going to hunt you down if you make things easier on yourself, and it’s not an admission of defeat or anything to be ashamed of. Besides, if you do decide to go about things in a different way, it’s entirely possible that you’ll end up with a better end product, or that you’ll find with the pressure off of you, you think, “hang on, I can do what I wanted to do originally after all,” and find that it wasn't a difficult or as daunting as you first thought.
So there you go. That’s a few tips that I find help me when I feel overwhelmed, and I hope that they help you too. If you have any tips yourself, I’d love to hear them if you want to put them in the comments. The important thing to remember, is that you are not alone in this. We’re all here for you cheering you on, and above all, have fun with it.