How you start the day matters.
And if you choose to undertake a 30-day challenge your choices are even more important. How to keep up with your daily obligations yet still participate in this new endeavour? Time management becomes critical.
I learned just how critical, when I recently participated the 30 Day Media Music Challenge. Each day in August, I created a short piece of music, ideally :15 to :30 seconds, , using a music prompt as the seed idea. It sounded like fun, and it was, but I learned some serious life lessons.
For that one month, my composing time took centre stage. Other commitments had to be moved, adapted or abandoned. That’s kind of fun, like how routines are overset by taking a holiday. But it also meant other people in the house had to adjust. My husband willingly accommodated to an afternoon schedule for our project of laying down laminate flooring. Even Kaila the cat had to wait for her daily walk outside on her leash.
Small beer, you might say, but having successfully carved out some daily creative time for myself, I’m now not so willing to go back to the way things were. I liked beginning my day puzzling out chord changes and instrument voicings. I’d rather do that than laundry or flooring. But I’d also had to give up time to work on my clay sculptures, and my art journals, and my coloured pencil drawings, and that got to be annoying. I missed dabbing paint and squishing clay. And usually, by now I’d have started knitting socks and making tomtens for Christmas.
So as much as I’ve enjoyed the music, the routine I’ve followed for the past 30 days is not sustainable. I’ve gained some dexterity with my musical tools, plumped up my music library and had a lot of fun. But the summer’s over, the challenge is complete and it’s time for a change.
I have been reminded, though, that I’m happier when I spend some time each morning doing the creative things that feed my soul. Going forward, the dishes, the flooring, and even the cat will just have to wait.
debra rowe studio 