Planted Plans

In the past few months, I have had so many different plans and thoughts surrounding this life change. I've envisioned different scenarios: some feel so natural and attainable, others overwhelm me with the amount of work and change they will require. I am taking two college courses this semester that I picked specifically with my life change in mind: Permaculture Design and Plant Propagation. I have a fair handle on the science for both courses, but the subject matter in these courses are both new areas of knowledge. I'm still getting my study rhythms in place with life as it is now, and having taken this past year to slow down, I find life ramping back up again.

This weekend I had planned to bake three different recipes, sort and compile my seed lists, clean my seed sorting table, and finish up any school assignments I had not finished in the week. Oh, and my weekly logging and reviewing of my budget and cash spending from the past pay period. What did I accomplish? One loaf of bread, half the schoolwork, and a giant headache. Momentum will ebb and flow, but this weekend bled me dry. I also found my two beehives dead, lost my lemon tree seedlings, and just had an overall feeling of no forward motion at all.

As I write this, I think- were my aspirations more than my abilities? Surely not, but at times it can feel that way. One small victory- I maintained the first pay period of my rather stringent cash budget with $22.00 "extra" to go into the farm fund. I was so preoccupied with other missed goals I'm only just doing a little dance in my head for that as I type this post.

I am an elaborate planner. I have at least three half filled notebooks all at different stages of development of life plans, dreams, designs, and just general thoughts as to what I hope all this will amount to. I have a hard time with baby steps. I look for leaps and am disappointed in myself when I only maintain ground. But that kind of expectation of oneself is not only impractical, its a sure fire dream killer. The cliche of learning from failure seems so hollow to me- even though I have indeed grown from my biggest missteps in life.

So, incremental progress. Holding ground is still growth. Not giving up is continuing on towards the dream. Lowering expectations for myself is essential to reaching benchmarks. Setting realistic goals.
In that vein, my goals for the next two months:
1. Pass both classes with at least a B.
2. Sort and categorize all my seeds for planting.
3. Stop setting so many goals
One loaf is better than none. And slowing down might just make for a stronger start than rushing towards big dreams. Next post, we will talk about seed list 2017!

To small steps of progress....