Just Do It

Thank goodness for free will. Sometimes, I forget that I have the option to do what I want. Honestly, one constant of my life is wanting to do too many things simultaneously. Having multiple interests and adhd does tend to cause analysis paralysis. However, my main issue is waiting for inspiration or the “right moment” to do something. But inspiration fades. And so does motivation.

Recently, I decided to learn Mandarin Chinese. It’s an idea that has been in the back of my mind for the better part of a decade. I’m a person who takes to foreign languages easily. While in university, I combined Spanish major with one in Latin American Studies, and being an overachiever, I also studied French and Portuguese. Many years have passed since my undergraduate studies, but I still maintain conversational skills in French and Portuguese. With learning Mandarin, I would unlock the ability to speak with about a billion other people and really challenge my mind to something far removed from the Indo-European language family. I crave a challenge, but I also am a creature of procrastination, so naturally, when I decided to learn Mandarin, my mind to me to wait. After all, I’m in Spain right now, and my Spanish can still use some ayuda. Why start now and confuse myself? I let this be for a couple of days before I realized I was doing myself a disservice by not at least starting a lesson. If it proved to be too difficult, then I would take a pause until my contract in Spain ended. The best time to start something is yesterday, and I had already let too many yesterdays fade into the ether.

The more I reflected on my decision, the more I the behavior was a pattern. Wanting to wait until the first of the month to start budgeting. Or wanting to wait until Sunday to begin anew habit. But why wait? I’m alive now, I should strive to make the change now. I know there are psychological reasons behind why this happens, and I’m sure my childhood has something to do with it, but every pattern can be broken and replaced with a better one. Unfortunately, that can take a long time, and patience is not one of my strengths. Yet. Motivation is not always going to be present in the moment, but I can be dedicated to showing up just a little bit for any lifestyle change.

Ni Hao